Vital statistics have rarely been so eye-catching. Alaska’s Prince William
Sound has 300 miles of savagely spectacular shoreline laced with the highest
coastal mountains on earth, plunging from 2,134 metres (7,000 feet) straight
into 600-metre-deep ocean. It’s drizzled with hundreds of glaciers, 20 of
them snaking to the sea where they spew out millions of tonnes of icebergs
each day.
But if the figures are dazzling, the reality is even better: the
all-you-can-eat National Geographic banquet comes with a generous side
serving of wildlife from orcas to bears and sea lion. It’s like Cumbria on
steroids, with a safari thrown into the mix.
Even better news is that the most effective way to access the Sound – the
northern end of the Gulf of Alaska – is also the most exhilarating:
kayaking. Our week of paddling and camping produced immediate bonding with
American IT experts, a Russian trader and a grouchy Welsh accountant: Big
Brother in the Great Outdoors.
We might have been mixed together in the area ravaged by the Exx- on Valdez
oil spill in 1989, but there was no evidence of the catastrophe as we
floated past roaring waterfalls and deep green mountain slopes. Early
strokes pulled us further into a fjord towards the siren call of calving
ice.
The culprit was the Shoup, a blue-grey toothpaste squeeze of a glacier,
reached by carrying our kayaks through shallow water between two bays. It
was teeth-chatteringly cold. Within seconds, the Welsh accountant, who
unwisely sported open-toed sandals, was wincing with pain. A short while
later he appeared to be crying. “Fall in and you have five minutes before
you’re unconscious,” warned our square-jawed guide, Erik. “Life expectancy
is 15 minutes.”
Shoup was worth the risk. We paddled to within a kilometre of its snarling,
groaning, roaring face, which formed the mesmerising backdrop for that
night’s camp site – the first of many barnstorming locations to pitch tent
and scoff steaks, stews and pastas like a hungry American. The only possible
drawback was scenic fatigue.
It’s a trip where you become highly tuned to the rhythm of nature and its
primeval urge to reproduce, from massive colonies of breeding kittiwakes and
clumps of punchy sea lion to millions of salmon, radars locked on their
birthplace for spawning. In Sawmill Cove on day three, the whole river
boiled with pinks and the bank was littered with their carcasses nibbled by
predators. It made fishing in Scotland seem ludicrously bad value – and
produced some of the freshest sushi I’ve ever tasted.
But that was just one suit in a whole deck of wildlife from eagles, puffins
and cormorants to otters and inquisitive seals. On day six, as we slalomed
through chunks of ice from distant Columbia Glacier – a giant white serpent
five times longer than Shoup – an orca arced past our slow-moving kayaks: a
dramatic Alaskan freeze frame to remember for the rest of my urban life.
Perhaps high on nature, we celebrated the killer whale’s graceful cameo with a
short, sharp shock of cryo-genics. Small bergs were harnessed as diving
boards for a wild leap into chest-deep, seriously cool briny – a thrilling,
chilling, frankly lunatic finale to a showstopper of a week.
Need to know
Ian Belcher kayaked with Pangaea
Adventures (001 907 835 8442). A six-day Shoup-to-Glacier Island
kayaking trip costs £667 (includes guides, food and equipment).
Kayaking can be part of an itinerary with Travelbag
(0870 814 6545) which offers flights, car hire and eight nights in
Anchorage, Valdez and Homer from £1,249.
More information: Alaska Travel
Industry Association
Alaskan adventures
Salmon
Go Fishing Worldwide
(020-8742 1556) offers wonderful fishing in the Tikchik Narrows where 75 per
cent of the king, silver, coho and chum salmon are caught. The 11-day trip
includes two nights in Anchorage and seven nights at a remote lodge reached
by float plane. Daily flights with a pilot/guide locate the premier spots.
The cost is £5,160 including all flights, full-board accommodation, daily
flyouts and guiding.
Bears
Frontier Travel (020-8776 8709)
offers 12-night trips including a visit to Anchorage, a stay at the
luxurious Alyeska Prince Resort for hiking in the epic peaks around
Girdwood, the quirky coastal town of Homer, Hallo Bay’s coastal brown bears,
three nights exploring the fjords near Seward and a night on Fox Island.
From £2,998 including flights, taxes, accommodation and car hire.
Mountains
Audley Travel (01993 838700) offers
12 nights’ self-drive holidays including a visit to Denali National Park to
view grizzlies near Mt McKinley, the second city of Fairbanks and the
WrangellSt Elias National Park, home to nine of America’s highest peaks,
plus a flight into a mining ghost town, ending with a glacier cruise. From
£2,700 including flights and taxes, accommodation, some meals, all trips.
