Anchorage in the Fall

A boat tour of Kenai Fjords is an awesome day trip from Anchorage. I signed up with Kenai Fjords Tours. For about $250 I went on the 6 hour "National Park Cruise." It included land transportation between Seward and Anchorage (2 hours each way) and lunch aboard the boat. Don’t get your hopes up, the "healthy chicken ceasar wrap" left a lot to be desired. But you’re not there for the food.

The onboard naturalist was good and helped us spot numerous humpback whales, a sea otter wrestling an octopus, and a couple of bald eagles, and several stellar sea lion rookeries. It was late in the season so we didn’t get to see too many birds. But we did get to see a puffin, "We’re so lucky," the naturalist proclaimed. "The last puffin of the season." We saw several other last puffins of the season that day, but apparently not the large numbers we would have seen earlier in the season.

The scenery is spectacular. Rugged islands, snow capped mountains, and moody glaciers. The trip culminated at Aialik Glacier – A truly awesome sight. The engines are cut, the crowd falls into a hush, and you just drift. Listening to the snap crackle and pop of the ice, straining to hear the crack of calving ice, you realize just how beautiful ice can be.

The Alaska Native Heritage Center is dedicated to sharing the culture and history of Alaska’s 11 major cultural groups: Athabascan, Inupiaq, St. Lawrence Island Yupik, Yup’ik, Cup’ik, Aleut, Alutiiq, Eyak, Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian.

The main facility, The Welcome house, is bright and airy with a great view of the lake and wooded area. In the center there is a stage where I got to see an Aleut or Alutiiq (I forget which) dance presentation. I really enjoyed it because while obviously staged for our benefit, it did not feel like a mass produced shallow experience. Maybe it was the personal nature of the stories they shared between dances. Maybe because it had a family feeling - the leader’s son kept walking around the dancers like a little general inspecting the troops. Whatever it was, I enjoyed it immensely.

There is also an auditorium and of course exhibits of crafts by native artists. Outside there are six life-sized native dwellings. I toured this with a docent who was most knowledgeable, was obviously proud of her heritage, and shared a lot of personal anecdotes. Well, except a good place to pick wild berries. There are some things kept private.

Admission is a little steep at $25, but overall a very nice experience, obviously run with care and pride.

With half a day left before my flight back home, there wasn’t time for one last adventure. On a waiter’s recommendation I decided to take a stroll along the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail. There are numerous places in town to rent a bike, but I decided to take a more leisurely approach.

Supposedly the trail is chock full of animals, including moose. Unfortunately I got a bit of a late start and the only animals I saw were small shore birds and those out for a walk with their owners. Still, the walk is quite lovely and seeing all the locals out makes you feel like part of the city instead of a tourist.

The 11 mile (one way) trail is paved, mostly flat and follows the Anchorage Coastline from downtown Anchorage to its present end at Kincaid Park. The trail will take you by marsh, muskeg and spruce forest. The Fish Creek estuary is particularly pretty. For a moment you will forget you are on an urban trail. This is the only creek in the city proper with a real tidal marsh, where fresh and salt water mix and nutrients yield an especially diverse wildlife habitat. Most estuaries in Anchorage have been dammed or blocked.

On the inlet side of the trail you will see the mudflats. Do not walk on them. Mudflats are like quicksand and you will get stuck. The tide also comes in quickly and you could find yourself in a lot of trouble. The mud consists of fine silt particles, the end result of glaciers grinding away on the surrounding mountains. This silt, or glacial flour, is suspended by water droplets in the mud.

All in all, a pleasant walk/ride affording some nice views of the mountains (Even Denali if it’s clear), various coastal terrains, Anchorage, and (supposedly) wildlife.

I dismayed when surveying the Anchorage food landscape. The recommendation from the nice lady at the visitors bureau centered around a free shuttle bus to the restaurant and the world’s biggest chocolate fountain. Sigh. The free guide to local dining fared a little better. Bon Appetit recommended a place, Rachel Ray another... Hmmm. But the Marx Brother’s Café caught my eye. The photography was adequate and the copy properly effusive. But the fact that is was located in a reconverted house made me hopeful. It made me think this was a person’s (not a corporations) restaurant.

The house is small, cozy, and thankfully, the tables are not cramped together. Vibrant artwork adorns the walls and single flowers the tables. There are not that many tables, so a reservation is a good idea.

The staff is nice and friendly and the staff to guest ratio is quite good. The staff’s snappy hustle makes sure you’re never short on water or bread.

This won’t be a cheap meal. Most of who I think were locals, seemed to be celebrating a special occasion. Appetizers run $6 to $14 and salads run about $8. The main courses were in the $30 range.

I settled on the spinach salad for an appetizer. It has a nice horseradish dressing and harvati cheese. Nice, if a little plain. The portion however, made it big enough for sharing. Since I could have stopped there, but I hadn’t had a hot meal all day and I wasn’t about to skip out on my main dish: Kodiak Scallops and chorizo over calamarta black pasta.

The scallops were buttery (in texture), nicely seared, and plentiful. The chorizo added a bit of heat to the dish and helped create a sauce that just that begged to be mopped up with bread. The calamarta pasta was great, turns out the color comes from the use of squid ink (calamar..ta. get it?). Overall it was a very nice, utterly satisfying, and attentive meal.

After a nice long walk on the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail, I came across Snow City Café. My cabbie had recommended it, and the long line outside told me something good was happening inside. I decided to check it out and snagged a seat and the counter (bypassing a wait time of over an hour for a table).

The décor is college student dinner. Distinct dinner booths, tables, and counter balanced with brightly colored walls, funky artwork, and snowflakes and Christmas ornaments hanging from the ceiling to round out the snowy theme. Lightly tattooed and pierced college aged kids hustle to keep the onslaught of dinners happy and fed without loosing the friendly vibe.

The pancakes apparently are not from scratch, so I went for the make your own omelet, which seems to be what everyone around me is having. I opt for mushrooms, sun-dried tomatoes, harvatti cheese, and reindeer sausage. Cmo’n, like I was going to order any other kind of meat while in Alaska! The omelet was big and the reindeer sausage tasty. Of course, being sausage I’m not sure I can say what reindeer truly tastes like. It was bit of a cross between pork and turkey. A good thing in my book.

The real revelation was the hash browns. Wow. Beneath a layer of crispy shredded potatoes the rest were closer to mashed than hashed. Yummy!

Breakfast at Snow City Café is the perfect breakfast to sustain you through a long day of sightseeing. If you get there late though, be prepared to wait or opt for the counter.