ALASKA - CRUISES AND CRUISE TOURS

Have you visited our 49th State? If you haven’t, what in the world are you waiting for? Think about a family vacation to Alaska.

The season ranges from May through most of September, with mid-June through mid-August being the prime time to travel. Though you may experience some overcast skies or even a few raindrops during this time, we have always found an abundance of clear skies and beautiful weather in July and August. A light jacket and a folding umbrella will be more than sufficient to keep you dry and warm, if the weather so dictates.

By not traveling to Alaska, you will have missed an incredible jewel and, you must take your children to Alaska. This is a magnificent state, rich in wildlife and an abundance of natural beauty. The capital of the 49th state is Juneau and the largest city is Anchorage. In the summer there is an additional bonus of having of daylight for most of the 24-hour period. We always suggest that if you go by cruise ship that you treat yourself to a balcony, as the sites are so plentiful day and night.

I must admit that I made my first trip to Alaska under duress. I thought that it would be cold and dreary and I am not someone who enjoys looking at animals on TV. But, Brad really wanted to go, and so we booked the cruise. WOW – I was amazed and fell in love – NO, it was not cold and dreary and seeing bald eagles soaring, whales breaching, salmon literally jumping out of the water, deer up close and personal and all the other animals in their natural habitat was a far cry from looking at National Geographic on TV.

Probably the greatest Alaskan experience is spending part of a day in Glacier Bay. The glaciers are both magnificent and beautiful and witnessing their splendor as they calve huge icebergs right in front of your eyes is a spectacle to behold. I was hooked. We have returned and look forward to returning again to see more of the inland area.

Many cruise lines send ships to Alaska for the summer months. Most cruises are seven days long, though a few are longer, and the cruise tours may range from 2 to 8 or 9 days on land before and/or after the cruise. Visits to see Mount McKinley or the Copper River or stays in Fairbanks, Denali National Park and the Kenai Peninsula are experiences that you won’t want to miss in your lifetime.

Excursions from the ships feature opportunities to go whale watching, be a dog musher, pan for gold, take a helicopter ride, walk on a glacier or a enjoy a train ride on the scenic railway, just to name a few. Brad thought that the experience of walking on a glacier was the closet thing he could imagine to walking on the moon.

Just a Little History of Our 49th State

From Wikipedia we learn that “Alaska (IPA: /əˈlæskə/, Russian: Аляска) is a state in the United States of America, in the northwest of the North American continent. It is the largest U.S. state by area (by a substantial margin), and one of the wealthiest (per capita) and most racially diverse.

The area that became Alaska was purchased from the Russian Empire on March 30, 1867, for 7.2 million dollars (at 2 cents an acre). The land went through several administrative changes before becoming an organized territory on May 11, 1912 and the 49th state of the U.S. on January 3, 1959. The name "Alaska" was already introduced in the Russian colonial time, when it was only used for the peninsula and is derived from the Aleut alaxsxaq, meaning "the mainland," or more literally, "the object towards which the action of the sea is directed." It is also known as Alyeska, the "great land", an Aleut word derived from the same root.

Alaska is one of two U.S. states not bordered by another state, Hawaii being the other. Alaska has more coastline than all the other U.S. states combined. It is the only non-contiguous U.S. state on continental North America; about 500 miles (800 km) of Canadian territory separate Alaska from Washington State. Alaska is thus an exclave of the United States, part of the continental U.S. but is not part of the contiguous U.S. Alaska's capital city, though located on the mainland of the North American continent, is inaccessible by land — no roads connect Juneau to the rest of the North American highway system.

The state is bordered by Yukon Territory and British Columbia, Canada, to the east, the Gulf of Alaska and the Pacific Ocean to the south, the Bering Sea, Bering Strait, and Chukchi Sea to the west and the Beaufort Sea and the Arctic Ocean to the north.

Alaska is the largest state in the United States in land area at 570,380 square miles (1,477,277 km²), more than twice as large as Texas, the next largest state. It is larger than all but 18 sovereign nations.