Sunday Summary #147

The Last Frontier

Hi there,

Welcome to Scho & Jo’s 147th Sunday Summary. This edition of the Sunday Summary was written in Glacier View, Alaska. We’ve quite the view from our mobile-office today!

Last Month.

When we last checked in, we were in Anchorage prepping for our Kenai Peninsula road trip. If you’re not familiar with Alaska and the regions, the Kenai is the most popular area to travel through. It has this combination of snowcapped mountains, glacier lakes, running rivers, and, of course, the water! This combination of mountains and water is breathtaking, and at each stop we were in love.

Our first destination was Homer, Alaska - also known as “The End of the Road” - you cannot drive any further in the contiguous US! Homer was this quaint, artsy, seaside town full of culture. The most popular area is the Homer Spit, a glacial moraine, where the marina, local saloon, and has tons of cute shops and restaurants.

While we were free camping on the beach with views of Lake Clark National Park, we received a Tsunami Warning. It was a scary realization that we’re in a different area of the world with different natural disasters - there was no hurricane warning a week out! We quickly packed up camp and drove to higher ground - fortunately there was no Tsunami reported but it was still an eye opening experience!

The next day, we went on our first backpacking trip to Grewingk Glacier, and it was the perfect first trip - 6 miles in with no elevation and camping at the edge of a glacial lake. Ollie was able to come, and she enjoyed hunting for rocks and icebergs while we had a few hours disconnected to relax and enjoy the scenery.

Our next stop was Seward, Alaska - a charming town nestled in a Fjord! It gave us plenty of Milford Sound vibes from our time in New Zealand, and the entire location was one of our favorites in all of Alaska. We boondocked on the riverbed of a glacially fed, braided river, with snow-capped peaks across the water, and spent some time on the water! We kayaked with Sunny Cove Kayaking and then took a boat ride into Kenai Fjords National Park. We saw an insane amount of wildlife - bubble-netting humpback whales, transient Orca, puffins, sea lions, and so much more. Kenai Fjords NP definitely made it into our top 5 national parks! It was nice being on a boat with our two good friends, Jackie and Alex from @where.is.ajax. Since they lived on a sailboat for a few years, and now travel in a truck camper, we chatted about the highs and lows of boat life compared to our current adventures. Traveling with friends is one of our favorite parts, and it’s been great traveling with Ajax for the past few weeks!

After leaving Seward and a quick pit stop in Whittier, Alaska, we prepped for our biggest Alaskan adventure yet, Katmai National Park! Katmai National Park is not easy to get to. Located on a very remote part of the Alaskan Peninsula, we had two flights, one from Anchorage and then a float plane from King Salmon! This meant we needed to board Ollie for the first time in her 10 years of life… An already emotionally charged event, when Ollie’s boarding appointment was cancelled the morning of our flight, it put us into overdrive, finding a last-minute replacement. All’s well that ends well, and when we picked up Ollie 4 days later, she was extremely happy and in great spirits.

Our time in Katmai was nothing short of exceptional. The coastal Brown Bears in Katmai National Park are the largest land carnivores in the world, and at Brooks Camp, you live in their midst. Fortunately, they are more full and fat on the plethora of Salmon, and they don’t care about you as long as you follow the rules from Bear School! We have to give a huge shoutout to Katie and Joey from @katieandjoeonthego for planning and inviting us on this once-in-a-lifetime trip. They’ve already started posting some Katmai videos on their IG, so be sure to check it out!

This Month.

Post Katmai, we reunited with Ollie and are now making our way to our final National Park in Alaska (of this trip) - Wrangell-St. Elias National Park. This is the largest US National Park, and it has some really neat history that we’re thrilled to learn about! We’re taking it a bit slower and will be catching up on Instagram and YouTube for the rest of August, so stay tuned for the adventures!

Videos.

Incase you missed it, here are all the vlogs we’ve released since our last Sunday Summary:

Blogs.

Here are all the blogs we’ve released since our last Sunday Summary:

From the Eyes of Ollie.

Alaska is tied for my favorite with Canada! So many rocks to catch in the streams, I am having the Summer of my life even though I just turned 70 years young… I still have lots of energy and hiking in me! My parents took me on a tram above a river and I loved the views.

Gratitudes.

This month we’d like to call out all our Katie and Joe for planning all of Katmai. They were fantastic trip planners to a huge group of 15, and Katmai National Park was a trip to remember. We are lucky to call them friends and are already planning a return trip for a multi-day kayaking adventure! Maybe in the next few years… Thank y’all!

Peace and love,

Jen + Elliot

 P.S.

If you are new to our Sunday Summary, you can take a look at previous issues here.