A Weekend Trip to Alaska
Two weekends ago, I booked an impulsive, last-minute weekend trip to Anchorage, Alaska on a Wednesday night — my flight was scheduled for first thing on Friday morning. After a late Thursday night out in DC, I found myself at Washington’s Ronald Reagan National Airport for an early-ish 7:45am flight to Chicago. Before I booked this trip, I was sure that all my segments would upgrade to first class by using some Regional Premier Upgrades that I had on United.
My flight to Chicago and then on to Anchorage were both uneventful, but about as good as it gets for domestic first class on United. The Chicago to Anchorage leg was a cool 6.5 hours, but DirecTV and movies, along with a proper meal and ice cream sundae helped pass the time pretty well.
I arrived at Anchorage’s Ted Stevens International Airport at around 1:30pm and immediately took a cab downtown for about $20. I planned to do this trip without a rental car, since the prices on rental cars were astronomical, and I was trying to do this trip on a low budget. Another cheaper option to get from the airport to downtown is Anchorage’s People Mover Bus system. The 7 Bus runs hourly between the airport and downtown (and vice-versa) for only $1.75. This takes about 30-35 minutes instead of the roughly 15 minute cab ride. Keeping with the low budget theme, I planned to stay in a hostel in Anchorage given the notoriously high Anchorage hotel prices.
I arrived at my original hostel — The Alaska Backpacker’s Inn — and had an immediate, terrible first impression. It was several blocks away from central downtown, it was filthy, and the girl at the front desk advised me that check-in was not allowed for another couple hours. So I stored my bag, and briefly considered just booking a hotel for the weekend, but cooler heads prevailed and I just walked to a bar instead. Humpy’s Great Alaskan Alehouse in downtown was highly recommended by some friends, so I went there. I had some great halibut fish n chips, as well as several beers from their solid beer selection. I also go to talking to some folks at the bar who advised that I check out the Bent Prop Inn, Downtown — a hostel just a block or so away, which they said was much nicer.
So I did just that — the guys who run the Bent Prop Inn could not have been any more kind. The place was much cleaner, and they were able to accommodate me for the weekend. It has a fantastic location right by the Marriott, and the price was right — $30 for the first night, and $25 for the second night for a bed in a 8-bunk bed dorm. By the time I’d gotten my things and settled down back at the Bent Prop, it was past 10pm Alaskan time (2am Eastern), and I needed some sleep.
I was up early the next morning for breakfast at Snow City Cafe. This place is a must for breakfast in Anchorage. The line was out the door at 7:15am, but I was able to get a spot at the bar after about ten minutes. I ordered the Kodiak Eggs Benedict, which featured King Crab, and was freakin’ amazing.
For the day, I’d arranged a trip out to the Alyeska Resort in nearby Girdwood, Alaska. As previously mentioned, I did not have a rental car, so instead I booked a round-trip on the Alaskan Railroad for about $46 each way. This provided a relaxing 90-minute train ride along Turnagain Sound to Girdwood. Once in Girdwood, the Alyeska Resort has a shuttle that picks passengers up and takes them to the resort.
The Alyeska Resort is the premier ski resort in Alaska. With it being Summer time, it was prime for hiking, mountain biking, and other outdoors activities. I decided to give the mountain a climb. There are very defined hiking trails up Mount Alyeska, and since there was a race going on that day, there were a good bit of people making the climb. Because of this, my concerns about bear encounters were significantly diminished, and I managed to hike up to the mid-mountain tram station where the uber-popular Seven Glaciers Restaurant is located. I had lunch at another location, since Seven Glaciers is only open for dinner. Everyone I’ve talked to highly recommended Seven Glaciers, and it did indeed look amazing.
After lunch, I proceeded to hike up as far up the mountain as I could. I made it quite a ways up when the hiking trail basically ended just short of the glacier atop Mount Alyeska. I was ready to stop hiking at that point due to exhaustion and the fact that at this point I was the only one up there — it was a tad creepy, and I couldn’t help but worry a bit about bears.
So down I went back down to the mid-mountain tram spot. I went ahead and trammed back down the mountain and hopped the shuttle to the nearby town of Girdwood, where I had lunch and some drinks at one of the resort bars called the Sitzmark Bar & Grill. This was a ski-lodge type bar at the base of a couple ski runs that were being used as mountain bike tracks that day. After several beers, I again hopped the shuttle back to the Girdwood station for my return train ride to Anchorage.
I really enjoyed the Alaska Railroad, and found it an very relaxing and scenic way to travel around. Though a car would have been twice as fast to Alyeska, one was also much more expensive. I arrived back in Anchorage at 9:45pm, and of course the sun was still up. That didn’t matter much to me, as I was exhausted and headed to bed.
Sunday morning I once again headed to Snow City Cafe, but this time ordered the Crabby Omelet. Again, it was amazing. As I said before, this place is a must visit breakfast place in Anchorage. It was rainy that morning, and I had several hours to kill before I had to return to the airport for my flight back home. I spent that time walking though town and observing the Anchorage Marathon, which was happening that morning. As lunchtime was upon me, I headed to F Street Station for a helping of beer battered halibut and some beers. Wow, this halibut was fantastic — highly recommended. Apparently F Street Station is also quite the hangout late night for locals. After a quick nap at the hostel, I hopped on the 7 bus to the airport and then boarded my United Airlines redeye flight back to Chicago and then to DC on Monday morning. Being the good employee that I am, I proceeded directly from Dulles Airport to work.
Overall, this was a helluva way to spend a weekend. I enjoyed every minute of it. As my third trip to Alaska, it was the first time that I got to spend some time in Anchorage. While there honestly isnt’ much to the city itself, the surrounding area is absolutely beautiful.
Great trip report!! Gets me in the mood to visit – I’ll save this for when I do. I am still jealous of how delicious your breakfast looked.