Category: Alaska

Aidan Shafland

First Trip of the New Anadyr Season!

Alaska, Day Trips, Environmental, Prince William Sound, Sea kayaking, Staff

The sea kayaking season here in the Prince William Sound kicked off with a bang! The first trip of the 2018 paddling season was chock full of wildlife like only the Prince William Sound can provide. I had the pleasure of leading this Gold Creek trip with a wonderful couple from Oklahoma and I’m already a little worried it will be hard to top this year but you never know!

The trip started off just like every other Gold Creek day trip and we loaded into the kayaks from our dock in the harbor and paddled out past the salmon seiners and the Stan Stephens boats. We paddled along the jagged, rocky shoreline of Blueberry Hill glimpsing seal heads and some sea otters frolicking in the water. So far so good, a pretty standard paddle along Blueberry Hill, but as we crossed Mineral Creek draining into the Port, my client saw a black bear walking along the Shoup Bay Trail! We paddled over towards it but as we got closer it spooked and ran off into the brush before we could snap a photo.

Kayaking in the waterfall lagoon

After the bear sighting, which have become rare in the sound in recent years, we continued and had the right tide to paddle in this beautiful little lagoon with a big waterfall cascading into the water.

We continued our paddle along the shore line towards the beach at Gold Creek where we hopped out of the kayaks to go for a quick walk to look at the Gold Creek Waterfalls and check out the beautiful temperate rainforest that Valdez and the Prince William Sound are famous for! While we hiked we found a porcupine kill and some huge grizzly bear tracks! (Not necessarily related but I like to think so)

Dustin checking out the porcupine quills
Look at the size of those prints!
Gold Creek Falls!

After our short walk in the woods we collected some fiddleheads and headed back to the kayaks for lunch. As we walked we noticed what appeared to be fresh bear tracks following ours! We got back to the boats and as we ate we heard and saw a young humpback breathing from the beach to round off the day. Or so we thought! While we finished eating some Ugly Fruit I heard a rustling behind me and with those big brown bear tracks fresh in my mind, went to go check it out. Much to my surprise there was a brown bear ambling down the hill not 100 feet away from us! I attempted to scare it off while also getting back into our kayaks. My attempts were successful for a while and then the most amazing thing happened! The bear came out onto the beach where we had been sitting and we got to spend the next hour hanging out with what appeared to be a two year old brown bear, and apparently a really hungry one!

The bear checking out our lunch spot
Dustin checking out the bear as the bear checks out Dustin!
The hungry bear chowing down on some mussels
The bear was really photogenic and posed for some great photos

We paddled with the bear for the whole way back to Mineral Creek where I got the attention of Jared, Bagel, and Sami who were leading a high school Marine tech class from the local H.S. so they could enjoy the bear as well.

What a way to start the season off! A black bear, brown bear, humpback whale, tons of seals and sea otters all in a six hour paddle right from the harbor! Hopefully I didn’t use all my wildlife luck on my first trip.

-Aidan

Kaden Addler

Anadyr Crew Heads to Homer to Become Certified Kayak Instructors!

Alaska, News, Prince William Sound, Sea kayaking, Staff

Happy summer 2018! We, at Anadyr, are so excited for this upcoming season of paddling in beautiful places with awesome people like you! The majority of our guide staff this year is returning for repeat seasons along with a few new folks joining the crew. In order to further our training in relation to sea kayaking and teaching skills, the returning guides were sent to Homer, Alaska at the beginning of May to complete a five day ACA (American Canoe Association) Level 1 and 2 Instructor Certification in Kachemak Bay across from Homer, AK. We now have five certified kayak instructors to guide on our day trips and multi-day excursions!

Kittiwake rookery in Kachemak bay across from Homer, AK.
Guide, Sami, hauling a load of kayak gear up the steep dock at low tide. Superwoman strength!

This course covered a variety of kayak related topics such as different rescue techniques, proper paddle stroke techniques for a variety of strokes, towing, and hazards and safety on the water. Another major focus of the course was learning how to effectively teach the skills that we are mastering to beginning paddlers (i.e. a lot of our client base). Those of us who partook in this course found the teaching skills to be some of the most valuable and certainly skills that will follow us into our everyday lives, especially as guides. Our love for this place and for accessing it via our method of kayaking is something we are all passionate about sharing with the public, which is why we are all here guiding these trips for a company who shares the same ideals and embodies that same passionate spirit. It is incredibly important then, to have the skills to effectively and easily teach others how paddle and be safe while doing it so we can move into the more exciting parts of the day with ease, leading to a much more enjoyable experience for our clients.

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Ilene Price

SEA KAYAK CAMPING TRIP TO THE FACE OF COLUMBIA GLACIER

Alaska, Camping Trips, Environmental, Favorite Comment, Prince William Sound, Sea kayaking, Uncategorized1 Comment on SEA KAYAK CAMPING TRIP TO THE FACE OF COLUMBIA GLACIER

Preface: Get ready for a longer blog about this unforgettable trip. Stick it out to the end to see my top two all-time favorite icebergs, and find out what finally merited busting out the emergency tequila:)

Photo is so nice, I had to use it twice. Cheers!

For five days in a row I awoke to the sound of two Brits giggling in their tent. That’s right. . . giggling like school children! (I don’t think they’d mind me saying so.) As I lit the stove to boil water for coffee, gazing out over the ice-filled bay in front of Columbia Glacier, I thought giddily to myself, “somewhere along the line I must’ve made a really good decision if this is what I do for my life’s work”!

Our vessels of choice at our campsite in Columbia Bay

I get to share with wonderful people the most beautiful places in the world using my favorite mode of transportation, sea kayaks. This trip, a five-day kayak and camping expedition starting on the south side of Glacier Island and finishing off with three amazing days exploring the recently-revealed landscape at the face of Columbia Glacier, was one of the best yet! A huge thank you and enthusiastic cheers goes out to my two clients, Rob and Anya, who just happened to squeeze in this kayak adventure amidst their lengthy motorcycle tour starting in Washington. Umm, yea. . . they’re kind of badasses on two wheels. Now they can proudly say they’re badasses with double-bladed paddles.

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