Leaving for Alaska in 4 weeks. Any tips?

[col4bin]

I will be in Anchorage, Homer, Seward, Girdwood, Katmai National Park and Denali National Park. I am planning on bringing my entire kit. Does it look I am missing anything (I have GND filters and a CP).

[Skip Souza]

How are you traveling? My most memorable vacation ever was a month long road trip to Alaska.

You might have a good excuse for an ultra wide ;-)

Oh, and don't forget the Deet :lol:

[Maureen Souza]

Just enjoy it. Every angle is a beautiful photo. There is more wildlife and birds than you can ever hope to photograph. Don't forget to put the camera down and take a good look with your eyes. Alaska is an amazing place.

[col4bin]

How are you traveling? My most memorable vacation ever was a month long road trip to Alaska.

You might have a good excuse for an ultra wide ;-)

Oh, and don't forget the Deet :lol:

I am traveling by car and by plane to Katmai. I will be traveling to various places within Katmai via float plane. My trip is 16 days.

[Skip Souza]

I am traveling by car and by plane to Katmai. I will be traveling to various places within Katmai via float plane. My trip is 16 days.
I am so envious.:mrgreen:

Your gear line up is pretty good. (don't forget the Deet) I think I would want more reach, it is a BIG state. For ease of travel in a perfect world I would leave the 70-200 and 300 behind and go for a 100-400 and all the flash cards I could find.

Hope you have a great time and will look for your photos.

Don't forget the Deet, those skeeters are huge :shock:

[canonrebel]

Wrap up warm...............LOL

[Maureen Souza]

Wrap up warm...............LOL
It shouldn't be too cold. When we took our month long trip through Alaska I only needed a sweater or jacket in the late evening. It was 82 degrees in Fairbanks.

[Laramie]

Lot of memory and/or a portable harddrive to back them up. Can't wait for the chance to get up to Alaska.

[Canonswhitelensesrule]

While in Seward, perhaps you'd like to check out, Kenai Fjords Tours. They seem to offer some incredible tours.
http://www.kenaifjords.com/?utm_sour...aign=gen eral

[col4bin]

Thanks all.

Besides Katmai, I think the highlight of the trip will be my day of bear viewing with Emerald Air Service (http://emeraldairservice.com). The folks that run this service were featured in the imax movie Bears (that is not why I booked with them but it didn'r hurt).

I plan on doing a kenai fjords tour....the long one that goes to all the outer glaciers.

I have 16gb of memory to carry around with me and I plan on bringing my laptop to backup my pictures nightly.

[RPCrowe]

I am going to the Kenai (I was just informed by a native Alaskan that it is pronounce like "Keenai") in July for a combination fishing and photography trip.

I have done a lot of research and have placed a lot of posts on various forums. The consensus of opinion from several experienced Kenai hands is that the smaller boats, while not as luxurious as the larger vessels, are the best ways to go for the tour of the Kenai Fjords N.P.

Two boats which have been recommended to me are:

Weather Permitting which will customize the tour for you and also allow you to disembark at several locations:

http://www.watertaxiak.com/

Captains Choice

http://www.kenaifjords.com/551.cfm

Your equipment is very much like mine. I have a 400mm f/5.6L lens but have decided in the interest of saving weight to take my 70-200mm f/4L IS and 300mm f/4L IS lenses with 1.4x TC and leave the 400mm at home. I will also take a 17-55mm f/2.8 IS and 12-24mm f/4 Tokina.

One thing which I would recommend for any once-in-a-lifetime or at least any very special trip is two camera bodies. I have had a Canon DSLR (10D) go down for no known reason with absolutely no hard use (it was less than 3 months old). Canon fixed it and had it back to me within a week but, that would have blown a trip if I had only one body.

In fact, I am toying over bringing a third body (Canon D60) which I have had converted to F/T infrared. If I can fit it in my new Lowepro Vertex 300; I will take the IR camera. I kind of wish that I had converted a nice P&S for IR which could have fit in the top-pocket of my shooting vest.

Have fun, shoot lots of stuff and enjoy yourself. I am very excited over the trip and cannot figure what is exciting me more - the photography or the salmon fishing.

[col4bin]

Thanks. I am thinking about renting a 5D as backup. This would also afford me a nice wide angle with the 24-105.

[Skip Souza]

Thanks. I am thinking about renting a 5D as backup. This would also afford me a nice wide angle with the 24-105.
Excellent choice! Go for it. I am still jealous :p

[ZeroOne86]

I spent 3 months there TDY in Anchorage in 2006. Thankfully I worked days for the majority of the trip so I didn't have to worry about the skeeters. The last week I had to worked nights and they started to swarm & attack. I went during the summer, it was cool in the morning and as the day progressed it got warmer. Sadly for me when I went it was unusually warm and we were staying in some less than outstanding accommodations. So I had to sweat out for a few days until I got a fan. The 12 hours daylight also threw me off a little bit too.

I went to Flat Top Mtn. and Portage Glacier park. I was lucky enough to be at a sports bar and they had radio station there and they were doing a contest. I was sold out by some of my co-workers I won't go into detail what I had to do to win it, but I won and got some glacier cruise tickets for Portage Glacier.

I'd also recommend going through the tunnel near the park and hike the portage glacier pass. It was a bit rough since the snow hadn't completely melted. The view was well worth the hike however. I also went to Talkeetna was a bit of drive, but it an interesting visit, the cafe there was pretty good too.

As far as equipment don't really know I sadly only had a P & S with me when I went. So needless to say I had a few blown out skies and the glare from the snow was killer. Have fun and good luck.

My deviantart has a few pictures from the trip http://zeroone86.deviantart.com and I have some more on my website below.

[Pandragon]

I will be in Anchorage, Homer, Seward, Girdwood, Katmai National Park and Denali National Park. I am planning on bringing my entire kit. Does it look I am missing anything (I have GND filters and a CP).

A rain jacket. For you and your camera :) Seriously...

Nice trip you have planned there. Don't use up all your memory shooting the bears in Katmai :)

While in Seward, perhaps you'd like to check out, Kenai Fjords Tours. They seem to offer some incredible tours.
http://www.kenaifjords.com/?utm_sour...aign=gen eral

There are some good whale watching/glacier tours from our little town. There will be Grey whales, Humback whales, Orcas, Sea Otters, Dahls Porpopise, and to many Steller Sea Lions to count.

[irispatch]

If I use deet based repellents how do I protect my camera from being damaged by the Deet? It does destroy the rubber coverings on cameras and other things.

[TrulyAlaskan]

It's been real nice up here this year, kinda a surprise since the winter was really not so great, and last summer was horrbile. Deet is a way of life. Seriously. You can go without it, or you will have lots of new friends.

Bring rain protection, wrap all your gear in trashbags then put those in your camera bag. Bring other trashbags for camera rain protection. Thankfully it's been relatively dry this year.

You seem much smarter than this, but I'm gonna say it anyway. Don't piss off our wildlife. I was hiking in a very common place the other day, and there were a bunch of tourists out there within 30 feet of a cow moose. THANKFULLY she didn't have a calf.
She got pissed off and charged them. Sent 2 off the backside of a steep cliff, and the other 6 or 7 went running. THANKFULLY she went after the 2 that went over the side, and couldn't get to them.

Animals will charge. Don't give them a reason to. I don't have to want to shoot any animal to save anyone's life but my own.

Other than that, have fun!!! Katmai is cool, are you renting a cabin or tent camping? Kenai is great to see, lots of animals. If you're in A-town, make sure you have dinner at either the brewhouse or Orso. Moose's tooth is really good too, but expect 2-3 hour lines. I waited last night for over an hour.... at 1130pm.

Drop me a line when you get up here, I can show you a few places.

[col4bin]

Funny how this thread was reborn from exactly one year ago.

[TrulyAlaskan]

lol

How was the trip?

[col4bin]

Amazing.

[jeev]

Any advice, regrets for folks going this year?

Amazing.

[col4bin]

I highly recommend Emerald Air Service if you want a nice bear viewing experience. The groups are small and it does not feel touristy. They are based out of homer. If I was to do it all over again, i would have went to Denali first and then worked my way down. The wild life was quite far away and almost always viewed from a bus. In Katmai and the Homer area the wild life was much easier to observe.