Well, here goes……………..we hope we don’t hurt anyone’s feelings by giving our honest opinion about this trip, especially our travelling companions.
Stephanie and I have been discussing this trip frequently over the past few weeks since we returned home.
We have been trying to look at the trip from different perspectives to make sure that our last assessment is accurate and truly expresses the way we thought this trip went.
We both agreed that the trip was not as fulfilling as we had hoped. Our discussions have mainly been about how we expected to see more in Alaska that would have made it feel like we were experiencing what one thinks about when Alaska comes to mind, majestic mountains, bears, salmon, and other scenery and forms of wildlife that Alaska is known for. We did not see a lot of amazing things, other than to see some whales and sea lions, as well as one mountain goat on our boat tour in Seward. And yes, we have to throw in a couple of far off moose sightings from the car while driving on the highway to and from Homer.
As we stated before in the Epilogue, and we still believe, other than the cabins at the Between Beaches stay, all of the other accommodations we stayed in seemed overpriced for what they offered. In thinking about this, I guess these properties have to make all of their rental income in the few months of Summer, after all, who wants to be in Alaska during the winter with the long, cold nights. This undoubtedly raises the rental rates as compared to properties in other locations that have longer rental seasons, or are rented year round. The places we stayed at just seemed to be very expensive for what they offered, especially with most of them only having one bathroom with a shower/bath, as well as a half bath. The cabin in Seward was completely oversold on Airbnb, who would want to put up to 10 people in a cabin with only 1.5 bathrooms, not me for that price.
The hotels in Anchorage were just ridiculously priced, almost $300 per night is outrageous. These places did have kitchenettes, and having a refrigerator made it easier to get some of our groceries ahead of time at the beginning of the trip, but we did not really need that on the return. It was good for Ashley because she needed a freezer for her frozen fish.
Stephanie and I both think that we spent too much time in both Seldovia and in Seward. Based on our overall plan of going to Seldovia and being close to Between Beaches, the two of us would have been perfectly happy if we had just stayed one, or maybe two nights max in Seldovia, preferring to stay an additional night or two at the Between Beaches cabins as an offset. The 4th of July in Seldovia was quaint, but did not seem to be anything any more special than we would have expected to experience in any small town in the USA on that holiday. Our stay in Seldovia was expensive and the cost of groceries there required a lot more effort on our part to bring in our own food and supplies for both there and Between Beaches.
In the end, we felt that there was just not a lot to do in Seldovia. For us, spending a day there on a side trip would have been sufficient. However, since Seldovia is also the town we needed to go to on the ferry for access to Between Beaches, going just for a day trip was not possible, and we understand that.
Seldovia was just small and sort of boring. You can walk the town in an hour, there are not many stores to visit, and food and drinks there in the restaurants are expensive since it all has to be brought in. For example, we paid $30 for a 12-pack of beer at the local liquor store!
We also thought there was too much old and abandoned “junk” everywhere when we drove around the area in the rented the golf cart, almost every piece of property had its own personal junk yard area. It is obviously too expensive to do anything with old boats, cars and other equipment brought there other than to let items just sit forever and rot away. Not much beauty in seeing that everywhere. We are amazed that a lot of people we talked to at various locations during the trip thought Seldovia was great, we just did not end up with that same opinion, oh well.
As far as Seward is concerned, again, we felt we just spent too much time there for what it offered. The boat tour of the fjords that we did from Seward was the highlight of our entire two week trip. That tour could have been better with sunnier weather, but the weather was just good enough to enjoy what we saw, and were glad we had been able to go with the COVID just starting for Ashley and Bryan.
I am not sure what else we would have done in Seward even if we did not have the COVID outbreak while we were there. There was an aquarium and aquatic facility we could have visited had I not gotten sick, but once again, we were in Alaska, I can go to Atlanta and visit an aquarium for a whole lot less cost and time. Sure, they might have aquatic animals that are native to Alaska at the Seward facility, but again, not what we were expecting. I admit, we did no research before we left to try and figure out sights and attractions to go and see on the trip, but besides Seward, and to some extent Talkeetna, we were sort of stranded for the rest of the time while we were in Seldovia and Between Beaches, we had no transportation in these two locations to visit anything, not that that was an option anyway.
In the end, we learned a valuable and I will say somewhat costly lesson that we already knew, but I guess that we need to have reinforced every once and a while. That lesson is that for us, it is really difficult to travel with other people. For this trip, I admit, I was lazy, and did not do my normal level of research to fully understand what we were really going to do at each location. I also did not pull together enough of the detailed information on the accommodations to fully understand their cost and amenities, other than we did read a lot about the Between Beaches on their informative website, so we knew more of what to expect there.
We did not make any of the reservations for accommodations ourselves, other than for Seldovia, and that was only because we were staying in a different location than Ashley and Bryan there, so it was up to us to reserve it directly. But, even that location was picked out for us based on the previous experiences of Ashley and Bryan. Stephanie and I sort of chuckle about the Asta Suite in Seldovia, and how we were offered the opportunity to stay there for this trip, which we though was a nice gesture. Ashley and Bryan had stayed there before and offered it to us because of the wonderful view. In the end, we would have been happy with their place instead of ours, we would have preferred their place with the full size kitchen with appliances over the deck with the view of the harbor and only having a mini fridge with no freezer, and a microwave.
We both admit that the weather played a role in our overall opinion of Seldovia and of the Asta Suite, but in the end, looking out at the harbor was just not that exciting for us, and we were not there that much during the day to enjoy it. Again, the weather played an large role in the utilization of the large deck, which was apparently the main attribute of that property, and its cost. We don’t know the cost for Ashley and Bryan’s place in Seldovia, but surely it was less, and that would have been alright with us, we always try to intermingle lesser cost accommodations along with higher cost places on our trips, sort of a cost compromise so we can stay in the nicer places with views in the appropriate locations.
Like we commented on before in the Epilogue, the cool and rainy weather had a large impact on our overall trip enjoyment, as well as dealing with COVID for about half of the short trip. Having to deal with COVID was much worse than just being sick with colds, COVID brings along more aggravation when dealing with it. There is masking, isolation, testing, fear of spreading it to other people traveling with you and in the community, possible travel restrictions, and just feeling worse than having a common cold. We have had colds on trips before, and it was not nearly as debilitating and had much less impact to those travel experiences.
As far as COVID and future travel, we have concluded that we will just be more willing to wear masks when we travel on airplanes, especially for long flights, and in crowded summertime/holiday airports. We have had COVID issues on or after our last two trips, but had no issues during the peak of COVID when we traveled to Switzerland and Austria. The difference being masks were mandated, as well as COVID vaccination certificates on that trip, so these measure did work in our opinion.
In the end, this was just not one of the best trips we have taken. It was somewhat relaxing, we did not really do anything in the first half of the trip, and not we are not sure we would have really done much after the first week anyways, but with our COVID outbreak, we never even had the opportunity. It is obvious that our travelling partners had a different opinion on what this trip was supposed to offer, it seemed to be structured so that we really did not have much to do but sit around and relax.
The only activity we think we really missed out on was the two hour flight to Denali and the glacier from Talkeetna, but even that was in doubt before we left because of the poor weather forecast for our time there. In the end, this became a COVID casualty also because the weather turned out to be fantastic, and we could have gone.
Stephanie probably has the best perspective on this trip, and that is that we now know we do not need to do anything more in these parts of Alaska. So, if we ever returned, we would opt to go elsewhere, possibly with the exception of being near Talkeetna if we wanted to do the flight tour to Denali. After we got home, It was especially disheartening for Stephanie, her cousin Kim and her daughters went on an Alaskan cruise about a week after we returned. They had great weather, and did a helicopter flight to a glacier and then a dog sled ride. Dog sledding was something Stephanie has always wanted to do, but did not really possible on this trip, we were generally too far away from any snow. It might have been possible from Talkeetna, we did not even look into it, again, poor trip preparation on my part, but then again, it would have been even more disappointing to have to cancel last minute because of the COVID.
As travel goes, it is always in the eye of the beholder. For us, if we wanted to purely relax, we would opt for a transatlantic cruise because that is relaxing for us. They are cost effective for that purpose. For land trips, we generally do not want to sit around or be in isolated locations, there is too much to see, especially when going that far from home. If we want to be in an isolated cabin, on our near the water, I am sure we could find locations easier to get to and more cost effective to stay in than going all the way to Alaska. Nothing about Seldovia or Between Beaches screamed “Alaska” to us. Without knowing, Seward could just as easily been a location in Washington or Oregon, with the exception of the boat tour, but there are probably some similar types of tours in those places also.
All said and done, we just did not enjoy the trip as much as we had thought we would, and that is unfortunate, but partly our fault. We have and will continue to spend a lot to go on our travels, but it is not just about the money. Our travel experience has given us both the intrinsic belief in our ability to plan our travels so that we feel we are seeing what we want to see and are also getting a good value, no matter how much we spend. That belief will always be a part of any travel considerations we make, we are willing to spend a lot on travel, but to that end, it is up to us to plan our trips so that we both expect and also receive an “experience” in return for the cost. It seems like that is harder to achieve when travelling with others. Everyone has their own thoughts on what they want to experience and pay for when traveling.
We know we could never travel with some of our other friends and relatives, most have a completely different approach to travel than us. We already know that their philosophy is that they are willing to spend a lot so that they are “taken care of” and someone else does all of the planning on pre-planned trips by travel companies. We generally want to take care of ourselves and of our trip planning, at least at this point in our lives. We do not like to be shuffled around.
Well, that is what we think, and we have expressed that in this post.
Now we just need to figure out our next adventure, but unfortunately, we have absolutely nothing planned, and that is disappointing.
Oops, I just fell off of my soapbox…………….
Farewell!