*The Alaska State Ferry system is sort of an unsung hero.* Everybody these days thinks in terms of cruise ships, and I guess if you like being on*board *a big ugly ship with 3000+ of your closest friends and worst enemies it's fine.Moonstruck wrote:I am also*looking at flying out, renting a car, and doing the ferry system.
But for a much more "real" experience, I highly recommend the ferries.* You can even get by without a car which reduces the cost a bunch I believe.* If you want a car in the towns up there you can rent one for the day.* At least you can in Ketchikan, Sitka, and Juneau.* Don't know about Petersburg or Wrangell although I'm sure Eric has the latest info about this.
And in addtion to the ferries, if you want to spend the money you can ride the floatplanes from Ketchikan out to some of the more remote communities.* Most of them are so small you don't really need a car to explore them.* And there are floatplane tours of some of the really wild country up there, specifically Misty Fiords (yes, they spell it wrong up there) on the mainland east of Ketchikan and out of Petersburg over the LeConte glacier and down into the Stikine River valley.* There are also jet-boat tours up the Stikine out of Wrangell.* The Stikine is one of the last totally wild (no dams) rivers along the coast.
I've posted the three aerial shots before--- I took them on one of my wife and my floatplane trips north---* but they are of a section of the Inside Passage (the ferry goes through here), approaching the LeConte glacier, and going over the backside of the glacier down into the Stikine River valley.
The last photo is the Alaska State Ferry "Columbia."* An actual ship as opposed to a horizontal Hyatt Hotel.
-- Edited by Marin on Friday 11th of November 2011 06:30:46 PM