5 WILD DAYS IN VALDEZ — Whales, Glaciers & Waterfalls

Finally, this is Alaska. We've got all of that and so much more in this video. Join us as we take a full-day cruise on the harbor, explore the salmon hatchery, and adventure out on some amazing hikes. But first, if we haven't met before, we're the Shinpas. We're a family of four who travels full-time so we can make memories now. This is where we stayed the night, 14 miles outside of Valdez under this massive waterfall. We're already packed up and ready to get into town to our campground. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the drive with us. Pulling into our campground here was really easy. And don't worry, we're coming back for a tour and all the facts in a bit. Here's a little bit about our home for the next few days. Valdez rose from a gold rush supply route to one of the snowiest places in the U.S. and in 1989, it was forever changed by the Exxon Valdez oil spill. But today, it's a gateway to world-class hiking, wildlife, and the mighty Columbia Glacier. We're going to start our trip off here in Valdez with a bang. We are going on a seven and a half hour glacier cruise. We're going to be joining Stan Stevens and their crew on one of those two white boats. They're catamarans, so if you know anything about boats, it means there's two hulls, so it's more stable, so we won't have as much rocking. So that's going to be a plus for a long day on the water. We're hopeful that we're going to see whales, sea lions, seals, otters, and we've even heard that there are arctic puffins here, which will be really, really cool. The weather looks beautiful. The seas are calm. There's not a lot of wind. These clouds should move and burn off. You can see the sun wanting to come through, so we're really excited to kick off Valdez this way and we can't wait for you to come along with us. All right. Thank you. Good morning. Hi. Thank you. My name is Alan. I'll be your captain today. If there's anything we can do to make your trip more enjoyable, please don't hesitate to ask. That's certainly what we're here for. Not just to take you out to a place that we're pretty proud of, but we want to make sure that you have a good time as well, so put us to work. We are a very unique operator in the sense that we allow people onto the bridge, into the wheelhouse, come visit me at any time. That's a radar, correct? Yeah, and they're both radars. They're just on different ranges. This is the short end over here and this is the short end over here. So this is how you turn the boat with your left hand? Would you use the steering wheel at all? I use the wheel a lot, just not when I'm standing, because this, I can turn from lock to lock like that. The wheel is like 12 turns to go from park one way to park the other way. Okay. So it totally looks like you're just spinning it, spinning it, spinning it. Yeah, it's a slow process. Within 20 minutes of leaving the port, we're already seeing wildlife. These cute little otters started our day out really well, and then there was the rock packed with sea lions just taking it easy for the morning. So obviously we're super excited to be here. Yeah. Like where are we going? Show us like where we're going and what we're doing. Yeah, absolutely. So this is Port Valdez, you know, top north Prince William Sound. So we started here in Valdez, made our way out right here through Valdez Narrows. That's going to be where Middle Rock is, or that seasonal low tide sea lion rock that Alan was talking about. Is that kind of where we are right now in that general area? We're pretty much right outside of the Valdez Narrows. I'd say we're right here right now. So we're traveling down the Valdez Arm, and my guess is we're going to tuck behind Glacier Island right here, past Fremantle, and go through Glacier Passage, which is just some really beautiful near water cruising. And then we'll either go behind Fairmont Island or around it. Depends on whatever Alan wants to do. And we'll make our way up Unaquik Inlet. Right here is the terminal moraine of Mears Glacier. Alan's going to talk about that later, but it's where the glacier was at its furthest most point of advancement. And that's where we expect to see those hundreds of sea otters. We'll make our way up Unaquik Inlet and up to the face of Mears Glacier. We'll get to spend some time there. Hopefully the weather cooperates and we can turn the engines off and just listen. Yeah, and listen to the pops, all that kind of stuff. We'll make our way back down. And then again, I'm not a mind reader, but my guess is we'll go around Fairmont Island, maybe even around Outpost Island, which is this little cluster of islands up here. Over this way back towards Glacier Island, this is Point Bullhead. That's where Alan expects to find those hundreds of sea lions. That's a known sea lion haulout. And then we'll travel our way back up and up to That's pretty darn cool. And you're third generation? Yeah, so my dad and Colleen have been together since I was nine. My dad's our captain today and I get to tag along. How cool is that? It's pretty, it's a cool family to be a part of. And it's a cool legacy to have as well. That's incredible. I mean, because one of the reasons that we decided we wanted to use you guys was because it was so family oriented. And we've only been on the boat now for about 45 minutes, but it's been amazing. And everything's so nice and clean and everybody's so nice. And I love the fact that they're like, come up and stand in the bridge. We've been on so many ships or we've been on so many boats that we're like, nope, that's off limit. And like, that's the coolest experience to see from there. Like, yeah, I don't know. So it's, it's really awesome. Sounds like that's bagels. So I'll let you guys go eat and we can keep chatting. Let's get a bagel. Yeah, please do. Part of what's included in the tour is food. So in the morning, they serve you a snack. They give you a bagel with cream cheese, peanut butter or butter, which is really nice. So it's definitely a nice touch, but you can also bring your cooler and we do have a cooler tucked over there in case you want something special. We're going to enjoy our bagel and the view and fingers crossed we see some whales. There's some North Pacific sea otters on the water out ahead of us. And we'll just take a look into these otters. Now we're not going to spend a lot of time with these animals because typically we find, oh, I'm going to say hundreds of these animals in Unaquik Inlet where we're headed. And so we'll just, just say hi to them and give them a drive Is that an eagle? Possibly, probably. Bald eagles, we do have a lot of bald eagles in Prince William Sound, around 2,500 mated pair. This is Alan, our captain. I'll ask you a couple questions. Sure. How long have you guys been in business for? This business was started in 1971 by Stan Stevens and his wife. It was just the two of them and their three children. And they did, well, Stan started doing hunting and fishing charters and then realized that he had a lot more fun taking people out and showing them the beauty of Prince William Sound. And so in about 1976, I believe is when they bought their first tour boat, actual tour boat. Compared to the size of this boat, how big was the first boat that they bought? It was about 60 feet, 65 feet, somewhere in that area. And this is an 85 foot boat. That's very cool. So being out here all day, I'm sure you see all sorts of cool stuff. What's your favorite thing to see out here on the water? Your personal favorite? You know, I think it's human nature to want to see what you don't normally see. And so I have been driving passenger vessels for 30 years and I've seen three sperm whales in that time. So a sperm whale is pretty neat for me. What's the craziest thing that you've seen on one of your tours? Bubble net feeding with humpbacks is pretty impressive. It doesn't happen very often in this area. It happens a lot in the southeast of Alaska, but that's where you have 10, 12, 15 animals releasing bubbles underwater and those bubbles create a net and then the humpbacks come up the water column with their mouth open and come out of the water with their mouth open and feed that way. I also think that a sea otter eating an octopus is pretty impressive. If we can get a good porpoise show, porpoise are some of the most interactive animals that we have out here. And so porpoise are really fun to see. Any kind of land based creature that's really rare, like black bear, mountain goats, again, that's just because of the rarity. So I know that these glaciers are melting rapidly and falling back super far every day. Is it common every day to see them fall off of it into the water? Yeah, so it's called calving and not all glaciers are receding. All of the glaciers in North America, tidewater, I'm going to speak about tidewater only, not valley, not hanging, just ones that touch the ocean, they all receded somewhere between 400 and 600 years ago, except Columbia Glacier. And that started in 1980. And it was predicted by a famous, well, famous in glacial circles, a glaciologist named Austin Post was studying Columbia Glacier in the 1970s. He predicted it would retreat. It did start retreating in 1980. And it's going through what every other glacier did years ago. So there are many glaciers in Alaska that are actually advancing. So they retreated four or five, 600 years ago, they became stable, and now they've started advancing. And Mears was advancing until a few years ago. It's come forward about maybe half a kilometer, a little more than half a kilometer in the last 20 years. Say like a glacier in Glacier National Park, a hanging glacier will be measured in centimeters a year. Mears is moving up to 10 meters a day. And it's just pressure from above, causing it to move and then it falls into the water. Think of a face of a glacier in the ocean as the mouth of a river, because that's essentially what a glacier is. It's just a river. It's a river of ice. Very cool. If you'd like to see the full interview with the captain, join our Patreon group. We have all kinds of behind the scenes footage, just like that. This is a part of the Columbia Glacier. And what's unique about it is that this glacier is in what they call a catastrophic retreat since 1980. And all that means is that it is retreating and shrinking at a rapid rate. But what we're told is that all of the other glaciers in the area did this two to 400 years ago. This one just decided to wait until 1980 to start. So it is deteriorating at a rapid rate. So you get these beautiful big chunks of it that we're getting to just circle and take in. And the colors are amazing. I hope that that's coming through for all of you. And just for a bonus, we've got a seal swimming around it. So this is really cool. We're getting ready to deliver some parts to this boat. And what I love the most about this is because, you know, even in the RV world, you help out your neighbors, right? Or if you were driving down the road and somebody was stranded and you could pull over and help them, you would. So this boat back here is anchored up and they have a very small box right behind me with the blue tape on it. But it's a really important part to get them running again. And that's just what you do when you're out and about is you help somebody if they're stranded or have need. Small clarification, we just learned that that part wasn't for the engine, but this gentleman sits his crab pots and they go down pretty far. Like I think they said 500 feet, right? 800 feet. And so it's a pot puller. So it's a very important piece of equipment. Maybe not quite as important as getting the engine running. But if you had a crab pot 800 feet down and you didn't have what you needed to get those up in a very efficient way, that would be an emergency. So anyhow, all is well. What a nice guy. And I, again, I just love the fact that they're helping people however they can, whenever they can. And we got to be a part of that. Looks like there's the glacier. I know. It's so cool. We love the animals on the iceberg floating around. That's your favorite part, right? Especially the sea otters. Not really little, but the sea otters, they're my favorite. Sarah loves the otters. You know, they're ferocious. Yeah. They're mean. They're so mean. They're very protective. He said that they're cute devils. I've got my second cup of coffee for the day. I come prepared. Turn off the engines and we'll just kind of float and see what we can see. Now, if this glacier is going to calve, that's when ice falls off the face into the water. It can happen at any time, anywhere. There's no way to predict when and where this glacier will calve. You just kind of have to be scanning right to left, left to right, looking for movement. The bluer areas of the face of the glacier are areas that are newly exposed to the atmosphere. I kind of talked about that blue ice earlier and so places that look a little bluer have just been more active more recently. I had no idea we would really see these glaciers calving. Chunks were popping and falling off for most of the time that we were here. Some of that actually feels kind of sad that it's falling off and into the water, but what we're told is that this glacier is actually advancing, so it's getting bigger every day. This is truly incredible. I mean, when you think about Alaska, when you think about Alaska, this is what you think about. We get to do this the whole day. Well, it's hard to imagine that the day could get any better, but trust me, we're just getting started. Now there are some big things coming up, and I'm not just talking about in this video, but big things for you. This fall, we're bringing the fun, music, and memories to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, and we want you there with us. From November 5th through the 9th of 2025, we're hosting our very first rally, and it's going to be four days of everything we love most. Great people, great food, and unforgettable memories in the Smoky Mountains. Join us in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee for four nights of non-stop fun. We've got it all lined up. Catered dinners, live music, games, group hikes in the Smoky, and an optional dinner show in town. And of course, we'll have campfires, conversations, and community. This isn't just a rally. It's a chance to meet new friends, swap stories, share laughs, and make real memories on the road. Whether you've been RVing for decades or just getting started, you're welcome here, and we promise you it's going to be something special. Also, we have a small amount of glamping tents for those of you who don't have your own RV. We're so excited to see you in Pigeon Forge. The link's in the description to sign up. We're headed to scoop some glacier ice out of the water. That's a biggie. Straight from the glacier. How would I feel? Feels like ice. Really cold. Look how crystal clear it is. It's like you won an award. Yeah, thank you guys. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So the piece Willis is holding has been touched by the air more. So there's air pockets in it, and that's why it's more of a white color. And then the piece Sarah is touching has really been in the water and not exposed to air as much, and that's why it's clear. So that's what they just told us. And they have a piece that they're going to show to everybody, but these are extras, and we're going to put them back in the ocean. So ready? Okay. All right. On three. Three, two, one. It's lunchtime. We're warming our hands up because they're frozen from getting all that footage of the glacier. It smells delicious in here. Just think chicken rice alfredo sauce. That's what the whole cabin smells like. And it's really nice. They come and actually serve us. Real quick while we're sitting here for lunch, I want to hear what everybody's favorite part so far today has been. My favorite part was going through the little passage that we went through. It was about a half a mile. It was real tight. We were right next to land and it was beautiful. My favorite part was getting up next to that glacier. I didn't expect all of that. Watching it calve and pieces breaking off and the noise. That was by far my favorite part. My favorite part was seeing glacier calving. The last time I saw that happen was when I was in my 20s stationed in the Arctic in the Air Force. My favorite part has definitely been what everyone else said with the sea otters. I love those little guys. They are by far my favorite part of this whole cruise. My favorite part was capturing the footage of those glaciers falling off. I am so happy that I got that footage and the entire day has just been so beautiful. Wait, if I have four regular Oreos, does that mean I can have two double stuffed Oreos? Oreo man. This is the beach of all beaches for these sea lions. There were hundreds of them and the sounds they made were very interesting to say the least. I was in the bathroom. I didn't know the whales were out. Oh my gosh, so cool. And out ahead of us is an outpost island. The little one with the trees on it. And we're going to go out and around. And as we got to the base of Unaquak Inlet, I did see the blow of what I believe is a humpback whale in the distance. And so I'm slowing down because I just don't want to overrun it. They can stay down for up to an hour if they want to, if they're resting. I don't believe that's the case with this one, but we'll just take it slow. I haven't learned to control them. So I'm anticipating that it's going to be somewhere out ahead of us when it comes back to the surface. But if you're outside and looking in the wrong direction, you should be able to hear it. It's a very pronounced sound. And so we'll just again, just take it slow and try and all, we're on the back of the boat right now. And just around the corner is where we boarded. All around the outside is an open deck. I think he told us earlier the boat's about 80 feet long, so it's a great size for the 149 people that can fit. This is the front, so even when all of the whales were out and most of the boat was congregated up here, we had plenty of space. Okay, and if we continue on, it's open on the other side. So completely open on the front deck all the way around. And you can see everybody's starting to get off the boat. All right, so when we go inside, it's one complete open space. Windows in the front and windows all the way around. As you can see, they have these great tables with lots of chairs for bigger parties. Here in the back, we have the galley and it was really nice because they served us our meals. But right here's where they prepped everything. And then there was tea, water, lemonade, and coffee available all day long. And then right here in the middle of the lower level are stairs that go up to the upper deck. Here's the bridge where Captain Allen steered the ship. Yes. You were wonderful. Thank you. My pleasure. If you step out at either side, you have that same railing and walkway. Or right back through here, there is some indoor seating up top. But the real magic was right here out back. Even today where the high was in the low 50s, this was amazing. This was an amazing place to sit. Just an unobstructed view from the top deck. You guys, we had such a good time on this excursion. We don't do a lot of these like we told you earlier. And this one was five stars. No doubt about it. If you're in this area, you're going to want to do this. We're going to put a link in the description so you can check them out. And even if you never come here, go to the website and just learn a little bit more about them. Willis, it was amazing. What an amazing day. We're going to go explore the rest of Valdez too. Let's start at home. This is the Bear Paw RV park and it's right across the street from the harbor. Remember when we walked across the street for the cruise? The campground was on the left and the cruise was on the right. It's also right in town. There are lots of little spots for vans and smaller rigs along the outside, but they also have very nice pull through sites here with full hookups at only $55 a night. It's only 30 amps, so just know that. In case you're worried about your rig fitting, it will. There's all kinds here and we were there at 45 feet. The amenities here are full bathrooms and showers, which were clean and nice. They also have a few laundry machines as well. This was a beautiful and amazing place to stay because of the location and the mountains surrounding us. Next, let's explore downtown Valdez. It's right around the corner. Here you will find cozy cafes and family-owned restaurants that feel like they've stood the test of time. It's the kind of place where a handwritten sign in a window invites you in. Just across the street from Main Street is the harbor, loaded with boats. Fishermen haul in halibut and salmon and seagulls circle overhead hoping for scraps. You'll see fillet tables lined with the days catched, cleaned and bagged right there on the docks. It's simple, authentic, and a reminder that this town still runs on tides, seasons, and hard work. In a world that moves fast, Valdez is content to move with the rhythm of the sea. There was this little ice cream shack that Jason and the kids couldn't pass up. They said it was delicious and a nice little cherry on top of our visit. Now, it's time to go explore out of town. Cheers. I love you guys. Yes, there we go. Stop one is the Salmon Gulch Hatchery and in this little book that I found, it says that this is where bears, sea lions, and eagles feed on returning salmon. It stinks too because, like literally stinks a little bit here because I guess when the tide comes up, where we are right now is covered with water and as you can see, some of the fish when they come in with high tide, they're not making it back out when low tide comes. And see where I'm standing here all the way out to the is what gets covered when the tide comes in. This is part of the fish ladder system right here over the rail and what I just learned is that this is actually a two-fold system. They do release the salmon once they're mature enough to go back into the wild and they fully mature and develop. But at the end of their life, which is about a year later, all of those salmon return here to spawn to lay their eggs and then they'll do the reverse. They'll come back in, actually those blue and white buoys up there where the water's falling over, that prevents the salmon from swimming upstream into the canyon and then they'll they come around the wall and there's a little gate that's open and the fish will actually get in that gate and then they will work their way up this ladder system so they're actually finishing that upstream swim into the section back here that's the spawning section. So this is fascinating. I've never seen this. I mean we don't have salmon in Florida and I've never had the opportunity to be in this kind of environment before. So coming here and doing this walking tour on your own is definitely a must do when you come to Valdez. And if not, you can go online. We'll put the website online but you can go online and they probably have the videos and you can learn more about it. This is really cool stuff. Don't underestimate these kinds of guidebooks that you find when you're traveling. This one's on Valdez and Jason picked it up several hundred miles ago and brought it home and I started looking at it and reading it and it's fantastic. I've starred some things and circled some things and this has really given me a really great foundation on what to do here and what we might be interested in. This is where we're headed right now. We were here in the port and we're staying somewhere over here where this heart is and so we're headed back in the direction that we came when we were headed here and we're going all the way to the Worthington Glacier. There's supposed to be a small walk that we can do and actually get out on it so that's going to be amazing and then there's some great hiking in here through this Thompson Pass. So we're headed back out of town but just in the truck. The bus is still at the campground and we're going to do Jason and I still work full-time. I'm a mortgage broker and he is a realtor and what we'd like you to know is that if you need any help buying or selling a home or purchasing or refinancing a home we can help. We're licensed in most of the states and where we're not we know some great people that we'd love to introduce you to. So if we can help you in that way there's a link in the description. Get some time on our calendar. We'd be honored to get to know you in that way. Now let's get back to the hike. All right Normie they got a special treat for you. So we're going to go down to the left down some stairs then we'll see the glacier. Then she said to take another left and there's a little trail that they dug out so the dogs can go down and drink some glacier water. So she said it might be overgrown but that is there and then it's about a third of a mile and it'll loop us back to the parking lot. So it's not a long it's about a third of a mile experience but we do get to go down to the glacier. And you get to drink the coldest water of your life. He's already shaking. He's got his little sweater sweatshirt on. That's the purest water you would ever drink Norman. That is the cleanest water a dog could ever drink straight from the glacier. We had a great time at Worthington Glacier. It was beautiful and now we want to go have a picnic lunch. So I got out the little book and I had circled Scenic Blueberry Lake. It's not too far from here. It's supposed to be a really pretty lake and there should be wild blueberries in bloom. So we'll go see if we can have some lunch and maybe a handful of blueberries. Oh look there's water. Oh all right you ready? That's a hard noise. Ah tastes like water. Let's get Norman some water. We need more cranksies. Take a good sip of that. Pass North Trail and it really goes up along the ridge there with gorgeous views. But don't be fooled it looks like it's nice and flat and easy. But we went all the way over the edge of the rock and then came back what looks like a road here and it was uphill the entire time. We definitely accomplished something in this hike and like I said it was there are gorgeous views. It's breathtaking from up on the ridge. The kids want to go back by the fish hatchery and see if the tide is in and if there's any extra wildlife. So let's go do that real quick before we head back to the campground. Okay everywhere we were standing earlier is now totally covered in water. The tide's in. Look at the seals. They're huge. There's two of them. The salmon. Look at These are sea lions. The big ones are sea lions. If you see little heads in the video those are seals. But it is definitely feeding time here tonight. We did not think we were going to get to see this and I hope you really enjoyed it because this was amazing. Especially to be this close. I'm so excited we finally found a bear up here. Like we were hoping he was feeding on the leftover fish from low tide but we missed it. So this is awesome. We get to check all the boxes now in Valdez. We saw a bear in Valdez. Valdez was the very first place in Alaska that we came to that felt like we were in Alaska. The snow-capped mountains, the drive through that canyon, it was magical. We've had a great couple days here and I tell you one of the highlights was getting to go on that Stan Stevens cruise to spend an entire day on the water seeing the glaciers, the seals, the sea lions, the cute little otters. Those are definitely Sarah's favorite. Oh and the orcas and humpbacks. I mean really? Did we get to check all the boxes? And don't forget those hikes we got to go on. Getting to go stand so close to the glacier, I really didn't know that that existed. So that was great. And don't even get me started on the hatchery. We learned so much about the salmon industry here. So that was a bonus, right? Homeschool check. Seeing the sea lions, catching those fish so close to us, that's something I'll never forget. And certainly something I never even thought I would ever see. And that truly completed our trip to Valdez. Being in Valdez was awesome because we're from Florida. We like the water and this was a perfect environment for us. However, we know Alaska has so much more in store for us and we can't wait to see what's next. Until then, go grab someone you love, make a memory now, and we'll see you on the next adventure.