Riding the Rails on a Train to Seward

We had an early train departure at 6:30am heading to Seward, so I got up around 5ish, although one glance outside and it might as well been 10am. I started the coffee pot and got ready while allowing Kim and Riley to get a few more minutes before having to get up. The coffee at every single place had two common things, first it was really hot, like hotter than the coffee that the stupid lady from McDonalds burned herself with, and it was also very weak. Later on I even tried to double up on packets that contained the grounds and it was still very weak. In fact I can’t remember seeing a Starbucks anyplace.

We got to the train and checked it, this is one of the last passenger train services around, and it was awesome. We ate breakfast on the train and then slowly worked our way up the shores and then through the mountains, they were big and beautiful. It was amazing, the slow rocking of the cars, the sounds of the tracks, and the wildlife. We first saw some doll sheep, which at the time was cool, however these things are all over the place, like deer in Wisconsin, and you soon tire of seeing them. However we also saw a few bald eagles across this unbelievable landscape.






View from the dome car.


Some shots of the train working its way through the mountains.




We passed a few glaciers along the way, however I found it rather hard capturing them as they were often in the distance with a number of trees right up against the train screaming past my lense.






We arrived in Seward after the four hour ride, worth every minute. There was a shuttle from the hotel waiting for us and we went and checked in. We stayed at the Windsong Lodge, which had a nice log cabin feel out in the woods and on the river, and a nice restaurant.


Once settled in we headed in to town for lunch. Someone told us this place on the water called Ray’s was famous, but no one ever told us why. It was great food and afterwards we headed to the Sealife Center, a pretty cool place even if it was educational.




I really liked Seward, it was a small town right in the mountains on the sea. It was at this point that I noticed that the majority of the people here were great big fat people. At first this was confusing, I figured with the mountains and the ocean, this was a place for outdoor athletic people, but then realized they really only have three months that they can enjoy the outdoors and they probably need all that girth to stay warm in the winter months.




There is one event, that I guess mostly outsiders take part in, and that is the 4th of July mountain run, where they run 3000 feet to the top of this mountain and then back down again. The record holder has done it in less than an hour.


It was a great day and we returned to the hotel for diner and then a night cap before calling it a day. We started a nightly ritual in videotaping Riley jumping on each bed in every hotel.






Even though we were further south it again only got dim and never really dark, so one thing we had no chance of seeing on this trip was the Northern Lights that we heard so much about.