From the North Pole to Volcano 🌋

Greetings from Hawaii! Emma and I want to update you all on our last few weeks of travel. When we last emailed, we were in North Pole, Alaska. Cloudy weather prevented us from seeing the aurora but we enjoyed our stay and we visited Santa Claus’ Factory (gift shop with tacky cards & cool t-shirts…see next photo). From North Pole, we made the 6-hour drive down to the southern port city of Seward. We broke up the drive with one more stop in Denali where we spotted some moose.

Zach + moose + his new favorite t-shirt

We spent a few days in Seward. The highlight was visiting Kenai Fjords National Park where we hiked to the Harding Icefield.

The icefield spans 700 square miles and has a max depth of 4000 feet.

The icefield was unlike anything either of us had seen before. Very cool.

From Seward, we then travelled to Cordova, Alaska where we received gracious hospitality from William, Emma’s cousin, and Sarah, William’s wife. Cordova is a small town with a population of only 2,000. There are no stoplights. The airport is a strip of tarmac and a small, one-room building. What Cordova lacks in urban amenities it more than makes up for in natural beauty and wildlife. While there, we saw sea otters, seals, black bears and bald eagles. William also took Zach under his tutelage in Cordova’s biggest pastimes: hunting and fishing. All in all, we loved the stay in Cordova.

This is William’s handiwork. Zach just got a photo with the fellow.

We ate this lucky silver salmon for dinner. Delicious. Both Emma & I caught silvers.

The view of the mountains as you leave Cordova. It really is pretty.

Aurora! On our last night, we caught a decent geomagnetic storm. Unbelievable.

After Cordova, we left Alaska and headed to the only state newer than it: Hawaii. We spent 3 days in Waikiki beach in Honolulu surfing, eating poke, and exploring. The poke here puts every other poke I’ve ever eaten to shame. Then, we left Oahu to travel to the Big Island, where Volcano National park is located. Highlights on the Big Island have been hiking through lava fields, visiting a black sand beach, and learning that the manager’s special at Thrifty (the cheapest rental car option on the island) is a Ford Mustang. Vroom Vroom.

Waikiki Beach! Great surfing spot for us beginners.

Turtle chilling on some black sand.

Lava field. Very different from an icefield.

That’s all for now! Thanks for reading along if you stuck it out this far. Stay tuned for next update.

Best,

Zach and Emma

P.S. If you didn’t see our first email and you want to check it out, you can find it here.