Kenai Peninsula Points of Interest

As you head down the Homer Spit, you'll see a collection of grounded boats. Some are occupied, and others are abandoned. All add to the charm of the Homer Spit. 

Finding your lost puppy is probably easier than this. Understand how refuge staff try to bring moose back to an area. It's not as simple as putting up posters.

Seward has one of the few relatively intact Main Streets in Alaska, and gives you a good idea of what the territory’s early coastal towns looked like. Despite two destructive fires, some of the town’s earliest buildings are still standing. In its early days, it was a rough and rowdy area, a place where one of Seward’s most famous mascots held sway – for a  More...

Let's go caribou-spotting on the wide open spaces at the mouth of the world-famous river system. This spot is one of your best bets for viewing these beautiful, stately beasts.

The town of Kasilof  (pronounced kuh-SEE-loff) has a lot of the great activities that other Kenai Peninsula towns do—fishing, camping and wildlife viewing. But this tiny town 15 miles south of Soldotna, on the Sterling Highway, is also a vibrant dog sledding  community—while here you can visit the kennel of Dean Osmar, an Iditarod champion, and take a ride  More...

You don't have to go into the art galleries (although that's a good idea) to enjoy art in Homer. Many of the businesses, especially on Pioneer Avenue, adorn their buildings with outstanding outdoor art works.

Driving from Anchorage to Whittier to play in Prince William Sound? You’ll go through Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel—the longest (2.5 miles) highway tunnel in North America, and the first designed for -40 Fahrenheit temperatures and 150 mph winds! 

The one-lane tunnel must be shared by cars and trains traveling in both directions, and it usually needs to be  More...

This creek near Cooper Landing was one of Alaska's earliest gold finds. Peter Doroshin, a mining engineer for the Russian American Company, discovered gold in the area in 1850. Joseph Cooper later discovered gold in 1884, but he did not file a claim. Charles Sickels filed the first claim on Cooper Creek in 1895. Cooper returned in 1896 to stake claims on his namesake creek. The  More...

In an area that’s famous for fishing, here is one spot where you don’t need a tackle box to blend in. As the name implies, this is a clamming town— with thousands of razor clams harvested annually from the sandy beaches.

Best of all, there is a pretty short learning curve for clamming: all you need is a little gear, a few safety pointers and a license, all  More...

The pass is an ideal location to witness the tremendous power that glaciers have had on the landscape. On the west side of the road at the pullout, travelers can see evidence of the millennial processes of past ice ages. Low, near-horizontal ridges mark the locations of glacial moraines near the tops of the mountains. These ridges, like bathtub rings, indicate changing ice depths as  More...

Russian fur traders colonized this fishing village in 1820. Steeped in the history of early Russian America, it offers an old-world setting with its Russian Orthodox Church on the hill, quaint fishermen's cottages and log homes. Information signs tell the history of Ninilchik and walking tour maps are available at local businesses. A trail leads to the church and cemetery on the hill.  More...

Digging for clams is easy and fun—kinda like fishing, but without all that waiting. Here are the top road-accessible clam havens south of Anchorage:

Anytime, though the best season is from April through September. Taste peaks in early  More...

The city of Kenai has plenty of natural wonders going for it: Overlooking the mouth of the Kenai River, it has great views of Cook Inlet as well as miles of sandy beaches, two mountain ranges and four active volcanoes.

Soldotna’s twin city has lots of cultural assets, too. Originally settled in the eighteenth century by Russian fur traders, the Peninsula’s oldest  More...

By midday, fishing boats have returned with their catch. Walk over to the fish cleaning tables to see halibut, salmon, and other quarry from the deep.

Visitors driving down to Homer (south west from Anchorage) find a perfect pull out rest stop on the right side of the highway on the hill above town. From this vantage, they get a preview of the pleasures to come. Fishing boats' windows twinkle out in Cook Inlet and Kachemak Bay, the Spit stretches half way across Kachemak Bay, and the snowy mountains on far side of the bay, embracing Kachemak Bay State Park, plus of course the the town itself.

Turn here for a scenic drive to an off-the-beaten-path town that sits on the edge of Turnagain Arm.  Established in the 1890's, it was one of the first gold mining towns in Alaska. Many of the town's original buildings are still standing, including the Seaview Cafe and Bar. There's still a hitching post in front of the mercantile, just in case you decide to bring  More...

This is a must stop for photos of beautiful Kenai Lake. The lake was formed from glacier water is a majestic blue and green tone. You'll find several parking areas along the lake and signs that give you a little history about it.

When the original town site of Seward was established in 1903, Lowell Creek ran down what is now Jefferson Street. (At 100 feet, Jefferson Street is the widest right-of-way in Seward.) Lowell Creek originates in the ice fields of the rugged Kenai Mountains, producing from one to three severe floods per year. Until the Diversion Tunnel was constructed in 1939, large quantities of  More...

An amazing array of invertebrates (animals without backbones) live within Homer's intertidal zone-between the water's reach at high tide and the water's edge at low tide. All you need is a pair of rubber boots and a tide book to explore their world.

Stop at the turnout to photograph this beautiful hanging glacier high on the mountainside.

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Ken Tarbox is your guide to this area. Ken's a retired fishery biologist for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. He's lived in the area for 32 years and wouldn't change a thing about it. 

Above Homer, up East Hill and right on Skyline Drive a mile and a half (a beautiful drive along the bluffs overlooking Homer), watch for the Wynn Nature Center, managed by the Center for Alaskan Coastal Studies. You can stroll in the wilderness among the beautiful flora and watch for wildlife or take a tour guided by a well-informed naturalist.

This tiny town along the Sterling Highway may be known as “North America’s Most Westerly Highway Point,” but it has another, lesser publicized claim to fame: this is where locals love to come fish.

In the spring, it’s king salmon, followed by Dolly Varden and silver salmon in the summer; in the fall, you can catch steelhead until freeze-up.

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Lawing was once named Roosevelt. “Alaska Nellie” purchased a cabin there in 1923 and later married Billie Lawing of Seattle. Together they ran a lodge and trophy museum that became a featured stop for Alaska Railroad passengers. Nellie loved to tell stories and her guests enjoyed her tales of daring and adventure on the Last Frontier.

The Keen-Eye Nature Trail is .75 miles long through a wooded area with a side trail leading down to Headquarters Lake. The Centennial Trail provide an additional 1.9 mile loop through a wooded area with further opportunity to view wildlife in the area. There are three basic options on these refuge trails. First and easiest is the 0.3 mile (one way), "accessible with assistance,"  More...

Heading south, a pullout on right-hand side offers views of Sixmile Creek. This is a popular spot for whitewater rafting tours, with most rapids being class IV. Tours are offered by Nova River Runners.

This spot, about a mile outside the town of Seldovia, offers big views that stretch out to the mouth of Kachemak Bay and even to Cook Inlet.

 Across the Inlet, you can also see the Pacific Ring of Fire, including Mount Illiamna and Mount Redoubt, each standing at10,000 and 11,000 feet. Even though they're some 75 miles away, on some days they seem like they’re  More...

Stop at the Scenic View RV Park for a breathtaking view of four volcanoes. Mt. Iliamna, Mt. Redoubt, Mt. Augustine and Mt. Spurr. These smoldering mountains are part of the pacific “ring of fire” with Mt. Redoubt erupting as recently as March 2009. Look for the interpretive sign to learn more about Alaska volcanoes.  

The City of Seward is the historic town where the Alaska Railroad got its start. It was the original headquarters of the Engineering Commission, those pioneers that were tasked with the construction of the rail line.

As the Seward Highway approaches Girdwood, travelers can see the remains of trees whose roots were swamped with salt water and killed during the 1964 Earthquake. Portage was devastated when much of the ground along Turnagain Arm sank five to nine feet. At high tide, the town that once lay at sea level was now under water. The ruins of buildings in the water are testament to that  More...

If you're a bird watcher, you'll love this half-mile trail of Aspen and Spruce forest. Get out your binoculars and see which birds are out there. 

The Jesse Lee Home for Children is the second of three child welfare institutions in Alaska to bear the name. The first was established at Unalaska in the Aleutian Islands in 1890. The home was moved to Seward on Resurrection Bay in 1926. Following damage to the home in the 1964 earthquake, the Jesse Lee Home was relocated to its present location in Anchorage in 1965.

Choose this site and you have a good opportunity to spot some "charismatic megafauna." Moose and caribou can often be found grazing along this oilfield service road, which runs adjacent to some prime wildlife habitat.

Drive a steep dirt road right up into alpine tundra terrain, rising from pristine white spruce forest onto tundra-covered hillsides surrounded by mountain ridges and rocky peaks. Camping is optional.

Check out this salmon-friendly habitat and learn why so many salmon spawn here annually. 

A facet of life in Homer that can be watched on television is the "Deadliest Catch" about commercial crab fishing in Alaska's icy waters. Co-captains Johathan and Andy Hillstrand have produced a new book about their adventures, Time Bandit: Two Brothers, the Bering Sea and One of the World's Deadliest Jobs. Anyone who has fished Alaska’s waters, whether winter or summer and for any species, know that it is a challenging and risky profession.

When people visit Homer, they may like to spend a day or two going “across the bay”— taking a boat or air taxi across Kachemak Bay to explore the quaint villages that straddle the line between towns and wilderness.

Here you’ll find 375,000 acres of forest, fjords, mountains and ocean. You can hike along 40 miles of trails, fish for salmon or rainbow  More...

Having trouble being efficient with all your resources? You could probably take a lesson from the ecosystem found here. 

Homer is known throughout Alaska as the state's premier artist community, home to dozens of galleries and artists. You'll find a convenient cluster of galleries worth visiting along "Gallery Row," the stretch of Pioneer Avenue between Main Street and Lake Street. Here are three we like.

Picture Alaska (448 E. Pioneer Ave.) features original paintings and fine art  More...