Kenai Peninsula Points of Interest

Seward Water­front Park extends from the small boat har­bor to the SeaL­ife Cen­ter and con­tains paid tent and RV camp­ing, play­grounds, a skate park, pic­nic­ing areas, beach access, and a trail lined with his­tor­i­cal landmarks.

Quick: what’s the longest com­bined rail and high­way tun­nel in North Amer­i­ca? It’s the Ander­son Memo­r­i­al Tun­nel, and you’ll dri­ve through it on the scenic and his­toric dri­ve to Whit­ti­er. The Kenai Moun­tains-Tur­na­gain Arm Nation­al Her­itage Area is a place whose val­leys and moun­tains, com­mu­ni­ties and peo­ple tell the larg­er sto­ry of a wild place and a rugged fron­tier. This audio guide gives you the inside scoop on its fas­ci­nat­ing his­to­ry. You’ll…  ...more

You can hike right up to Seward’s Exit Glac­i­er and feel the dense blue ice while lis­ten­ing to it crack­le. Walk the low­er trail to get a good pho­to in front of the glac­i­er face. Or, choose the more chal­leng­ing 7‑mile round-trip Hard­ing Ice­field Trail. There is a short ranger-led walk dai­ly at 11am and 3pm, from Memo­r­i­al Day through Labor Day. 

Crys­tal-clear Willi­waw Creek and its bank-side trail sys­tem in Portage Val­ley at the head of Tur­na­gain Arm offers excep­tion­al­ly good con­di­tions for watch­ing spawn­ing in action. Coho, sock­eye and chum salmon con­verge on the creek as it winds through the brushy flats begin­ning in mid-August, with some late-arriv­ing fish still present after first frost in the fall.

Behind the town of Seward is a moun­tain whose first peak ris­es 3022 feet. For­mer­ly Low­ell Moun­tain, it is now called Mt Marathon.

Spencer Glac­i­er ris­es 3,500 feet in a stun­ning, nat­ur­al ramp from a lake of roy­al-blue ice­bergs in the Chugach Nation­al For­est just 60 miles south of Anchor­age. It’s a fam­i­ly-friend­ly recre­ation des­ti­na­tion fea­tur­ing camp­ing, hik­ing, glac­i­er explo­ration, nature walks, pad­dling and sight­see­ing. Maybe best of all: You have to take a train to get there!

A stretch of exposed bedrock south­east of Anchor­age along Tur­na­gain Arm was gouged and pol­ished by mile-thick glac­i­ers dur­ing the last ice age. The grooves appear as smooth chan­nels carved into the rock itself by almost unimag­in­able forces. Some are sub­tle, like rip­ples, and hard to see. Oth­ers are large enough to lie inside on a sun­ny afternoon.

The Homer Spit is a long, nar­row fin­ger of land jut­ting 4.5 miles into Kachemak Bay. Dot­ted with busi­ness­es, the area caters to vis­i­tors and pro­vides numer­ous recre­ation oppor­tu­ni­ties, from fish­ing and beach­comb­ing to shop­ping and boating.