Denali to Seward

After leaving Denali National Park, we started towards Seward, Alaska.

We first spent two nights at K'esugi Ken Campground in Denali State Park.  This is a fairly new campground with large, open pull-thru sites and electrical hookups.

The next night was a no frills spot (but the price was right!)

Our next stop was a return to Williwaw Campground off the Portage Glacier Road.  Williwaw also has large, paved pull-thru sites.

Middle Glacier can be seen above the campground

Next to the campground is a salmon viewing station where we saw spawning Sockeye and Chum Salmon.

While staying at Williwaw, we took a day trip over to the small port town of Whittier.  The only land access to Whittier is via the Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel.  This tunnel was completed as a railroad tunnel in 1943.  By 2000 the tunnel had been modified to provide access to both trains and highway vehicles.  The tunnel can only carry one lane of traffic, so the directions alternate every half hour.  Auto traffic is delayed if a train is passing through the tunnel.
 

Most of Whittier's roughly 200 residents live in the Begich Towers building.

We ate lunch at Varly's Swiftwater Seafood Cafe.
We had eaten at the same cafe in 2005 and it is still operated by the same family.

The boat launch ramp is very steep, so a tractor does the launches and retrievals.

For our return trip, we had to wait for this train to pass through first.