Alaska was the site of my summer vacation this year—a week with two friends and thirteen other travelers on a fully-supported group trip, organized by Backroads, consisting of hiking, biking, rafting, kayaking, and camping. Yup, camping. Granted it was at very nice campgrounds in very nice tents that we didn’t even need to set up ourselves, but camping nonetheless. I’m not a camper—I spent nights at Girl Scout camp huddled under my sleeping bag with a flashlight and the latest issue of Vogue. But on our first night in Alaska, when one of our guides passed up a tent in favor of sleeping on the ground under a tree, I knew it was time to buck up. Roughing-it (well, pseudo-roughing it) in the 50th state would be fun.

And it was. Alaska is a seriously gorgeous place. Sweeping landscapes, towering mountain peaks, whales in the water, bald eagles on high. . . it was like an episode of Wild America every day. And with 17 hours of daylight to play with (the sun didn’t set until after 11:00 P.M.) there was plenty of time to take it all in. My compatriots and I soon got over the fact that, unlike in the city, we couldn’t order takeout for tent delivery in the wee hours, and started to appreciate everything that was around us. We met sinewy sled dogs who race miles in blistering cold during the Iditarod. We hiked next to glaciers and biked next to mountains. We flew between snowy peaks in tiny commuter planes. We kayaked on water as smooth as ice and rafted through churning rapids with names like Coffee Grinder. We ate our weight in granola bars.

We also learned some Alaskan anthropology from the very nice locals, who let us in on a little saying about the state’s population of single males: “The odds are good, but the goods are odd.” We can all chuckle about that from our comfy spot in the lower 48, where, yes, the goods can certainly be odd, but at least they’re in a pool deeper than the one spread across Alaska’s 580,000-plus square miles. I didn’t meet enough of that male population to determine if the saying is completely true, but it did give me pause when I romantically envisioned myself taking a year off and living in the wilds. (I have a feeling wayward bears might be the least of a single girl’s worries.)

Bottom line? Although I was ready for consistent hot water and exfoliation by the end of our week, I had a great time and would do it again. I’m more than ready for the next excursion and have the outdoorsy clothes, Gore-Tex-lined trail shoes, and raingear to prove it. I’ll probably still bring a Vogue, but progress has been made.

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This entry was posted on Monday, September 11th, 2006 at 7:26 am and is filed under Magazines, Friends, Travel, Vacation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.