In June of 2023, we set out on an epic 4-stage adventure to Alaska. We are national park nerds and wanted to visit Gates of the Arctic and Kobuk Valley National Parks, which are two of the least visited parks. We flew into the Seattle airport where we had a 14 hour lay-over, then flew to Fairbanks, Alaska, arriving at 2:30 am. We had one bag that had ripped, but we always carry thread and a glue gun…lol

We had booked a bush plane flight with Golden Eagle Outfitters. The weather was foggy in the morning, so we did not meet our pilot, Jesse, until noon. Once on the plane were set-up with head phones and we headed north.

The scenery was amazing.

We flew across the Yukon River. This is actually our 5th “crossing” including our previous Alaska adventures.

The vastness of Alaska…

Flying into Gates of the Arctic National Park, we flew through the mountain valleys and up and over the mountain tops.

Gates of the Arctic National Park, is where the headwaters of the Noatak River are located. It flows 400 miles to the Chukchi Sea.

Our plane landed on a gravel bar in the middle of the Noatak River. How cool is that!!

Since there are no visitor centers in the northern Alaskan parks, we took a small board with us. The park was established in December of 1980 and gets 3000 visitors each year. It covers 13,832 square miles.

Our next stop was Kobuk Valley National Park. It is famous for it’s sand dunes. Our plane landed right on the sand.

Kobuk Valley NP was created in December 1980 and covers 1.75 million acres. It receives approximately 15,000 visitors each year.

Sand Dunes in Alaska that are 40 miles ABOVE the Arctic Circle. They are 20,500 acres in size.

We were supposed to land at Noatak Preserve but the clouds settled so we couldn’t land, but we flew over it and took a picture.

We couldn’t get over the size of the area we were flying over. It brought into perspective how big Alaska is and how diverse the landscape was. And we couldn’t forget Willie P, the mascot of William Penn University in Iowa.

On one of the snow fields we flew over, we saw a black bear. It was obviously a big bear as we were flying at 1800 feet. We also saw numerous moose, including a mama with twins.

Our stop for the night was Kotzebue, an Inuit village on the Chukchi Sea. It was officially incorporated in 1880 and currently has a population of 3100 residents.

We stayed at the Nullagvik Hotel, the only hotel in Kotzebue. We had a great view of the Chukchi Sea.

We took a short nap, then ordered dinner, which for being in a remote location was very good. After dinner, the clouds had cleared so we took a walk along the beach at 10:30 pm. Being the end of June, the sun only skimmed the horizon and never truly set.

We decided to walk along Front Street and learn the history of the area. The town covers 26.5 miles and has numerous zinc and lead sulfide mines in the area. Jim just had to touch the Chukchi Sea…yup it was cold.

We got back to our room just before midnight. It had been a long but very eventful day. We were excited and exhausted as we went to bed. It was a good thing our room had good shades as the sun shone on our window all night.

The next day we would be heading to the Bering Land Bridge National Preserve.