Backcountry skiing on the Root Glacier, with Stairway icefall in the background. Springtime brings melt, opening a small pool of water on the glacier's surface. Cross country skiing, Wrangell - St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Click on the image to view a larger version of the photo.

Hey Folks

Here’s our Image of the Month for March 2010. Backcountry skiing on the Root Glacier one gorgeous spring day. This little blue pool of crystal clear water was simply too nice to pass up for a photo op.

Carrying a tripod allows me to set up for photos when I’m out and about by myself. I set up the shot, and visualize where I’d like to stand to make the composition. Sometimes standing a bit further away allows the photo to be more of a scenic shot, without the person being too dominant in the frame.

This is where a digital camera really helps, being able to review the shot in the LCD, as I’m not able to guess exactly where to stand. For example, I didn’t want my head here to merge with the horizontal line at the end of the glacier – base of the mountain in the distance, so it took a couple of tries to get it right.

Normally I wouldn’t leave quite as much room for the sky, but I wanted to give the image a bit more of an expansive feeling here, with more space. I also wanted to leave plenty of room for text, if the photo were ever to be chosen for a cover shot for a magazine or story. (more…)

Shower Camp Camera Cover from Alaskan Alpine Treks on Vimeo.

Hey Folks

I thought this video might be both entertaining and useful to visitors to the website. Here, Andy Seeger shows off his fashion-sense and creative ingenuity with ‘Shower Cap Hat’ – a cheap workable solution to protecting your camera gear from bad weather on backpacking trips. Backpacking is ALL about compromise; weight, bulk and space, durability, multi-use, etc … these are things to consider when packing for your trip.

Rather than carry an expensive and heavier camera rain cover, a cheap plastic shower cap fits perfectly. it’s lightweight, packable, durable, light and easily available. What’s more, as Andy says, you can even get water with it. (more…)

Snowshoeing through the forest in search of the wolf, Wrangell - St. Elias National Park, Alaska.

Hey Folks,

A week or 2 through the winter boreal forest hoping to find wolves is always a treat – whether the wolves show themselves or not. So far, no luck – they remain the mystery.

But what a treat it is to hear their howls, or find their soft tracks in the snow, and to know they too sift through the boreal forest. To enter the winter boreal forest is to enter the realm of the wolf – the home of Canis lupus. Few creatures can quite so vividly engage our mind and spirit like the wolf – so rarely even seen, yet so enmeshed in our cultural histories and stories.

I’ve walked I don’t know how many miles and waited hours, days, hoping for a glimpse, (more…)

Hey Folks,

I’ve been crazy busy trying to get the website overhauled – I hope you enjoy the new design. Fortunately, I’m a better photographer and backcountry guide than I am web coder!

Here’s a video I shot in Katmai National Park and Preserve, of a family a bears fishing in Brooks River while another young bear wanders around the scene – the young cubs get a little distraught, but ole mom is pretty undisturbed about it all. If you’re not a member of Facebook and can’t see the video, you can view the video on Youtube here.

Anyway, I thought I’d post this here just to keep in touch, and look forward to our Grizzly Bears in the Fall phototour coming in 2010. I’ve just added that html page, so be sure to check it out. I have 2 slide shows on there of new grizzly bear photos.

Cheers

Carl

Mountain Avens and Dwarf Fireweed, Hole in the Wall, Skolai Pass, Wrangell St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Click the image to view a larger version.

Hey Folks,

It’s always nice when a magazine editor wants your photo for their story, and you get published. But it’s WAY nicer when you get published in a magazine you enjoy, read and value. This image posted here is in the current edition of backpacker magazine, page 65 – full page vertical, which is nice. The image accompanies an article on backpacking “the Goat Trail”, in Wrangell – St. Elias National Park and Preserve. This was the first route I ever hiked in Wrangell – St. Elias, and definitely a favorite of mine, so having my image chosen to accompany the story represents much more than just another published photo and a check to me.

It’s also cool for me because a few of my friends are published in the same edition of the magazine. It’d be remiss of me not to mention Bret Edge, Jon Cornforth and Ron Niebrugge, all of whom are photographers I admire. T (more…)

Hey Folks,

This short video was taken on the Skolai Pass Phototour, fall 2009. We had a great trip, some great weather, some great people, and loads of fun. This particular afternoon we put in some miles hiking out along the Russell Glacier toward Mt Bona and Mt Churchill, to awesome peaks 16 000 and 15 000 feet high, respectively. The Russell Glacier runs right up to the north face of Mount Bona, and inspiring sight.

We had a fantastic hike, enjoyed lunch on the high flat plateau, and then walked back toward camp at Chitistone Pass for the afternoon, and to shoot the evening light on the mountains. And, I must say, we had a simply unbelievable evening, with gorgeous alpenglow on the mountain peaks. It was a lot of fun being in the right place at the right time for some photography. That doesn’t happen everyday, but when it does, it makes al those hours and miles worthwhile. (more…)

A grizzly bear charges up the river chasing spawning Sockeye Salmon, Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska.

Hey Folks,

NB: I’ve now added this trip to our regular webpages. By all means, browse this page, but also visit the page listed under ‘Phototours’ on the Trips section of the website. That page can be found here.

This coming year, 2010, I’m super excited to offer a new phototour to Katmai National Park and Preserve; we’ll be basecamping in remote southwest Alaska, photographing grizzly bears, dawn til dusk, for a week. Katmai National Park is home to some of the largest grizzly bears (or “brown bears” as they’re often called in that region) in the world. Feeding largely on salmon from some of the richest salmon runs in Alaska, the bears are magnificent creatures and there’s no better time to photograph them than in the fall. This trip offers an unsurpassed opportunity to photograph wild grizzly bears in a remote and brilliantly wild setting and promises some simply incredible photographic possibilities.

Schedule:

– Trip #1: Sept 19-25, 2010.

– Trip #2: Sept 26 – Oct 2, 2010

Price:

– Fully Outfitted Camp and Guided Photo Tour: $2675.00

-  Both trips (14 days): $4600.00

(more…)

School teacher Natalie keeps up with her reading on the Sanford Plateau trip, July 09, Wrangell - St. Elias National Park, Alaska.

Hey Folks,

Here’s a photo of school teacher Natalie from this past trip. We had a great walk across the Sanford Plateau in July. The weather was awesome, as you can, and we had an absolutely gorgeous evening after dinner up on the Plateau; the sun going down to the north lit up the entire region just beautifully. Natalie wanted some photos of her reading a book that she could show to her school students when she returned to teaching after the summer. I took a couple of her in front of Mt. Drum, and a few with the awesome west flank of Mt. Sanford as a backdrop. You can also see some of the glacial moraine in the valley below, a remnant of the receding Sanford Glacier. We hiked across the lower portion of the moraine, and then climbed up on to the plateau the following morning. It’s a steep climb, but as is the case so often with climbs like this, so well worth the effort. Once upon the plateau, the walking is easy, and the vast open range of tundra really a great place to visit.

This trek was a first for Natalie, she’d never taken on quite a trip like a backpacking trip in Alaska before, (more…)

A grizzly bear chases Sockeye Salmon through a stream, Katmai National Park, Alaska.

Hey Folks,

Well, the season has wound up tight, and I’m slowly getting back in to ‘office-mode‘ for the winter. I’ll try to write a ’summer backpacking wrap’ before too long, with some notes from the various trips we had this year. In the meantime, I’d like to mention a trip I’m planning for next year, 2010, that I’m WAAAAYYYYY excited about. I’ll be leading a photo tour to Katmai National Park in the fall, after the backpacking season. We’ll basecamp in Katmai National Park for a week, and photograph grizzly bears, also known as ‘brown bears’ in that particular region, all day long. For those of you unfamiliar with Katmai National Park, the region is home to the greatest population density of grizzly bears anywhere, and also some of the largest bears in the world. (more…)

Mt Sanford, Wrangell - St. Elias National Park, Alaska.

Hey Folks,

So summer’s almost here. I’m looking forward to some great trips this summer, and hopefully some good weather. The weather in Anchorage and across the state has been awesome this last month or so – sunny skies, warm days and clear nights. The trees are greening up fast, and the snow’s gone in the lower altitudes. It’s simply gorgeous here right now.

This photo is of Mt. Sanford, on the north side of Wrangell – St. Elias, from Gulkana, looking across the Copper River basin to the 16 237′ tall Mt. Sanford, as it catches the last rays of the day.

Cheers

Carl