DON'T CRUISE to Alaska - What Alaskans Know that You Don't

so I heard you're planning a trip to Alaska and you don't know if you should add about these to your itinerary me not worry we're gonna let you in on those Deets here real quick let's go [Music] oh hey hon I'm making some chai tea if you want some yeah please oh heck yeah thank you even got my dad joke one going yeah that's the good stuff perfect for a rainy day hey I also got my sweatpants on got my awesome uh little slippers on we're good to go let me just have a seat my favorite place in the RV so Valdez I'm just gonna say it yes you should plan a trip to Valdez if you're gonna be in Alaska it's a big deal and we're gonna tell you why you should visit Valdez and then we're also gonna give you some tips on visiting Valdez and what to look out for oh well and I think we should also talk about finances because that's always a plus like how much we spent in RV parks the excursions we took and that adds up quickly let's just go along with all that as we proceed please here's a fun fact right off the get-go did you know that Valdez is actually known as the snowiest town on Alaska arguably in the United States of America but that depends on what resource you're looking at it just gets a lot of snow okay I don't make the rules no kidding well let's just we were gonna haul our butts from toke all the way to Valdez in one day and though it looks doable on a map we decided to split it up we actually stayed at Glen Allen at an RV park there and this decided a two-hour Drive in the Valdez should be fine a two-hour Drive in the Valdez turned into a four hour drive which includes stops breaks and all the construction what what do you have to say about all the construction babe the construction Alaska has plenty of it no halt in the construction whatsoever no matter where you go they're always trying to improve the roads and I gotta give it to them my heart goes out to them because it's just never ending when you get here with your RV it expect some rough roads especially in these construction sites where they have the road torn up to nothing it's literally just dirt patches and you're going down these gullies and back up you're maneuvering in very tight spaces it just is all part of the adventure the coolest part though I have to say is we were in no rush which is great and that's something we want to encourage you guys as well if you're planning on doing the drive to Valdez Alaska do not rush enjoy the journey enjoy the construction take the time to just get out stretch your legs and look around because it is beautiful the drive itself is an attraction gonna want to feel rushed that day you're going to want to take your time pull over when you feel like you want to pull over have your cameras ready wear your contact lenses if you're blind like me it is like driving through Jurassic Park world is that what it's called Jurassic Park world uh something like that the best part I feel like about the drive was you got to see a free Glacier along your way wasn't that called Worthington Glacier I believe as we were driving about it's about 30 miles outside of Albee's you got to see that on your way out and the views were phenomenal not including the surprise waterfall we pulled up to what was that all about that snuck up on us quickly I did read about it in the mail post book and I'm like there's supposedly a really cool waterfall that we should maybe check out but we weren't playing on stopping we were saying let's drive to it from Valdez because it's about 13 miles from Valdez itself and we were like ah we'll see it another time I was driving the truck and like something made me pull over I couldn't help myself I had to quick like get on the radio to tell Keith and rainy or pull it over right now you got the Drone out and got some really cool shots I just stood there like here's the best part plenty of parking alongside the road there so if you're driving a big fifth wheel you'll have plenty of room there how many times you're on the road and you see something nice and there's no parking you're like well wish I could have stopped and saw that bridal veil Falls y'all did it well you did it right with all the free parking I was able to whip the Drone up it was a 600 foot waterfall I think something incredible like that definitely worth a stop to see and of course if you miss it you can just drive back from Valdez it's only 13 miles away come on Carl the best part about the drive that day is that we had all Sunshine all sunshine on the radar you know who else is on Full Sunshine let me show you hi you're full of sunshine did you go to Valdez did you go to Valdez in Alaska can I help you by the way I don't think I say this enough if you guys enjoy our content make sure you hit the Subscribe button it's free and also hit that notification Bell right next to the Subscribe button because a lot of y'all are reaching out like do you even make videos anymore Hank's family if you hit the Bell it will make sure YouTube will share every video with you that's a warning okay so the drive to Valdez obviously is incredible but actually finding a spot in Valdez it wasn't as bad as you thought it would be there's plenty of RV parks we stayed at Bearer paw RV park but the coolest part was they had an adult only section right on the water I'm not trying to brag but I'm trying to say You must go there if you're ever in the area okay but I will share negative Nae Nae is coming out and I will share the experience we had at check-in there that was on when we went to check both of our RVs in now I made this reservation for Bearpaw 2 back in April and uh everything was all good we paid a deposit but when we got there uh the guy was like we don't have anything he was very confused about us being there lo and behold he had sights for us and they were Waterfront at the adult Park but I'm just saying that was kind of a weird experience there so I'm not sure what advice to offer you in that scenario but sometimes they don't have your information I guess but besides that our RV sites were real nice backed up right into the harbor Waterfront seagulls Galore the seagulls and just in case you're wondering we paid sixty dollars a night we had full hookups 50 amp back in sight to set the record straight there's tons of RV parks and Valdez so you probably won't have a hard time finding a spot to stay to set the tone however what Valdez is like think of fisherman Town plenty of fishing lots of boats sea life it's incredible if that's what you're into being on the water right on the water we got to sit there and watch the boats go back and forth which was really neat to see even better however was the time we got to jump on a bow and we're gonna get to that in just a second actually if you want something amazing to do while visiting there we'll get into it right now foreign [Music] can I just say how ah I judge myself so hard for putting those Snippets together for you guys because it makes us look like we have this amazing life this epic life but in reality it's just a bunch of footage with some music I try not to judge myself too much because I want you guys there to experience it for yourself nonetheless I'm pretty happy that I was able to capture all that with our own cameras Nene really came in clutch there with some amazing what was it dad jokes [Music] they act just like that stuff it seals the deal I think they ever kind of like get tired and hit a ceiling you get a ceiling you know like hitting a hitting a wall hitting a scene okay it's funny you talk about that little Montage with the music because I feel like the music really does it but what if we put this song to it [Music] or what about this song laughs or [Applause] every time go back to the original definitely hit up your local Glacier Wildlife Cruise that's in the area we did the Lulu Bell which is like well known I heard something interesting hun and uh somebody that I talked to that lives in Alaska said that this may be Fred's last year doing the Lulu Bell are you serious Captain Fred he was the guy that made the whole Cruise what it is the coolest part about Captain Fred is he's so down to earth he was 145 dollars a person to get on this like Glacier cruise and you think wow that's a little pricey but if we were out there for nine hours straight no word of a lie and sometimes cat Fred will keep people out there for like 10 11 hours we've seen it personally that's a long time and I don't prepared mentally done a boat for nine hour dress warm enough the sun was out that day which was a benefit that we got to see everything but we thought it would be warmer than what it was so distress in layers bring plenty of cash because they serve food on the on the ship we had uh salmon chowder soup we had muffins there were brownies in the evening they had all sorts of snacks he did not stop talking by the way we thought that he was on like a recording because he was talking and giving so much information we were actually inside the Captain's Quarters at one point and he's just holding a microphone he's just talking the whole time he is amazing wealth of knowledge give that guy a YouTube channel all right so what can you actually expect on the tour one of my favorite things was the amount of sea life we were exposed to sea otters sea lions humpback whales the best part was Captain Fred took you up close and personal to each and every one of them he did it in such a way well he just knows what he's doing he's been doing it for his whole life is what he explained and the craziest part was the amount of shots and exposure you had to this Wildlife was unlike other unlike anything I've ever seen in my life now skipping forward to the glacier itself this Glacier was exposed to an earthquake back in I think that late 80s or 90s it was like a 9.2 magnitude earthquake I'm not a hundred percent sure on the history but it really took a toll on this Glacier and we get out there and Captain Fred was telling us about the whole how it started here and then we proceeded in like it was Miles and over time this Glacier is breaking off into the ocean do you think these just fell you could see it is it that big display so he took us through these what it felt like the Titanic legit we are pushing through ice slowly and I think well we're close enough to the glacier right now cat Fred's like let's keep going he's like we might be able to sneak a little bit closer he just kept saying that and saying that I think he knew he was going closer he just wanted to like egg us on the vest was when there was like a legit little iceberg in front of us and people in the boat are like uh you're you're hitting there's a big clump of ice here and he just pushed it and broke it like out of the way no big deal Fred's just pushing icebergs out of the way the chill you felt as you got close to the glacier was just unreal and it definitely made a difference when you got away from the glacier so that is just something cool to experience like we were bundled up nice and warm and toasty and it was end of June hopefully the Lulu Bell is still available for you guys to do in the future but if not there's tons of other tours in different areas that do Glacier and Wildlife tours it's definitely something you want to add to your list while you're in Alaska were we looking forward to going out and having some local Cuisine yes my favorite place we went was the NAT Shack is a food truck kind of centered in the middle of town but with views of the harbor other places we really enjoyed eating at was the Stamp Mill for pizza and beer and the legendary Fat Mermaid I'll tell you what though every time we are getting food we always think to ourselves we got to film this because we want to show you guys like how delicious this meal looks and every time we don't because the food comes out and we're just like but how about that weather all weekend Valdez you remember how can I forget okay Valdez is known as being a really rainy place there's increased amounts of rainfall luckily when we hit it on the first day there with the Lulu Bell Tour it was crystal clear outside sunshine and it was amazing views but the rest of the week it was completely overcast cloudy and all the mountains were hidden so it's kind of bummed out about that but it gives us a great excuse to go back and visit Valdez in the near future all right I do have a question for you however Nene was there anything you disliked about Audis that's a good one I would say it kind of felt like you were uh trapped on an island in a way like once you're in Valdez you're in it so being there for a week was probably good enough there's enough resources to get you through the week but I don't know if I'd be able to like be in Valdez for a long period of time now listen there is a lot of people always asking how could we support you Hanks well here's a big thing it's always watching our videos and believe it or not we have a plethora of videos for you to catch up on I'm gonna throw a playlist up here for you to watch it will start you from the beginning and get you caught up till now we love you guys thanks for your support and we'll see you next Thursday bye guys

Channel: HappilyEverHanks

Views: 222,056

Keywords: Alaska, alaska cruise, cruise to alaska, Valdez, valdez alaska, valdez ak, ak, don't cruise to alaska, cruise, RV, happily ever hanks, the last frontier, should I cruise to alaska, drive or cruise alaska, rv alaska, RV living, travel, travel to valdez alaska, what to do in valdez alaska, driving to valdez alaska, alaska bucket list, alaska highway, alaska itinerary, alaska life, alaska travel, living in alaska, living in an RV, rv camping, rv life, lu lu belle valdez alaska

Id: _Z0yMlGU1Tw

Length: 15min 12sec (912 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 10 2023