AMHS Ferry from Whittier, AK to Bellingham, WA
Although not technically a road trip, the ferry ride from Alaska to Washington is an amazing experience. It starts in Whittier, Alaska and crosses the Gulf of Alaska, proceeds down the Inside Passage of Southeast Alaska, and end in Bellingham, Washington. It takes 6 days, and stops in a couple of ports along the way, you can’t leave the ferry port, but it is fun to see the different towns. I was moving a vehicle from Anchorage down to Seattle at the end of April 2021, and really the only two options to move a vehicle from Alaska are driving or the ferry. The drive is over 2,200 miles, and while beautiful, I was planning on taking another vehicle down later in the summer, it’s also about 40 hours of driving, and I was happy to let someone else do the driving by taking the ferry for the first vehicle.
The first portion of the trip was from Whittier to Yakutat across the Gulf of Alaska. We left Whittier in the evening, spent the night and next day crossing the Gulf, there were some spectacular views of the Alaska Range. We arrived in Yakutat for a stunning sunset.
Ferry in port at Whittier.
Beautiful sunset in Passage Canal on the way out of Whittier.
Mountains along Passage Canal on the way out of Whittier.
Mountains along Passage Canal on the way out of Whittier.
Alaska Range mountains while traveling along Prince William Sound.
Alaska Range mountains while traveling along Prince William Sound.
Search light with Alaska Range mountains while traveling along Prince William Sound.
Beautiful sunset when we got to Yakutat.
Beautiful sunset when we got to Yakutat.
Beautiful sunset when we got to Yakutat.
Beautiful sunset when we got to Yakutat.
Beautiful sunset when we got to Yakutat.
We left Yakutat later that evening and spent most of the night traveling the last hundred and fifty miles before entering the Inside Passage on the way to Juneau. It was pretty cloudy in Juneua, and we didn’t leave the ferry, so there aren’t very many pictures of the Juneau area, but we did get a nice view of the Mendenhall Glacier. After spending a couple hours in Juneau, we departed for Ketchikan en route to Bellingham. After leaving Juneau it got pretty wet and rainy, there were pretty low laying clouds and it was fairly foggy, so I explored the ferry and looked for interesting things to photograph while trying to stay somewhat dry. This is pretty normal weather for the inside passage and I don’t think you can travel a couple days through the region and not get rained on, so I tried to make the best of it.
Mendenhall Glacier.
Mendenhall Glacier.
Commercial fishing vessel near Juneau.
Rope on cleat.
Search light in wet, foggy weather.
Search light in wet, foggy weather.
Empty outdoor walkways.
Rope with cleat (long exposure)
View behind ferry.
View behind ferry (long exposure).
View behind ferry (long exposure).
Wet day outside, view from window.
Car deck.
Wet drop.
The weather cleared up for the final portion of the trip through Canadian waters and into Bellingham. All in all it was a great trip. I got a two berth cabin for myself, it didn’t have a bathroom, but it worked great for me. On the days that were rainy and dreary I watched a lot of movies, the food was alright. The ferry was pretty empty, Covid was still raging and masks were required. I think a lot of people were staying away from travel, which made the trip nicer in some ways, but it was somewhat isolating as well, everyone kind of stayed to themselves.
Rope on cleat.
Rope on cleat (black and white).
Commercial fishing vessels in Inside Passage (black and white).
Commercial fishing vessels in Inside Passage.
View from outdoor walkways.
Rainbow over islands.
Rainbow over islands.
Sun rays and rain squalls.
Search light with islands.
More beautiful sunsets.
More beautiful sunsets.
Starboard bow (long exposure)
Starboard stern (long exposure).
Port stern (long exposure).
Stern of ferry looking toward port (long exposure).
Stern (long exposure).
Bow (long exposure)
Sunset (long exposure)
Search light coming into Bellingham.
Sunrays at sunset near Bellingham.