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Glacier Kayaking Tours in Seward

Why Aialik Glacier?


There are many incredible glacier day tours in the Seward area. Aialik Glacier, Holgate Glacier and Northwestern Fjord all offer kayaking opportunities in Kenai Fjords National Park. It is our goal to help you find out which tour is right for you and why we have chosen to focus our energy on the Aialik Glacier Day Trip. 

When visiting Seward, the two most popular things to do are boat tours and kayak tours. Most boat tours are on large vessels and involve observing, but not actively engaging with, the landscape of the fjords. On our Aialik Glacier Day Trip, we provide each group of 6 guests with their own knowledgeable guide and travel out to Aialik Bay on a 24-passenger water taxi. This wildlife-viewing boat tour tends to be a highlight of the trip for our guests.

Although all of Kenai Fjords National Park is rugged and enchanting, one of the most important factors in your choice of paddling trips should be location and travel time. Aialik Glacier is the largest and most actively calving tidewater glacier in the park, so its expansiveness is matched only by its gregarious rumbling as giant chunks of ice sheer from its face. 

Check out the video to learn more about our Aialik Glacier Day Trip!

What about Holgate or Northwestern?

Guests will find discounted trips offered to Holgate Glacier and Holgate Arm because this area is closer to Seward, and therefore cheaper to access. Holgate Glacier is significantly smaller than Aialik Glacier and doesn’t calve as often, so we’ve found that it doesn’t provide a comparable guest experience. If you’re already putting in the time and resources to make the trip out to Kenai Fjords National Park, we recommend heading to Aialik Glacier for the most awe-inspiring and memorable glacier experience. 

We have chosen not to run day trips to Northwestern Fjord because the water taxi ride to access this area can be up to 6 hours roundtrip, which is too long for most people. If you’ve come all the way to Alaska to go kayaking, let’s get to the paddling! We do run multi-day trips in Northwestern Fjord; since it takes so many resources to travel that far, we like to stay a while once we’re out there.

Both Holgate Arm and Nothwestern Fjord are much smaller and more narrow fjords than Aialik, so there is not as much room for everyone to find their own slice of wilderness. In comparison, Aialik Glacier is over one mile wide at its face, and thus on a scale of its own (look for the kayakers in the image at the top of this page!).

After 40 years in business, and many tour offerings over the decades, Kayak Adventures has consistently had the best guest feedback from our Aialik Glacier Day Trip. This is our number one factor in deciding where to focus our energy, and we look forward to sharing this place with you.

  • Most Popular
From $499

Our most popular trip combines an intimate wildlife boat tour through Kenai Fjords National Park with the opportunity to kayak near Aialik Glacier, the largest and most actively calving tidewater glacier in the park. View wildlife, learn about this important ecosystem, and get inspired to join us in protecting Alaska.