Alaska Souvenir Shops

What can I say?  It was beautiful!!

For the first half of the trip I walked around in a euphoria, taking it all in, enjoying every sight, every sound, every smell.  I wanted to see everything I knew, loved and remembered!!

We were so blessed with a place to stay with a long time friend and a borrowed church van for our entire time!

I want to remember and share everything, so I'll be doing a series of posts on our Alaska trip.  My hubby was great and took SO many photos.  Although now we have the task of going through all of them!!  I guess that's a good thing as I relive the great time we had.

Our trip started out a bit crazy with a phone call the night before from the airline saying our flight was cancelled.  We were able to get booked on another flight, but our original flight was direct, this one was not.  We had some delays and scares that we might not all get on the plane, but we made it.

You know you're in Alaska when stuffed animals and totem poles are everywhere.

Poor Reegan left her beloved kitty blanket on the plane.  We had quite a few tears the first night, but I promised her we would find a replacement.  So Mr. Wolfy entered our family.

It's actually a husky sled dog, but hey?!  Name it herself, she will!

One of the top places I wanted to go was the Alaska Wild Berry Products.

A little shop started in Homer, Alaska years ago.  I remember visiting the shop every summer on our Halibut fishing trips growing up.  That's why it was definitely at the top of my list of places to visit.  In 1994 the owner expanded and the shop grew into quite a tourist attraction bringing busloads of tourists to it's Anchorage location.  

Inside the shop you can see quite an impressive chocolate fountain, thought to be the world's largest.

 As you can imagine, the whole store smells of chocolate!!  You can even buy several varieties to take home with you.

What started the business though were it's jellies and jams made from Alaskan berries....strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, cranberries, and many other Alaskan fruits like rhubarb and rose hips.

Bears are everywhere throughout the store!  This one was playing the piano!

These benches line the front of the store and you can hang out with some more bears!

It was a joy for us to take this trip with my parents!

During the summer the store extends to an outdoor park with cafe, ice creamery, theatre and you can pet some reindeer.  Sadly the park was mostly closed and we missed the reindeer.  They had just left 2 days prior, but we got a quick photo with this bear in the park.

They crack me up!

Another shop that is a must see is the Ulu Factory.

Are you wondering........

Ha!!

Well, an ulu is an Eskimo knife used to filet meat.  Here is my hubby using one after catching some halibut (which I'll talk about soon, I promise).

I loved the dog sled on the front porch!

So did my kids!

In the summer, you can take a trolley around.  Not sure where to, but I thought it was cute.

Inside the store you can find all kinds of Alaskan products.  Ulus, eskimo yo-yo (I got me a new one!), Alaska shaped cookie cutters, jewelry, ornaments and even bear hats.

Silly boy...

There are some other great shops in the downtown Anchorage area, but these 2 are definitely my favorite.

And that's not even the best part.  I can't wait to show you all the beauty that is Alaska!!  Mountains, ocean, waterfalls, wildlife!!  Soon, I'll share more!!

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