Sarah and I wanted our honeymoon to strike a balance. On one hand, we had to go somewhere mountainous and hike, but we wanted a touch of comfort to make things relaxing. We'd both wanted to go to Alaska for years (I'd been the previous year for work, but that was in Kotzebue, which doesn't count as mountainous), and it was time.

But first, we had a hike in Colorado to do. Our reception cabin in Twin Lakes sits under the shadow of Mt. Massive, the highest peak in the state. It was be a shame not to check that 14er of our list while we were right there! Plus, we had a time capsule of fine scotch and copies of our wedding vows we wanted to hide, to be respectively consumed and re-read to each other.

So with a hangover and lungs not really adjusted to the altitude we set off on a 13 mile roundtrip with 4,880ft of gain.

When it's the highest point in Colorado, you know the views are going to be amazing

24 hours and a couple of flights later and we were touching down in Anchorage. Our first stop was a B and B in Girdwood, only about 20 miles and 30 minutes from the middle of the city. The town is situated on a small plane just above a bay, surrounded by mountains. After some dinner and hot tub time, we crashed, ready to hit the trail.

After abusing our rental car up 8 miles of dirt road, we started up the trail to Crow Pass. We were going to do as much as we felt like of a trail that runs more than 20 mile over the pass to Eagle River. The very motivated with a car shuttle can do the the whole thing in a day, but we just wanted to get to the pass.

The lower elevations, below 1,000 feet or so, were dense brush, and we would learn this applies to all of lower coastal Alaska. But the reward for pushing through the bush was amazing tundra at ridiculously low elevations. Crow Pass is only about 3,500 feet, but looks like 12,000 in Colorado. Easier on the lungs!

This pass is part of the Chugach National Forest, which with Chugach State Park, form a beautiful mountain wilderness the size of some states right next to Anchorage. Our introduction to Alaska started off on the right foot. We could have spent our whole vacation hiking here, but we had the entire Kenai Peninsula to get to.

Glaciers...Right Outside of Town!