Head north to Alaska for a quarantine break.
A couple of years ago my wife and I took a cruise to the lower ports of the 49th state. It was one of the most memorable trips of my lifetime.
The snow-capped mountains went past the balcony on the ship much too quickly. On excursions from the ship we saw glaciers melting into the sea, sea otters lolling in the waves, and seals sunning on the rocks. In a cove we watched as a humpback whale made a corral of bubbles to capture fish, and a pod of orcas swam past the boat.
Doesn’t the idea of getting on a cruise ship to Alaska with a few thousand of your closest friends sound great right now? Maybe not.
So head to the North Country virtually. Just in time for an invasion of armchair explorers, Travel Alaska has put together a website full of adventure. The 25-minute video of bears frolicking in a river is worth the price of admission (free).
But wait, there’s more. You can watch a huddle of walruses sleeping on a beach, or try to spot the snowy owl before it moves. There also are Alaska-based backgrounds to use at your next meeting on Zoom. If all this inspires you to start planning your next real vacation, you can order travel guides from the website.
Closer to home, Travel Texas, the state tourism website, wants to tell you where to go. It also has a list of six barbecue joints that ship the national meat of Texas and seven virtual tours, including a 360-degree view of the interior rooms of the Alamo.
1,496th in a series.
Follow “Day Trips & Beyond,” a travel blog, at austinchronicle.com/daily/travel.
This article appears in April 24 • 2020.
