Planning an Alaska Girls' Trip
Add Alaska to the top of your list for an unforgettable girls’ trip! Whether you're a seasoned angler, hiker, or cross-country skier, or your ideal vacation includes spa time, relaxation, and local cuisine (or all of the above!), you can enjoy an incredible Alaska getaway with your favorite ladies! Looking for women-only tours? We’ve got ‘em. Fine dining and drink? Easy! Outdoor retreats, gorgeous accommodations, hiking, and A-lister worthy spas? Well, that’s just standard around here! With local craft breweries, rejuvenating wellness escapes, outdoor recreation, world-class dining, and year-round beauty, an Alaska getaway with your favorite friends will be nothing short of outstanding!
Alaska Tasting Tours
Alaska Wine Tasting
Enjoy sampling our unique wine offerings, while taking in the beautiful landscape that made those flavors possible. The endless sunshine and fresh, wild berries across the state give our wine unique flavor complexities. Blueberry, black currant, and blackberry are often incorporated into the fermentation process, yielding incredible and irresistible results.
Areas like Soldotna, Homer, and Anchorage are known for their local berry-infused wines and mead and offer tours at various wineries. In addition to winery tours, there are also annual festivals celebrating fine food and drinks across the state, while wine walks at local museums allow you all to enjoy the rich history of Alaska while sipping on locally inspired wines!
Alaska Brewery Tours
For a delicious beer or spirit, you'll find over 50 breweries and distilleries throughout the state - from Kodiak to Fairbanks to Juneau and beyond. Anchorage has the densest concentration of breweries in the state, which you can explore on several brewery tour options, either by van or - if you're feeling a little more adventurous - by bike. Brewery tours are also available in communities like Juneau, Skagway, Ketchikan, and Fairbanks, where you’ll learn about the process of brewing and distilling, and why Alaska yields such a unique and delicious drink.
Tour seasons vary by region and company, but if your travels take you here during the winter, do be sure to check out our Alaska Craft Brew & Barley Wine Festival usually hosted at the Dena’ina Center in Anchorage at the end of January!
Culinary and City Tours in Alaska
When it comes to culinary tours, you won’t be disappointed. With multiple James Beard Award nominees in tow, Alaska’s restaurants are world class. It shouldn’t be a surprise since we have some of the freshest, most unparalleled seafood in the world! If you're looking for a foodie component of your trip (or why not make it the main attraction?) you’ve come to the right place!
Culinary tours are plentiful and will allow you to try all types of cuisine! Ketchikan, also known as Alaska’s first city, offers a local historic tour of the town where local restaurant and pub stops are included. If you’re traveling through the Inside Passage, Juneau also offers incredible culinary tours where you can sample local cuisine and wine at some of the best restaurants in Alaska! Visitors to Anchorage can join a half-day downtown walking tour or a full-day culinary tour that mixes local fare with insights into Alaska’s history. With so many culinary tours offered throughout the state, you and your friends will certainly get your fill! And don’t forget city tours, where you can enjoy everything from food to wildlife!
Resorts and Spas in Alaska
Alaska is known for combining the best of what the outdoors offer with the finer things in life. Alaska spas boast incredible recreational settings, whether you want to be on a wilderness lake, be surrounded by mountains, or be close to natural hot springs. Local spa packages usually complement their surroundings and can include massage, dining, and aesthetic offerings – all within luxurious settings!
Spas and Fishing: A Unique Alaska Package!
Wanting a spa experience, but also hoping to get some Alaska fishing in? Look no further! You’ll be able to catch your fish and enjoy it too! Whether you’re a seasoned angler or a newbie, many fishing lodges and wilderness lodges offer stunning spa packages, for those looking to enjoy both the rugged and refined side of Alaska! You and your friends can enjoy a day of guided fishing out in the stunning natural oasis Alaska offers, and come back to spa treatments, luxurious accommodations, and fine dining in the evening. Some lodges offer women-focused packages as part of your booking as well!
Hot Springs in Alaska
Don’t forget about our amazing hot springs! Here, incredible spa-like opportunities are available right in the heart of nature’s best scenery. Just outside of Fairbanks is the Chena Hot Springs Resort, where you can soak in the rejuvenating hot springs and enjoy post-soak massages and many other luxurious packages. Enjoy a day out dog sledding (in winter or summer!) and relax in the hot springs in the evenings. If you’re here between mid-August through mid-April, be sure to add watching the northern lights to your evening activities!
Ski, Snowboard, and Spa
In the Anchorage area, skiing, spa day, and fine dining collide into one glorious setting in Girdwood. Be sure to check out the world class Nordic Spa at the Alyeska Resort that boasts relaxation pools, hot tubs, steam rooms, saunas, massage, and more – nestled in the forest at the base of the mountain, surrounded by outstanding slopes and scenery.
While the resort offers fine dining, shopping, and rental equipment for the slopes, the local town of Girdwood also offers great food, trails, and local artisan shops for you and your friends to explore year-round. In addition to downhill skiing, winter visitors can take part in spectacular cross-country skiing, fat tire biking, and snowshoeing. Summer visitors enjoy access to a wide variety of hiking and biking trails, activities such as rafting and helicopter tours, and some fun festivals, including the Girdwood Forest Fair and Blueberry Festival.
While Alyeska is certainly the most famous, it’s not the only skiing and snowboarding region in the state! In Juneau, the Eagle Crest Resort is a great option for skiing and snowboarding as well, while the Fairbanks area boasts the most northerly ski lift in North America at Ski Land Ski Area, along with Moose Mountain Ski Resort.
A Walk on the Wild Side: Wildlife Viewing in Alaska
Talk about an amazing selfie opportunity – there are so many wildlife viewing options for you to enjoy in Alaska! For guaranteed wildlife viewing, visit one of the state’s wildlife conservation and rehabilitation centers. In addition to exciting up-close views of Alaskan animals, you’ll be supporting important conservation and wildlife protection efforts in the state – definitely a win win.
The Alaska Raptor Center in Sitka is well known for its rehabilitation and veterinary services of Alaska’s most impressive birds. Tour the center to see all varieties of local birds up close. While in Sitka, don’t forget to stop by Fortress of the Bear and get up close with Alaska’s rescued bears!
If you’re in the Southcentral region, be sure to check out the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center where you can see everything from moose and musk ox to foxes, lynx, brown bears, and more! No trip to Seward is complete without a stop at the Alaska SeaLife Center, home to sea otters, Steller sea lions, marine birds, and more – viewable from both above and under water.
A glacier and wildlife day cruise is a fantastic option to view marine wildlife in their natural habitat. From Seward, Whittier, Homer, Juneau, Gustavus/Glacier Bay, and many other coastal communities, you can hop on board a fantastic full-day or half-day tour of the seas. You’ll see whales, sea otters, puffins, porpoises, and more! You can even get up close and personal with glaciers on some tours.
To view bears in the wild, Katmai National Park and Preserve in the Southwest region and Denali National Park in the Interior region offer the perfect opportunity in the summer months. Local wilderness lodges are also available in the areas to immerse yourself in the landscape and spend more time viewing the magnificent wildlife.
If you’re looking for something a little milder, be sure to check out the Reindeer Farm in Palmer, where you can feed and even pet reindeer, moose, and more; or Running Reindeer Ranch in Fairbanks, where you can take a walk with a reindeer and even participate in some reindeer yoga!
Revel in the Outdoors
There’s really no shortage of the incredible outdoor opportunities that Alaska offers anyone that visits – and your girls’ trip is no exception!
No boys allowed: Women-only tours
Enjoy the solace of nature with your close friends, surrounded by women who lead and inspire. Women-only tours are available throughout the state. You’ll enjoy hiking, kayaking, glacier touring, wildlife viewing, and so much more, with only women in your group. Many women-led tours also include lodging, from luxury accommodations to backcountry camping.
There are a wide variety of multi-day women-only tour options to choose from ranging from a few days to two weeks. Many itineraries are available with various companies, so you can have your trip planned out by a local expert and hostess with the mostest! Tour operators center their trips around various activities like hiking, national parks, rafting, backpacking, and wellness. Most tours offer a nature focus, where being active and connected to the outdoors is at the heart of the tour – all within a women-centered and led group.
Locally-owned companies Backpack Alaska and Ascend Alaska lead women-only backpacking trips to some of the state’s most beautiful backcountry destinations. For anglers looking to spend time with fellow fisherwomen, both Women’s Flyfishing and Wild Strawberry Lodge offer women-only fishing trips. Arctic Dog Adventure Co., a woman-owned dog sledding company based out of Fairbanks, leads multi-day dog mushing trips just for women, and Squid Acres Kennel in Cantwell, also women-owned, offers a women's mushing retreat for a truly unique Alaska adventure. Adventure 60 North based in Seward offers multi-day kayaking and camping adventures in Kenai Fjords National Park just for the ladies.
If you're looking for a healing and rejuvenating experience, Alaska’s beauty and serenity is certainly the place to go. Women-only yoga and wellness retreats are available throughout the state. Ground yourself and find balance in the beauty of Alaska’s unparalleled majestic surroundings, while connecting with not only the women around you, but with yourself! A variety of companies offer these retreats in year-round, pairing daily yoga practice with activities like hiking and kayaking in summer and snowshoeing and northern lights viewing in winter. Workshops, incredible cuisine, relaxing accommodations, massage, and many other healing offerings are available with these packages.
Outdoor Adventures
Here are some additional options for you and your favorite gal-pals to add to your Alaska girls’ trip:
- Dog sledding tours
- Fishing charters
- Biking
- Backcountry expeditions
- Guided camping and hiking tours
- National Parks Tour
- Day Hiking
- Thru-Hiking
- Sightseeing tours
Support Women-Owned and Operated Businesses
Have your girls’ trip come full circle by supporting Alaskan women-owned and operated businesses! Alaskan women are tough, smart, and independent, and many of the state’s best tour companies are led by these local ladies. From dog sledding to rafting to wilderness lodges and cabins, check out our list of just some of the women-owned tourism businesses in Alaska.
There’s no girls’ trip as epic, relaxing, inspiring, and just plain extraordinary as one in Alaska. You and your friends will share a lifetime of memories in just a few days!
Alaska: AKA Your Next Adventure
Where will your Alaska adventure take you? Order our Official State of Alaska Vacation Planner and plot your course.