Shipping to Alaska

[wargowsky]

Any good advise for shipping gear and food to Alaska? Airline rates are insane. UPS and USPS aren't much better. Is there a cheaper way to get a couple hundred pounds of gear/food up there without paying $300-$400? I realize that I could cut weight by buying food in Anchorage (instead of shipping it), but I'd hate to waste a day buying and repackaging food when I could be climbing. Any advise?

[xhen]

I'm originally from AK and used to ship a pallet of stuff to and from college. It's not too bad.

 

Boyer Barge Lines (Northland Services) or Alaska Marine Lines (AML) are your ticket. They both have offices in Seattle.

[John Frieh]

Buy it in Ancourage or Wasilla. Unless you haul major ass to Talkeetna (assuming you're headed into DNP) you rarely fly the same day you get into Talkeetna. Even if you do chances are there are climbers in front of you waiting to fly. Might as well spend the day shopping/packing and planning (hoping) to fly the next day.

[Maxtrax]

Also, for getting your stuff back to the lower 48 you can often get cheap freight with Lynden on their back-carries because they're coming south mostly (or entirely) empty anyways.

[xhen]

Oh yea, forgot about Lyden.

 

AML and Boyer mainly service SE AK, where I'm from

[wfinley]

You can ship freight... but it's not really worth it unless you have more than 500lbs. Plus with freight you run the risk of it taking longer than they say (avg. time estimate is 2-8 weeks) and have to deal with picking it up at the port which is a major pain. As John said - just buy your food up here. About the only mega-chain we don't have is Trader Joes.