"Go where the tourboats cannot go" Wildlife, glaciers, wilderness Personalized, value-added tours Biologist-guided Whittier Departure Prince William Sound, Alaska

Accessible Boating Adventures

Our boat's custom design features allow anyone with impaired mobility to enjoy the advantages of a smaller (30') boat, with a minimal need for assistance. In the harbor you board and disembark via the boat launch ramp. Out in the wilds of the Sound, you may as easily go ashore anywhere with a reasonably firm beach. For photos, click here.

The boat's accessible features . . .

• easy boarding from boat launch ramp with minimal assistance

• ADA-standard 32"-wide boarding ramp and cabin doors

• low coamings (door sills)

• 8 ' X 10' heated cabin, with big windows, low enough for easy viewing from a chair

• deck anchors to secure 1 or 2 (squeeze 3) chairs in cabin, 2 on stern deck

• strategically-placed grab bars

• Elevated porta-potti and privacy curtains convert 7' X 8' rear deck into a spacious toilet, or leave the back curtain open and enjoy the view!

• easy beach access with minimal assistance

Accessible boating possibilities

Any of our day tours are possible for those with impaired mobility. In addition, the more adventurous may want to charter our water taxi service to reach either of the two accessible public use cabins in Prince William Sound. Or, let us help you design a custom tour that includes logistics support and transport from a cabin for sightseeing, wildlife watching, or fishing.

Accessible U.S. Forest Service cabins

Accessible public use cabins, administered by Chugach national Forest, are located at Harrison Lagoon and Green Island. The cabins are sturdy wooden structures with oil and/or wood-burning stoves and simple wooden bunks, furniture and counters. However, as a commercial operator, we cannot reserve these public use cabins for you. You make your own reservations on-line by visiting Reserve USA. For general information about the Sound's several Forest Service public use cabins, click here, or call the Glacier Ranger District at (907) 783-3242. For more specific information about the two accessible cabins, read on.

Harrison Lagoon Cabin. This cabin is located about 25 miles by boat from Whittier. It is situated on a small peninsula, with one side facing the open water of Port Wells, and the other a shallow lagoon that completely drains on minus tides. Since it's along the very popular route to Barry Arm/Harriman Fjord, it's often booked by kayakers and others weeks in advance. There is no water available at the cabin, but with a small boat, one may reach several streams in the lagoon.

Accessible features at Harrison include wooden ramps to ADA-standard doors and a crushed gravel path leading to an accessible outhouse. Access from beaches on both sides of the cabin for wheelchairs are not truly accessible without one or more AB persons helping move a chair across large cobbles on one sidfe, and through a marshy area and up a short, but moderately steep path on the lagoon side.

Green Island Cabin. The cabin is located about 60 miles by boat from Whittier. It is situated in old-growth forest at the head of Gibbon Anchorage, a 2-mile long maze of islets and protected back channels, in a wildlife-rich area that also has good halibut and salmon fishing. The covered front porch has a sweeping view across 50 miles of open water to mainland mountains on the eastern side of the Sound. The other side faces Gibbon Anchorage. The cabin's deck is protected from rain by an overhanging roof. Boardwalks lead to an accessible outhouse, and from the cabin deck 100 yards or so through the woods to the beach. From the Sound Access one can literally roll directly onto the boardwalk, and right on to the cabin.

Dee and Verne enjoy a family of Bald Eagles on their way ashore at remote Kelly's Cove. In 1996, Dee was the first physically challenged woman known to visit a remote beach in the Sound. She also added several seashells to her collection.. SEA photo