Only Kayak: A Journey Into The Heart Of Alaska

by Kim Heacox

Finalist for the 2006 Pen Center Usa Western award in creative nonfiction.

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir, Travel, Adventure, Nature, Outdoors, Environment

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Kim Heacox is the author of more than a dozen books, five of them published by National Geographic.

He’s won the National Outdoor Book Award twice, first in 2015 for his novel Jimmy Bluefeather, the only work of fiction in 25 years to win the award. And again in 2020 for his memoir, The Only Kayak, as an “outdoor classic” (originally published in 2005).

He writes opinion-editorials for The Guardian in celebration and defense of the natural world, and lives in a small town in coastal Alaska with his wife, Melanie, where they support the emerging Glacier Bay Leadership Program within Tidelines Institute. Learn more about him at www.kimheacox.com and download the Jimmy Bluefeather book club guide at westmarginpress.com.

Reviews

[Astin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book startled me. First - the author's voice. Kim is fully and completely open as he describes how a place brought about his metamorphosis. His honesty and authenticity commanded my attention. Even more impressive is his conviction. Kim describes how his experiences led to him becoming a 'conservationalist,' and he doesn't mince words about the sadness and challenges that came with standing on those convictions. This story has kept me up at night since I finished reading it. The courage it takes to stand on that line moved me. Kim lost some important friendships because of those convictions. That place were two people can't see eye to eye...where it is impossible to span the divide between opposing convictions - is deeply sad - but at the same time, profoundly courageous.
Finally - this story strikes at something deeply personal - it gives voice to a collection of my experiences and musings regarding life in Southeast Alaska and our relationship with the natural world. It resurrected memories of hypocrisy as I witnessed a culture that once lived with deep respect for the land, but today has clearcut and raped that same land in the name of profit, leaving an ugly wasteland. Today, that same drive for profit has depleted our oceans and rivers, and I am a part of this process. Big halibut used to be the norm when fishing around Prince of Wales...but are now the exception. How many salmon did we happily fill our freezer with...only to sit there until freezer-burn took over because we took too many. How many good people and their families depend on livelihoods that do not respect the land that sustains us?
In all, this is a profound book that touches some deep and difficult subjects. But his sometimes self-deprecating tone left me laughing-out-loud, and his touching insight into the side of human-nature that is profoundly generous left me tearing up. This is an incredible book for anybody who has considered their relationship with the natural world, or who considers nature their playground.

[Lori · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best books I have ever read.

He insightfully questions what it means to be a part of modern society but still long for open spaces, to experience wildness, to be a human in the midst of a world so inhuman.

It's one of the most profound works of philosophy and poetry I've encountered in a coming of age story.

He somehow manages to capture the stunningly visual landscape of Alaska into a verbal dialect that is a conversation with the reader but it's so astoundingly thoughtful that you feel like you are reading a photograph. I can't describe this the way I want. He takes you on a journey of discovering self inside a changing landscape that is a mirror image of the inner psychological, emotional, and spiritual questions we all try to understand. He manages to illuminate the mystery and wonder of Alaska.

From the first time I came to Alaska and became bound under her spell I have been at a loss to describe the reality of it to my friends and family and now I can easily recommend they read this beautiful memoir by a man who truly gets what it means to be here and why it is so hard to describe the immensity of this vast north land and he does it more articulately and eloquently than I ever could.

[Peter Beck · Rating 4 out of 5]

Have you ever wondered what that national park ranger collecting your entrance fee and warning you about the wildlife is really thinking and dreaming about? Kim Heacox begins his life in Alaska as a young seasonal ranger in Glacier Bay. There is a good chance two of the people who heard his cruise ship lecture were my maternal grandparents. He blossoms into a naturalist and conservationist whose photographs are every bit as amazing as his writing.

I was drawn to “The Only Kayak” for the same reason Heacox is drawn to the kayak: It is a unique way to interact with our world. Your are more vulnerable to the capriciousness of mother nature while at the same time exposed to her creatures on their turf. Two of my most unforgettable experiences have been kayaking off the coast of Maui with a pod of dolphins leaping through the air and with a raft of sea otters using rocks to open shells in Monterey Bay.

The fact that “The Only Kayak” is about so much more than just kayaking is both its greatest strength and weakness. I love the way Heacox weaves together his adventures with “geotheomorphology,” local history, photography, literature and the Beatles as music therapy. What could be more awesome than swapping John Muir and F. Scott Fitzgerald quotes with a new friend while on an epic kayak journey? How he saves his future wife’s life on a later trip is even more amazing.

Unfortunately, the second half of the book gradually loses steam as Heacox increasingly focuses on his environmental activism, which I found tedious after a while. Even Heacox becomes profoundly bored at a meeting with the park superintendent. Getting married and finding regular jobs leaves Heacox and his friends wistfully staring at maps of places they wish they could explore.

Heacox has a follow-up book on Denali, but he relates some of those experiences in “The Only Kayak” and I have had my fill of his environmental activism. I haven’t been able to find the right book with his photography. Instead, I want to learn more about John Muir as well as his relationship with Teddy Roosevelt. I am not sure how close they became, but close enough for Muir to ask TR when he was going to outgrow his "childish habit" of killing all the wildlife he encountered. Douglas Brinkley’s “The Wilderness Warrior” might just fit the bill.

[Lorraine · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book, specially as I was in Glacier Bay around the time I was reading it. The author has a beautifully descriptive style which I really enjoyed. At times it went on tangents which were interesting and informative so I really appreciated them, a few times they dragged on a bit. But all in all, specially if you’ve been to the area, or are planning to, this book will cause you to appreciate Alaska and Glacier Bay even more.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun foray into the mind of a ranger and his backstory. Came for the John Muir vibes and stayed for the story

Dragged on a bit but was a cool read and made me want to go camping and get out and explore

[Richard]

From the January 2012 issue of Backpacker magazine: Required Reading:

From the first sentence—"I live in the sunlight of friends and the shadows of glaciers"—this book is a uniquely descriptive and often-gripping tate of Heacox's life in Glacier Bay, Alaska. The book spins around a dichotomy I find so compelling: Outdoor adventure is about finding natural wonders, far from civilization, but it's also about the people you seek it with.
          —Michael Lanza
           Northwest editor

[Donny Burns · Rating 5 out of 5]

Valuable and gripping insight into what is arguably Americas most beautiful frontier, via the words of a man who is beyond talented at capturing the imagery, beauty, excitement, power and essence of the land. Kim’s documentation of his time as a ranger, a friend, husband, and many other roles is done in a beautiful humble way. His input on environmental politics is both inspiring and hilarious, as he explains encounters with those inexperienced, under exposed, money hungry, or just plain dense. Additionally, it cannot be stressed how well he captures Michio Hoshino’s life, impact, and who he was as a person. Kim is an authentic genuine man who writes as such and is generous enough to let us into these experiences. I look forward to reflecting on this book during my next solo kayak trips.

[Patricia · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Only Kayak gives you an compassionate, yet factual, look at what Alaska, specifically Glacier Bay, was like before the first cruise ship came gliding in. I will be on one of those cruise ships this summer, and this book has given me the opportunity to look at Alaska as it was, and as I hope it always will be.

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Never mind the children not yet born who would prefer a meadow to a mall.”

Reading this book gave me mixed feelings. Not about the book itself. I loved it. You see, I’m heading to Alaska in a couple weeks. It’ll be my first time. I’ll only have enough time to explore a tiny sliver of an immense and wonderful place. As a naturalist I’m excited beyond belief. Yet my excitement is tempered. Leopold was right: “One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds.” Well he was partially right. Reading this book made me feel not so alone.

What will I feel when I first set foot in the Tongass? I fully expect (hope for?) joy and awe. The ancient immensity of the temperate rain forest, the huge trees, the aroma of the forest….what about when I see my first Alaskan clear cut? I know what those look like. I’ve hiked through these dead zones and seen them from the road where someone has tried (in vain) to hide their ugliness behind a narrow row of trees.

My upcoming trip stayed in the back of my mind as I read Heacox’s masterpiece. Sadness and guilt joined and intertwined with my hopeful anticipation with each turn of the page. Sadness that the beautiful places on earth, those we would call “wilderness” are disappearing as the juggernaut of economic development continues inexorably until there’s nothing left to destroy. Maybe we could say what’s happening today to the Alaskan wilderness is what already happened in the lower 48.

I’m thankful for the beauty that I’m sure I’ll see in Alaska. But it’s all relative and it’s finite. I feel guilt as I drive my car to and from town. Filling the tank each week with the blood fuel that drives the greed that drives the destruction. I suppose we all have a balancing act to perform.

Ultimately I’m thankful for this book. It’s a beautiful blend of Muir, Thoreau, Leopold and others. It’s a story of friendship and beautiful places. A story of adventure and an elegy for a world we may slowly be losing. It’s context for my trip and for how I think about the world. Finally I’m thankful that I’m not alone in my feelings.

The book was published in 2005. I wonder what the author would add.

[Coates · Rating 4 out of 5]

Alaska book #9: Heacox explores Glacier Bay in this book, at times as an explorer, a philosopher, a preservation activist, and a self-critical poet. The book is part memoir, part nature writing, part manifesto. Heacox is an idealist, drawing influence from throughlines like The Great Gatsby (the last page), the Beatles, and his photographer friend Michio. The book is really a love song with stories sprinkled throughout, covering a lot of the same terrain as his novel, Jimmy Bluefeather. I enjoyed the heart behind the book, including his acknowledgement of his own complicity in the problem of access to wilderness areas. 

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I feel a strange kind of kinship with Kim Heacox. His writing is beautiful and has a way of putting into words all the emotions and feelings rattling in my brain and heart in a way I can never clearly do. This book is thoughtful, made my heart hurt, made me happy, cherishes relationships and connection of all kinds, pays honor to bears and trees. It's a beautiful book and y'all go read it and then go read everything else by him. Thank you for writing this book.

[Janine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this book during and after my trip to Glacier Bay, Alaska which made it that much better!

[heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

The perfect book for an Alaskan cruise!

[Sue Combs · Rating 5 out of 5]

When forced to choose a favorite book, this is the one that most often comes to mind. I’ve read it multiple times, along with every other book Kim Heacox has authored. Magical.

[Roland · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every once in awhile I come across a book that I wish I could rate as 6 stars. This is one.

[Thebookiemonster · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was beautifully written and inspiring. It is very quotable and I underlined a lot of passages. You learn less about Alaska itself and more about glaciers and John Muir, so Coming into the Country is a better intro to Alaska book. This is more of a poetic and inspiring individual account of a person's experiences there, which apply to all of us and our relationships with the wilderness.

[Ryker Hurst · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s difficult for me to write a review of the book in which Heacox rambles through his life in Southeast Alaska as a park ranger at Glacier Bay National Park & Preserve and later as a free-range environmental activist. As best I can tell, most reviews center not on their appraisal of the book as literature, but their reaction to his life as such. I made the mistake of reading other reviews, and poor ones universally mention that the second half of the book is “political” which in this context means, as best I can tell, explores themes the reader would rather not discuss in any way, or at least not from this perspective. Heacox is not political, incidentally, unless “honestly motivated in goodwill about something meaningful” is your definition of political. My problem is that I worked as a park ranger for the National Park Service at Glacier Bay, my name is Richard as is Heacox’s blond, daring ranger sidekick, and I happen to be all of those things too, so I just thought the book was accidentally about me even though it’s not. I read the book long after I left the Park Service, only dimly aware of its existence at the time. Perhaps that was the best order so as to have my memories unsullied by the Richard of the book. This isn’t a travel guide, so you need not prepare for travel or time in Southeast Alaska by reading it. It is at any rate a personal, meditative read, not meant to prepare you, but meant to explain a trip already taken by someone else, so you can undertaken a random trip all on your own. You need not take his, and you need not agree or disagree with his, umm, politics, just appreciate he has things he cares about. If you don’t, you’re not living a full life I suspect. The wonderful thing is, southeast Alaska is the kind of place that will pull care and compassion from you, because it will turn your attention from merely being focused inward and project it unto a world beyond you, which in a place like this you cannot ignore, and nothing is better than that (I am amused some reviewers call this turning of attention to the larger world a mere working out of “white male privilege,” as if the best thing to do is to remain mired in self-regarding belly-button gazing). Reading about someone else’s journey, even to the extent it is a rambling one, is fascinating and beautiful, ethically and spiritually.

[Kathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author’s writing paints a beautifully accurate view of the unspoiled riches of the Inside Passage and the truly majestic grandeur of the Alaskan landscape. It is a book that one could read in a single setting, traveling vicariously through his words. He does tend to get a little overly indignant and IMHO unrealistic about finding resources to balance supporting those who live and rely on the area while preserving it responsibly. I had the feeling his idea would be to only allow those he deemed worthy to explore the wildness he so loved - but I empathized and understood the tension and heartbreak of seeing some of that sacred beauty exposed to risks that may forever ruin it. It is a difficult conversation and process that continues today.

[J Wahl · Rating 5 out of 5]

After the first 20 pages I wasn't sure that I would like this book. I am glad that I stayed with it. I loved this book. My only opportunity to see Glacier Bay was on board a massive cruise ship in 2010. While I never felt comfortable on board that huge floating city with thousands of people, I did appreciate and will forever be grateful for the opportunity to see the landscape of this area at a distance. With this book I was able to get up close and imagine what it might have been like to take part in the landscape. The book reinforces my impressions from 2010 that Alaska and Glacier Bay are spectacular places.

[Brigette · Rating 3 out of 5]

PopSugar 22 #43 - Palindrome

My opinion of this book vacillated the entire time I was reading it. Part conservationist manifesto, part love letter to Alaska, HUGE part bromance with Michio Hoshino (Kim spends much more time talking about Michio than about Melanie, his wife....), and a fair dash of white male privilege. The writing can be beautiful but there were definitely parts where I rolled my eyes fairly hard. I did enjoy learning about Michio's work and will probably get one of his books. Worth reading if you want lovely descriptions of Alaska and can tolerate some of the rest of it.

[Cheryl · Rating 2 out of 5]

Blue minarets of ice tipped away at precarious angles. Others stood as fractured fins and flying buttresses two hundred feet tall, certain to fall any day. Any minute. A light rain washed the ice and rock, the kayak and me. Delicate streams dripped off my hat into Reid Inlet where each droplet beaded diamond-like before joining the great whole of the silt-laden sea. Birds called in dialects of kittiwake and tern.

I always compare any Alaskan memoir with Richard Nelson’s The Island Within, I can’t help it. That book defines lyrical and deep writing. And they were friends, so I wonder if Heacox ever accompanied Nelson on his island forays. This was fine, a little dated, and it had some interesting stories, and it was a look at Alaska partly through the lens of being in a kayak instead of climbing mountains.

I glided forward, thinking that a kayaker's passage through Glacier Bay is more like that of light through water, a refraction, a silent process of changing—and being changed-with each pull of the paddle and chant of the rain, each soft landing of snowflake on icefield. You hear the idioms of ice, the crystals cracking, the glacier groaning. You brace for the icefall that doesn't come because the glacier has more patience than you. You think about geologic time, the depth of an epoch, the tiny tenure of a single human life.

He explained that to understand geomorphology was to see the Barth as clay in a potter's hands, wet, formative, spinning. He spoke of plate tectonics and granite continents as if they were clipper ships that traveled the floors of the seas with their sails trimmed, making only a few inches per year, but floating nonetheless. Lighter rock on heavier rock. Erosion and deposition weren't just processes; they were ceaseless crusades wherein water sought to smooth the surface of the Earth while tectonics and volcanics conspired to wrinkle it.

Life wasn't just respiration and reproduction; it was friction and force, frost and rain, stream piracy and misfit rivers, intrinsic thresholds and laminar flows. He spoke past midnight until I thought my head would explode. Like a medieval peasant bent over his dirty potatoes, I had bumbled through the years unaware of the long past and future, never seeing the world as anything other than fixed. unchanging, unchangeable. To accept change in my own family and town, in me, my friends, and that girl down the street who was never very pretty but look at her now, I could do that. But to see the Earth as something on a potter's wheel would require some convincing.

Some three hundred years ago René Descartes put his arm in water and saw how it bent—or appeared to bend—and said it was proof that we cannot trust our senses. Maybe I was halfway to Reid Inlet. Maybe the sun, four hundred times larger than the moon but four hundred times farther away, was in fact the same size as the moon. Each occupied the same portion of the sky. Maybe we humans are the paragon of species, the paradox too, and Tlingit elders are right when they say ravens know more than we ever will. Maybe Descartes had rocks in his head. The West Arm of Glacier Bay is nothing compared to the open ocean. But it's big water when you're out there in a kayak, sitting low and eating stale crackers and watching lenticular clouds form over ten-thousand-foot peaks. On clear days, afternoon winds can rise quickly and fill the bay with rows of white, foaming waves. It's best then to paddle early in the morning.

When speaking of landforms, Dr. Folsom often used the verb composed. To him the Earth was a Beethoven symphony, a Chopin étude, something spherical, divine. All the better that it was an unfinished symphony, a work in progress. All you had to do was go out there and see it.

So there I was, impossibly small and alone, beginning to relax in my smallness and aloneness as I rode the laminar bare back of Glacier Bay and told myself I didn't have far to go. The risk officer would have laughed the way a joker laughs. The water was smooth as skin. I tingled with fear, excitement, gratitude, a deep sense of... what? I wasn't sure.

[Brandi]

Favorite quotes:
So we paddled through the rain and the waves to be the only kayak, to prove to ourselves (more than anybody else) that we could do it. We were ready for it to end, for the hot showers and chocolate ice cream waiting in Bartlett Cove. We also wanted it to last forever, the lean living and cherished illusions, the rhythm of the paddles, the music of the water, the feeling of coming home to a home we’d never known before.

Wilderness areas are places to explore deeply and yet lightly; to exercise freedom but also restraint, to manage but also leave alone, to bring us face-to-face with a dilemma in our democracy. How do we convince people to save something they may never see, touch, or hear?

In America, we love “the road” and write about it all the time. Some of our best literature and music comes from the empty highway. But they’re not empty anymore. Roads run both ways, and the greater challenge, I believe, is learning to stay rather than leave, to stand still and listen to one elegant piece of land where the trees whisper and the light is just right after the rain, and you say, “Okay, this is it. This is where I will live, love, and die.”

Every time it snows I receive a letter from God. Was it okay to believe that? Was it okay to regard the Sistine Chapel as no more beautiful than new-fallen snow on a western hemlock, how the crown of the tree bowed as if... well, in prayer?

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lots of people seem to really love this book. I thought it was good, but not that wonderful. Sometimes the author struck me as being a little self important, and I didn't find most of his insights that new or inspiring. I did like learning a lot more about Glacier Bay, a place I've never visited, and I have found myself thinking about some of that information as I travel in other places, which is always a good sign.

I'm sure that part of the reason that I didn't love this book is that I listened to it as an audiobook. Perhaps some of my feelings about the author's attitude come from the way it was read. Also, the mispronunciations in the audiobook really drove me crazy. The name of the town Gustavus probably occurs at least 100 times in this book, and every time it is pronounced incorrectly. Pronouncing Valdez wrong (that happens too) is more understandable, but even Seward gets mispronounced. It seems to me that audiobook narrators would learn to pronounce the names of places in the books they are reading, but I don't think I've ever listened to an Alaska audiobook in which all the place names are pronounced the way locals pronounce them. I believe the name of the author's good friend Michio Hoshino is mispronounced throughout the book. And, weirdly, the reader pronounces the word "frontier" as "frawntier" repeatedly.

[Heidi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thanks to my friend Elaine for bringing her favorite book to our book club. I relished Kim Heacox's memoir as he conveyed his love for Glacier Bay, and his urge to keep it wild. He shared stories, not just about the place, but especially about the people. Kim’s buddy Richard was quite a character, introduced in the opening chapter and present throughout the book, along with Melanie, Hank and Kim's photographer friend, Michio.

Heacox had some great turns of phrase in the book - the one that first comes to mind is when he said, “I’m a Marxist & Lennonist (Groucho & John)", which was a good callback because he had conveyed his love for the Beatles several times in the earlier narrative. A cruise ship enrichment coordinator, once introduced him as Jim Peacock, conversationalist – a funny malapropism.

The author is a huge proponent of not overusing natural spaces. He made the case against America's notion of manifest destiny and illustrated several paradoxes within the National Park Service. I appreciated the tidbits about John Muir and his little dog Stickeen.

[Renaissance · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nature, kayaking, Alaska--just three facets of this book which attracted me.

The book focuses on the Glacier Bay area, but its wider focus is the effect of consumerism, materialism and development on natural areas, including those managed by the NPS.

It honestly states the tensions between preservation of nature and access to it by the public, as well as the importance of commercial fishing versus the necessity to control it and maintain fisheries.

Change is inevitable, whether from melting glaciers, the rise and fall of human structures, the presence or absence of wild animals. The big question is how do we preserve our "wild" areas while still making them available for appreciation and enjoyment by the public.

The book held my attentions, partially because it was written by a person who is about my age and has many of the same values as I do, although he has done much more than I to actually advocate for the preservation of nature.

[Reney · Rating 4 out of 5]

"The Only Kayak" by Kim Heacox is a non-fiction, memoir about this man's time in Alaska. He has documented his experiences living and working in the Glacier Bay Area. The book starts in the late 70's and it includes his wide-range of thoughts and feelings about Alaska, the wilderness, conservation, the importance of the friends he's made and just life in general. If you like that type of story which I occasionally do - then this is a good one!

I have always been interested in Alaska although I've never been. This book helped to deepen my appreciation for it. Someday, I will kayak on Glacier Bay myself. Will I be the "only kayak"? No, most likely not! Because Alaska is changing, but then again so am I. At my age, I would not want to be the "only kayak" and would feel much safer with a tour group.

That's OK. Respecting and managing change within your environment and yourself is part of life.

[Jacob Wechsler · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just visited Alaska and purchased this book while on my trip. I fell in love with alaska in just a week and am so glad I got my hands on this incredible story.

Kim is a great writer with a beautiful soul. He does a fantastic job of describing Alaskas purity while making the readers understand that it is ever changing. The threats posed to Alaska and its natural scenescapes come from all directions. The struggle is the balance of it all, as it is in nature.

I loved the numerous other books he referenced within the story, I would love to read some of them one day. The stories he tells and his reflection on life makes this book one of my favorites I've read in a while.

Beautiful story. Beautiful writing.

[Agnieszka Woźniak · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kim Heacox writes a thought-provoking book about environmental issues affecting mostly Glacier Bay, Alaska using an eclectic mixture of personal stories, quotes from literature (such as from "The Great Gatsby"), and discussion of environmental issues to weave a story about Alaska. How does one share the wonder of a place such as Alaska without inundating it with tourists? Not everyone can kayak through the wildness. But if only those fit enough to hike and kayak in a remote place such as Alaska can enjoy its beauty, who will speak to protect it from commercial exploitation? The personal stories and photos keep this from being just another ecologic treatise.

[Brian Miner · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Only Kayak surprised me. At times making me reminiscent, joyful, hopeful, sad, and melancholy. It touched and called to my soul in a way not many books have. The author is at times a staunch defender of the environment, and at other times a philosopher; sometimes wanting Alaska to himself, and then turning around and wanting everyone to be able to experience it. It is a story of life, live, friendship, and adventure. But mostly it is the tale of the glaciers and their connection to each of us. You are missing out on a great experience if you don't read this book.

[Doranne Long · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kim Heacox writes beautifully and shares powerful messages and stories, including the willingness to be the only kayak, or to tent camp with bears, which involves life-or-death risks. He shares paradoxes, including taking photographs and writing books, which are then printed on paper made from trees, about conserving our natural resources. And yet, he also shares a sense of humor, which makes us laugh, and not give up hope, as we grieve our changing world, which includes the melting of glaciers and loss of wilderness.