History Location Getting Here Fun Facts
While Kodiak is probably best known for its legendary Kodiak Brown Bear, this ‘Emerald Isle’ is also famous for its world-class fishery and phenomenal hunting.
Simply put, there is no other place in the world that offers the quality fishing, hunting, and wildlife viewing opportunities... Kodiak Island is truly the outdoorsman’s dream! Kodiak’s untouched wilderness touches the soul of everyone who sets foot on this island and its beauty is sure to draw you back.
Kodiak is home not only to the world’s largest bears, but it also produces enormous salmon and halibut, as well as the largest trophy Sitka Blacktail. With lush green forests, crystal clear streams, and snow-capped mountains, anyone who sees this scenic wonderland appreciates why it is called Alaska’s Emerald Isle.
Kodiak has rich history dating back 7,500 years, when the island was first settled by the Alutiiq, a coastal people related to the Aleuts. The Alutiiq lived off of the land, subsisting primarily on Kodiak’s salmon, halibut, and whale. Many artifacts including oil lamps and arrowheads are still found all over the island and date back to the early Alutiiq establishments.
The Alutiiq people thrived on Kodiak Island until the mid-1700s, when Russian merchants and fur traders arrived in search for valuable sea-otter pelts and new fishing grounds. After seeing Kodiak’s rich natural resources, the Russians named it the capital of their Russian Colony in Alaska. Large-scale commercial fishing operations began in 1882, when the first salmon cannery was built on the Karluk River to process the legendary sockeye runs.
After the Russians sold Alaska to the United States in 1867, many American entrepreneurs migrated to Kodiak to continue commercial fishing operations. The island’s commercial fishery was primarily dedicated to salmon, but starting in the 1950’s, large-scale King Crab fishing began to flourish, and within a few years, the island was known as the King Crab capital of the world. By the mid-1970s the King crab harvest began to decline and most crabbing moved west to Dutch Harbor. However, many of the boats on ‘The Deadliest Catch’ are still based out of Kodiak.
Today, Kodiak’s economy is still based around the fishing industry, with an abundance of commercial and sport fishing operations.
Kodiak Island is located directly south of the Alaska mainland, roughly 250 miles from Anchorage. The body of water separating Kodiak from the mainland is the Shelikof Strait, named after the Russian merchant who founded the first colony in Russian America (Alaska). Directly across the Shelikof is Katmai National Park, famous for its brown bears and spectacular scenery, with stunning glacier lakes and untouched wilderness.
Please see our wildlife viewing section and photo gallery for scenic pictures of Kodiak, Katmai National Park, and Glacier Bay.
Kodiak is actually the 2nd largest island in the United States and has a total population of roughly 14,000 people. Only Hawaii covers a larger area than Kodiak.
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Kodiak Legends Lodge is located in Larsen Bay, a small town roughly 60 miles southwest of Kodiak. Larsen Bay is efficiently accessible only by airplane or boat, as there are no roadways through Kodiak’s untouched wilderness – (a crazy friend of ours did the hike and it took him 21 days by foot!)
The best way to get to Kodiak Legends Lodge is by taking a quick 25 minute flight from Kodiak, through spectacular scenery where you are likely to see Sitka Blacktail Deer, Mountain Goats, and Kodiak’s Legendary Brown Bear.
Guests at Kodiak Legends Lodge should schedule flights into Kodiak (ADQ), which has seven daily flights from Anchorage served by Alaska Airlines and ERA Aviation.
After arriving in Kodiak, guests should walk 50 yards (just across the airport parking lot) to ‘Island Air’ to catch either a charter aircraft, or one of several scheduled flights to Larsen Bay. After arriving in Larsen Bay, our staff will pick you up at the runway (or the beach in front of the lodge if arriving by floatplane) and bring you to the lodge. The Larsen Bay airport is a 2-minute drive from the lodge.
• Second largest island in the United States
• Home of the Kodiak brown bear (population of 3,000), which is the world’s largest carnivore
• Largest Coast Guard base in the United States
• Twice the size of Texas
• Has more than half the world's glaciers
• A halibut has both of its eyes on one side, though when they are born the eyes are on either side and one migrates over as the fish matures.
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