Ivanof Bay is a community on the Alaska Peninsula at the head of Ivanof Bay, an estuary of the Ivanof River that starts at an elevation of roughly 1000 feet (305 m) on the south flank of the Alaska Peninsula and flows generally southwest for 9 miles (15 km) draining a watershed of 15,545 acres (6,291 ha), about 57 miles (92 km) northeast of Sand Point and 13 miles (21 km) west of Perryville, Alaska. The village and river are named after the bay, which in turn was named after Cape Ivanofsky by William H. Dall of the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey in 1880. Cape Ivanofsky was named by Friedrich B. von Lütke in 1836 and is now called Kupreanof Point. The rocks surrounding Ivanof Bay represent Late Jurassic to Holocene sedimentary and igneous activity along an episodically active convergent plate margin. The river valley and the head of the bay are mostly filled with Quaternary alluvial deposits of sand and silt derived from the Meshik Volcanics that developed during the early Oligocene and late Eocene on the Alaska Peninsula north of the bay and the Kupreanof Peninsula along the western shore of the bay. The eastern shore of the bay represents rocks of the Tolstoi Formation that developed during the middle Eocene to late Paleocene and consists of sedimentary rocks characteristic of shallow marine deposits such as a river delta.

Ivanof Bay is relatively small and south-facing, and due to its narrow shape, it offers protection from most storms in the Gulf of Alaska. Archaeological evidence suggests that Unangan Aleut and Alutiiq peoples have occupied this part of the Alaska Peninsula for approximately 9,000 years. They subsisted by hunting marine mammals and fishing for salmon, halibut, octopus, and gathering shellfish. The head of the bay was the site of a historical fox farm and a portage trail led from the head of Ivanof Bay to Humpback Bay to the east and was used to avoid rounding Alexander Point in small boats. Another trail called the Granville Portage leads through Smoky Hollow and connects Ivanof Bay and Stepanof Bay to the west. In 1912, Ivanof Bay was briefly a place of refuge for Alutiiq people driven away from their villages by the eruption of Mount Katmai. The U.S. Revenue Cutter Manning under the command of Captain Kirtland W. Perry transported surviving villagers from Douglas and Katmai to Ivanof Bay, and later they were moved to a new village site to the east that was named Perryville.

In 1930, the construction of a salmon cannery led to a more permanent population, and the facility operated until the 1950s. In 1965, the community grew considerably after six households relocated from Perryville to Ivanof Bay in search of a better water source and hunting grounds, as well as the opportunity to pursue a peaceful lifestyle with religious freedom. All of the families that relocated to Ivanof Bay were members of the Slavic Gospel Mission. Today, Ivanof Bay remains a traditional Alutiiq community following a mostly traditional subsistence lifestyle augmented by commercial fishing. The bay is an important bird habitat and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service routinely finds high concentrations of at least 24 species of waterbirds using this area. Bald eagles and rough-legged hawks have also been observed and a study using satellite collars found that emperor geese use Ivanof Bay as a wintering area. Marbled murrelets are known to use the bay and several small seabird colonies have been documented along the coast. Read more here and here. Explore more of Ivanof Bay and the Alaska Peninsula here: