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Gold Fever.
Alaska’s gold fever built Juneau, and a trip to Juno just would not be complete without visiting at least one of the over thirty gold mines in the area. Visit the mines, get a glimpse of what it was like to be an Alaskan Gold prospector, then do a little gold panning for yourself at one of the public creeks or with a gold panning tour.
Glacier Hunting.
Juneau is Alaska’s ‘Gateway to the Glaciers,’ with some 42 glaciers located within a 1,500-square-mile radius. Mendenhall Glacier is perhaps Alaska’s most famous drive-in glacier. Its ice floe lies only 13 miles from Juneau’s city center. Visit on your own or take an organized tour. If you want to see more of the glaciers in the area, flightseeing is the best way to do it, and provides a spectacular bird’s eye view of the icefield. Some helicopter tours even offer glacier landings, glacier treks and even dog sled rides.
Kodiak.
Kodiak, on Kodiak Island, celebrates Spring with an annual celebration of the migration of Gray Whales. Thousands of Gray Whales can be seen from the shore as they follow their northerly migration route along the shallow western coast from the warm lagoons of Baja, Mexico, to their summer feeding grounds in the cold Bering Sea. Kodiak is one of the best locations along the migration route for people to view the whales because they swim so close to shore. For more information, call (907) 486-4782, or visit www.kodiak.org.
Fairbanks.
Discover Fairbanks - the largest city in Alaska’s great interior and the second largest city in the state. Fairbanks is a treasure trove of Alaska’s cultural and natural history. Shop for Native Alaskan crafts, discover Alaska’s Gold Rush past, go mushing with a dog team, or take a riverboat tour to the edge of the Last Frontier, Denali National Park and Preserve, or the Arctic tundra and wilderness.
Denali National Park and Preserve.
Denali National Park and Preserve, easily accessible from Fairbanks, is the home of Mount McKinley - North America’s tallest mountain (which stands at 20,320 feet). The mountain (also known as Denali) is part of the Alaska Range, which includes countless other spectacular mountains, mountain landscapes, and several large glaciers.
The Denali National Park and Preserve covers more than six million acres of Alaska’s interior. It is the largest protected ecosystem in the world, with 750 species of flowering plants, 39 mammal species, 165 bird species and 10 species of fish. It was first established as Mount McKinley National Park in 1917, and was designated an international biosphere reserve in 1976. In 1980, the park was expanded, and its name was changed to Denali National Park and Preserve.
Nome.
The people who live in Nome, Alaska will tell you that Nome hasn’t changed much in the last one hundred years - and that’s exactly the way they like it! Residents of this Far North Alaska town are a mix of native families, descendants of Gold rush pioneers, and naturalists seeking the lifestyle and the solitude the city offers its residents.
For visitors, Nome offers colorful, sweeping views of the seemingly endless tundra - complete with plentiful wildlife and abundant wild flowers and tundra plants, which blanket
the lush landscape. Vast herds of musk oxen and reindeer graze the tundra, and grizzly bear, moose, fox, beaver, wolves, wolverine, lemmings, voles and shrews are also abundant.
Although Nome is only accessible by air or sea, once visitors arrive, they can explore 350 miles of roads that wind through tundra, mountains and coastal plains. The road system passes through a variety of habitats - from beach to boreal, each boasting its own bird populations. Summer provides great fishing with ample streams and rivers, as well as the Seward Peninsula waters. Nome is also the finish line for the 1,049-mile Iditarod Sled Dog Race. The race, which begins the first Saturday in March in Anchorage, ends when the dog teams begin arriving in Nome as early as 9 days later.
Forget the snow and ice. We’re talking Springtime. The time when the days are getting longer - really longer - longer like eighteen to twenty hour days in May and June. Alaska in the Spring is sunny - beautiful, fragrant, and colorful; all the more so after the long dark Winter. And everyone finds both excitement and renewal as Spring unfolds in Alaska.
Anchorage.
Did you know that Anchorage, Alaska is known as the “City of Flowers.” Not what you might think of initially, but remember: portions of Alaska are on the same latitudes as the countries of northern Europe - the very countries where we go to see Spring flowers of all kinds, not the least of which are Amsterdam’s famed tulips.
Anchorage goes a step further each Spring. The city plants thousands of flowerbeds and hangs hundreds of hanging baskets of flowers all over the city. Now add to that all the private gardens and flowerbeds planted by residents, and all the fields full of wildflowers, and it’s easy to see why people from all over the world travel to Anchorage to take in the sights and the scents of Spring.
Juneau.
Juneau, located in the area of Alaska known as the Inside Passage, is the capital of Alaska. It is also one of the most beautiful cities in the United States. Residents often brag that Juneau is the most scenic capital in the country, and it is also often referred to as ‘little San Francisco.’ The city center, which hugs the side of Mt. Juneau and Mt. Roberts, has many steep and narrow streets running past a variety of structures - new buildings, old storefronts, slanted houses, and historic buildings - all held together by a complex network of staircases. Juneau’s bustling waterfront is home to cruise ships, tankers, fishing boats, kayakers and floatplanes. Overhead, the snow-capped peaks of Mt. Roberts and Mt. Juneau, provide, among other things, superb hiking.
