Alaska: Everyone’s Last Frontier

Alaska is a great place to live and especially to explore. Despite Alaska being the largest state, able to cover half of the Lower 48, most activity is found in the South Central region near Anchorage.

Any visitor can find something to their liking. For the shopaholic and tacky tourist there are streets lined with unique boutiques and souvenir shops in which funny T-shirts and local handmade items are available for purchase, I highly recommend buying an ivory carving or a qiviut scarf. The sportsman can reel in a King Salmon to be proud of on the Yukon River or any of Alaska’s 3,000 rivers or catch a charter boat out of Seward or Homer and try their hand a catching a monster of a halibut. If hunting is more your speed there is fantastic moose and bear hunting, make sure to check season dates and regulations before getting too excited. For families there are parks, museums and tours as well as a zoo in Anchorage.

Though Alaska sports an extensive array of activities, the choice of what to do may be limited on the time of year. Alaska greatly changes from summer to winter, so the experiences a traveler will have is greatly changed. Alaska bursts into live in the summer because the weather finally warms up, but the 23 hours of sunlight doesn’t hurt either (24 hours in some of the more northern cities). There is fantastic hiking, from the casual stroll on Anchorage’s Costal Trail to the intensity of climbing a real mountain like Denali. There are many festivals and markets that pop up all over the state, such as the Saturday market in downtown Anchorage or the State Fair in Palmer. Another great time for Alaska is the 4^th of July when throngs of people flock to the small fishing town of Seward for the world famous Mount Marathon Footrace where participants hike 3022 feet up the mountain and come back to the finish on 4^th Avenue, the party in town is one of the best around. Now winter is a bit of a different story, like many Alaskan animals that can be spotted in summer, the state goes into a bit of hibernation. This doesn’t mean there is nothing going on, actually there are still tons of activities just in different areas. If visitors don’t want to stay inside head to Alyeska Resort for some wicked skiing and snowboarding. Snow machining is also a popular past time among locals. The museums and galleries are also fantastic for those not willing to stay in the cold to long. After the depths of darkness in December, there is a surge of energy at the end of February in the form of a festival call “Fur Rondezvous” with performances, mini fairs, a beauty contest and of course the famous Iditarod sled dog race start ceremony in the heart of downtown Anchorage.

So come and be immersed in all that Alaska has to offer. Words cannot describe how amazing the people and places really are, but take the word of this 3^rd generation Alaskan who still loves it here. Let Alaska be your last frontier.