Juneau
Going to Juneau and not seeing the Mendenhall is like visiting Rome and skipping the Colosseum. The most famous of Juneau’s ice floes, and the city’s most…
Must-see attractions in Southeast Alaska
Southeast Alaska
Welcome to the largest national forest in the US, a tract of land almost the size of Ireland and significantly larger than adjacent Wrangell-St Elias…
Southeast Alaska
Just 30 miles north of Yakutat is Hubbard Glacier, the largest tidewater glacier in North America. The 8-mile-wide frozen behemoth is easily Alaska’s most…
Sitka National Historical Park
Sitka
This mystical juxtaposition of tall trees and totems is Alaska’s smallest national park and the site where the Tlingits were defeated by the Russians in…
Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park Museum & Visitor Center
Skagway
The recently improved NPS center is in the original 1898 White Pass & Yukon Route depot. The center is spread over two interconnecting buildings. One…
Saxman Native Village & Totem Park
Ketchikan
On South Tongass Hwy, 2.5 miles south of Ketchikan, is this incorporated Tlingit village of 475 residents. It's best known for Saxman Totem Park, which…
Sitka
East of downtown along Lincoln St, the Russian Bishop’s House is the oldest intact Russian building in Sitka. Built in 1843 by Finnish carpenters out of…
Jilkaat Kwaan Cultural Heritage & Bald Eagle Preserve Visitor Center
Haines
Part of a welcome renaissance in Tlingit art and culture in Alaska, this heritage center is located in the ancient native village of Klukwan, 22 miles…
Southeast Alaska
This impressive museum is what the colorful history and characters of Wrangell deserve. As you stroll through the many rooms, an audio narration…
Ketchikan
For a crash course in Southeast Alaska's impressive totem art look no further than the Totem Heritage Center, where old poles brought from deserted…
Treadwell Mine Historical Trail
Juneau
It's hard to envisage today, but the Treadwell mine on Douglas Island was once the largest gold mine in the world, set up like a minitown with its own…
Juneau
As far as cable cars go, this tramway is rather expensive for a five-minute ride. But from a marketing point of view its location couldn’t be better. It…
Sitka
Built between 1844 and 1848, this church stood for more than 100 years as Alaska’s finest Russian Orthodox cathedral. When a fire destroyed it in 1966,…
Southeast Alaska
Twenty miles north of Hyder and back inside Canada lies the fifth-largest glacier in Canada (and the largest in the world accessible by road). The old…
Juneau
Get ready for some spiritual enlightenment. The Shrine of St Thérèse is a natural stone chapel on a beautifully wooded island connected to the shore by a…
Juneau
A spectacular sight at Mendenhall Glacier is this waterfall, a mini-Niagara (in season) caused by Nugget Creek diving off a hanging valley into Mendenhall…
Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center
Juneau
This mini-museum holds ranger talks, shows an 11-minute film and displays exhibits relating to the glacier and its formation. There are huge panoramic…
Ketchikan
Ten miles north of downtown Ketchikan is this seaside park that contains 14 restored totem poles, a colorful community house and a viewing deck…
Southeast Alaska
Of the three totem parks on POW, the Klawock Totem Park is by far the most impressive and obviously a great source of community pride. Situated on a hill…
Sitka
Old headstones and Russian Orthodox crosses lurk in the overgrown and quintessentially creepy Russian Cemetery (located at the north end of Observatory St…
Totem Historic District – Kasaan
Southeast Alaska
This is one of the great Haida cultural centers in Alaska. It's in Kasaan, one of only two Haida villages in the state, and, since 2002, has been listed…
Juneau
Amble out to the end of Basin Rd, a beautiful 1-mile walk from the north end of Gastineau Ave, to the former Alaska-Juneau Gold Mining Company complex. It…
Southeast Alaska Discovery Center
Ketchikan
Three large totems greet you in the lobby of this center run by the National Park Service (NPS), while a school of silver salmon suspended from the…
Skagway
Skagway Museum is not only one of the finest in a town filled with museums, but it's one of the finest in the Southeast. It occupies the entire 1st floor…
Juneau
Demolished and rebuilt in a snazzy new $140-million complex in 2016, the result is impressive. Sometimes called SLAM (State Library, Archives and Museum),…
Ketchikan
Departing from Stedman St is Creek St (a boardwalk built over Ketchikan Creek on pilings), a history book of misshapen wood-paneled houses painted in…
Skagway
In 1898 Skagway’s rival city, Dyea (die-ee) was the trailhead for Chilkoot Trail, the shortest route to Lake Bennett, where stampeders began their float…
Southeast Alaska
About 9 miles from Bartlett Cove is the small settlement of Gustavus, an interesting backcountry community. The town's 400 citizens include a mix of…
Skagway
The founder of Skagway was not a gold-hungry Klondike stampeder but the savvy Captain William Moore, who arrived in the area on a hunch in 1887 and built…
Southeast Alaska
The Shakes are a long line of Tlingit leaders (the current leader is Chief Shakes X). They are represented on this tiny, grassy islet slap bang in the…
Sitka
This is no zoo, or bird show for gawping kids. Rather, think of it more as a raptor hospital and rehab center – and a good one at that. The 17-acre center…
Southeast Alaska
Thought Alaska's history started with the Klondike gold rush? Not so. Historians and anthropologists should home in on this state historic park on…
Sitka
East along Lincoln St on the former campus of Sheldon Jackson College is Sheldon Jackson Museum. The college may be gone, but this fine museum, housed in…
Old Sitka State Historical Park
Sitka
There are no physical remains of Old Sitka (known historically as the Redoubt), the original Russian settlement in the area, although archaeological digs…
Ketchikan
Dolly's house, in Creek St, looks like a dollhouse from the outside, but it once operated as a bastion of the world's oldest profession (read:…
Gold Rush Cemetery & Reid Falls
Skagway
Visitors who become infatuated with 'Soapy' Smith and Frank Reid can walk out to this wooded cemetery, a 1.5-mile stroll northeast on State St, where…
Sitka
Walk west on Lincoln St for the walkway to Castle Hill. Kiksadi clan houses once covered the hilltop site, but in 1836 the Russians built ‘Baranov’s…
Juneau
Juneau’s only state park overlooks Berners Bay and Lynn Canal; salmon fishing is excellent off the Berners Bay beaches and in Cowee Creek. Hiking trails…
Southeast Alaska
The North Boat Harbor is the best one for wandering the docks, talking to crews and possibly scoring some fresh fish. Begin at the Harbormaster Office; a…
Haines
This extravagantly esoteric museum is an exercise in how to make hammers look interesting. And – get this – it largely succeeds. Plucked from the…
