Anchorage

From the west end of downtown a paved trail follows the shore for some 18 km, a favourite for rental bicycles. Moose often step out of the woods; a cow with a calf may charge, so give her a wide berth. On clear days Denali shows far to the north.

On the 2nd floor, the Smithsonian's Arctic Studies Center shows over 600 garments, masks and hunting tools of Alaska Native peoples, lent from Washington. Native elders helped write the labels. It is the best way to spend a rainy day downtown.

Alaska Native peoples are presented as five cultures, and six traditional dwellings stand around a lake. Guides come from each group and explain daily life inside the houses. Indoors they demonstrate Arctic games such as the high kick at a hanging ball.

The trailhead is 20 minutes' drive from downtown, making this the most climbed peak in Alaska. The round trip is just over 5 km, but below the summit you scramble up rubble on all fours. The flat top draws many at dusk to watch the sun drop over Cook Inlet.

Two lakes by the airport, joined by a channel, make what is called the busiest seaplane base on earth, with over 100 movements a day in high summer. People bound for roadless villages and fishing camps board here. Watch them lift off in spray from shore.

South of town the Seward Highway runs between sea and cliffs. With the incoming tide the water can arrive as a single wave, a bore, but catching it means checking the tide table around the spring tides. Never walk onto the mudflats; the silt can trap a person.

At Portage, at the head of Turnagain Arm, injured and orphaned bears, moose and muskoxen live in large enclosures. Wood bison, long gone from Alaska, were raised here and released into the wild in 2015. You can drive the loop without leaving the car.

The only road into Whittier is a tunnel of about 4 km through the mountain, a single lane that cars share with trains. Each direction has fixed entry times and it shuts at night, so plan around the schedule. On Portage Lake nearby, glacier ice drifts.

On the first Saturday of March the sled dog race to Nome, over 1,600 km, holds its ceremonial start on 4th Avenue downtown. Snow is trucked in to cover the street. The timed start comes the next day further north; during the ceremony you see the dogs up close.

About 40 minutes north, a Russian Orthodox church stands in the Dena'ina village of Eklutna. Each grave in the cemetery carries a small, brightly painted house, known as a spirit house. Guided tours run in summer only.

The tram at Girdwood's ski resort, about an hour south along Turnagain Arm. From the upper station you take in a ridge hung with seven glaciers and the inlet running out to sea. In summer, hikers who walk up can buy a ride down.

A valley glacier two hours' drive northeast, among the rare Alaskan glaciers reachable on foot from a highway. Access crosses private land, so you pay at the gate and walk the ice in crampons with a guide. Blue crevasses and meltwater pools are the sights.

Boats from the southern port of Seward bring you close to tidewater glaciers calving into the sea. Otters and sea lions appear en route, humpbacks with luck. In summer an Alaska Railroad train runs from Anchorage to Seward, making it doable in a day.

On Hatcher Pass to the north, the park keeps a gold mine that boomed in the 1930s and 1940s. Red-roofed bunkhouses and a sagging mill dot the tundra slope. Snow keeps the pass road fully open only in high summer, so check before going.

In summer king and silver salmon run up this creek right behind the downtown rail depot. Anglers in waders lined up with office towers at their backs make a scene unique to the city. Fishing requires an Alaska state licence.