NPS Photo/KOBU The Northwest & Arctic of Alaska is one of Alaska’s most diverse regions ranging from coastal plains to mountain ranges; the land is vast, but the population small at just over 10,000 residents. Much like the varied land, the northern reaches of the state experience some of the largest seasonal changes in sunlight. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Arctic Interagency Visitor CenterCities Nearby: Fairbanks
The visitor center is a partnership between three federal agencies that manage the public lands along the Dalton Highway: the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Open only during the summer, the center provides Dalton Highway road conditions, visitor services, exhibits and films, trip planning, hunting and fishing information, bear barrel loans, backcountry registration for Gates of the Arctic National Park visitors, a bookstore, and more. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Arctic National Wildlife RefugeCities Nearby: Fairbanks
Arctic National Wildlife Range was established in 1960 to preserve unique wildlife, wilderness and recreational values. In 1980, the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA) re-designated the Range as part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and provided four purposes that guide management of the entire Refuge: to conserve animals and plants in their natural diversity, ensure a place for hunting and gathering activities, protect water quality and quantity, and fulfill international wildlife treaty obligations. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Bering Land Bridge National PreserveCities Nearby: Nome
Imagine a place of whimsical beauty and larger-than-life landscapes, an ancestral home to ice-age giants, and turbulent volcanic activity, a land that holds secrets to the intriguing history of human migration, sustains people that have lived here for generations, and continues to be part of a wide breadth of traditions. Bering Land Bridge is unlike any other place on earth. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Cape Krusenstern National MonumentCities Nearby: Kotzebue
North of the Arctic Circle, the Cape Krusenstern National Monument holds 70 miles of shoreline on the Chukchi Sea. It’s more than 114 beach ridges have been used by humans for 5,000 years. Vast wetlands provide habitat for shorebirds from as far away as South America. Hikers and boaters can see carpets of wildflowers among shrubs containing wisps of qiviut from muskoxen. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Dalton HighwayCities Nearby: Coldfoot
The Dalton Highway stretches 414 miles across northern Alaska from Livengood (84 miles north of Fairbanks) to Deadhorse and the oilfields of Prudhoe Bay. Built during construction of the trans-Alaska oil pipeline in the 1970s, this mostly gravel highway travels through rolling, forested hills, across the Yukon River and Arctic Circle, through the rugged Brooks Range, and over the North Slope to the Arctic Ocean. Along most of its length, you'll see no strip malls, no gift shops, no service stations—just forest, tundra, and mountains, crossed by a double ribbon of road and pipe. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Gates of the Arctic National Park and PreserveCities Nearby: Bettles
This vast landscape does not contain any roads or human-made trails. Visitors discover intact ecosystems where people have lived with the land for thousands of years. Wild rivers meander through glacier-carved valleys, caribou migrate along age-old trails, endless summer light fades into aurora-lit night skies of winter. Gates of the Arctic remains virtually unchanged except by the forces of nature. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Iditarod National Historic TrailOther Region(s): Interior Region & Southcentral Region
The Iditarod National Historic Trail commemorates a 2,300-mile system of winter trails that first connected ancient Alaska Native villages, opened up Alaska for the last great American gold rush, and now plays a vital role for travel and recreation in modern day Alaska. Over 1,500 miles of the historic winter trail system are open today for public use across state and federal lands. The Bureau of Land Management, under the National Trails Act, is the designated Trail Administrator, and works to coordinate efforts by federal and state agencies on behalf of the entire trail. BLM maintains about 150 miles of the trail, including five public shelter cabins. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Inupiat Heritage CenterCities Nearby: Barrow
On the rooftop of the world, the Iñupiat Heritage Center in Utqiagvik, Alaska, tells the story of the Iñupiat people who have thrived for thousands of years in one of the harshest climates on Earth, hunting the bowhead whale. In the 19th century, these lonely seas swarmed with commercial whalemen from New England, who also sought the bowhead for its valuable baleen and blubber. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Kobuk Valley National ParkCities Nearby: Kotzebue
Caribou, sand dunes, the Kobuk River, Onion Portage - just some of the many features of Kobuk Valley National Park. The Kobuk River is an ancient and current path for people and wildlife. For 9000 years, people have come to Onion Portage to harvest caribou from herds half a million strong, as the animals swim the river and crisscross sculpted dunes. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH National Petroleum Reserve - AlaskaCities Nearby: Barrow
Formerly known as the Naval Petroleum Reserve No. 4,the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska is now a vast 22.8-million acre area on Alaska's North Slope. In 1923, mindful of the land's conceivable petroleum value, President Harding set aside this area as an emergency oil supply for the U.S. Navy. In 1976, in accordance with the Naval Petroleum Reserves Production Act, the administration of the reserve was transferred to the Department of the Interior, more specifically the Bureau of Land Management, and was renamed to what is now known as the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A). 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Noatak National PreserveCities Nearby: Kotzebue
As one of North America's largest mountain-ringed river basins with an intact ecosystem, the Noatak River environs features some of the Arctic's finest arrays of plants and animals. The river is classified as a national wild and scenic river, and offers stunning wilderness float-trip opportunities - from deep in the Brooks Range to the tidewater of the Chukchi Sea. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Unalakleet Wild and Scenic RiverActivities:
The clear, smooth waters of the Unalakleet National Wild River meander gently for 80 miles among the rolling Nulato Hills and across broad expanses of arctic tundra, continuing to the seaside village of Unalakleet, Alaska at the rocky shores of the Norton Sound. Located 400 miles from Anchorage, the village of Unalakleet has approximately 800 people and is accessible only by plane. 
NPS Graphic/ANCH Selawik National Wildlife RefugeCities Nearby: Kotzebue
The 2.15 million acre Selawik National Wildlife Refuge is situated on the Arctic Circle to the east of Kotzebue Sound, and occupies a unique variety of landforms in northwest Alaska. Refuge lands extend eastward to the headwaters of the Selawik River and the continental divide. Only a very small percentage of Alaska is accessible by road, and refuge lands, including the 240,000 acres of designated Wilderness Area, are some of the most remote “wildlands” in the state. |
Last updated: December 26, 2023