Alaska
Alaska is the largest state in the United States, known for its vast and diverse geography, including mountains, forests, and tundra. It is home to the highest peak in North America, Mount Denali, and has a rugged coastline with numerous fjords and glaciers. Alaska's unique location also makes it a prime spot for viewing the Northern Lights.
3 Key excerpts on "Alaska"
eBook - ePub- Rough Guides(Author)
- 2021(Publication Date)
- Rough Guides(Publisher)
...Alaska The sheer size of Alaska is hard to grasp. Superimposed onto the Lower 48 states, it would stretch from the Atlantic to the Pacific, while its coastline is longer than that of the rest of the mainland US combined. All but three of the nation’s twenty highest peaks are found here and one glacier alone is twice the size of Wales. In addition, not only does it contain America’s northernmost and westernmost points, but because the Aleutian Islands stretch across the 180th meridian, it contains the easternmost point as well. Wildlife may be under threat elsewhere, but here it is abundant, with bears standing 12ft tall, moose stopping traffic in downtown Anchorage, wolves prowling national parks, bald eagles circling over the trees, humpbacks breaching in crystal-clear waters and rivers solid with fifty-pound salmon. Travelling here demands a spirit of adventure, and to make the most of the state you need to enjoy striking out on your own and roughing it a bit. Binoculars are an absolute must, as is bug spray; the mosquito is referred to as “Alaska’s state bird” and only industrial-strength repellent keeps it away. On top of that, there’s the climate – though Alaska is far from the giant icebox people imagine (see box). The state’s southernmost town, Ketchikan, rich in Native American heritage, makes a pretty introduction, while Sitka retains a Russian influence. Further north are swanky Juneau, the capital; Haines, with its mix of old-timers and arty newcomers; Skagway, redolent of Gold Rush days; and Glacier Bay National Park, an expensive side-trip from Juneau that penetrates one of Alaska’s most stunning regions. To the west, Anchorage is the state’s main population centre and transport hub, while south of here are the stunning Kenai Peninsula and Prince William Sound...
eBook - ePub- (Author)
- 2018(Publication Date)
- Lonely Planet(Publisher)
...The Land & Wildlife The USA is home to creatures both great and small, from the ferocious grizzly to the industrious beaver, with colossal bison, snowy owls, soaring eagles, howling coyotes and doe-eyed manatees all part of the great American menagerie. The nation's varied geography – coastlines along two oceans, mountains, deserts, rainforests, and massive bay and river systems – harbor ecosystems where an extraordinary array of plant and animal life can flourish. Wilderness Films Wild (Jean-Marc Vallée) Winged Migration (Jacques Perrin) Grizzly Man (Werner Herzog) Into the Wild (Sean Penn) Jeremiah Johnson (Sydney Pollack) The Revenant (Alejandro González Iñárritu) Geography The USA is big, no question. Covering nearly 3.8 million sq miles, it's the world's third-largest country, trailing only Russia and Canada, its friendly neighbor to the north. The continental USA is made up of 48 contiguous states ('the lower 48'), while Alaska, its largest state, is northwest of Canada, and the volcanic islands of Hawaii, the 50th state, are 2300 miles southwest of the mainland in the Pacific Ocean. It's more than just size, though. America feels big because of its incredibly diverse topography, which began to take shape around 50 to 60 million years ago. In the contiguous USA, the east is a land of temperate, deciduous forests and contains the ancient Appalachian Mountains, a low range that parallels the Atlantic Ocean. Between the mountains and the coast lies the country's most populated, urbanized region, particularly in the corridor between Washington, DC, and Boston, MA. To the north are the Great Lakes, which the USA shares with Canada...
eBook - ePub- Alice Beck Kehoe(Author)
- 2014(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...7 Alaska When the United States annexed Alaska in 1867, it acquired the western sectors of two immense ecological zones, the Arctic Coast and the Subarctic, and the northern sector of the Northwest Coast rainforest zone. That zone, home of the Tlingit and Haida, has been described in the preceding chapter. This chapter describes the Arctic Coast and the Subarctic zones. Arctic Coast The Arctic Coast from Pacific Alaska across Canada through Greenland is inhabited by nations speaking Eskimo languages, and formerly called “Eskimo.” Today, two of these nations are self-governing territories, Kalaallit Nunaat (Greenland) and Nunavut (Northeast Canada), their indigenous inhabitants the Inuit. Alaska’s northern people are Iñupiaq (a version of the word “Inuit”), and those in the west and southwest coastal areas are Yupik. Some Yupik live on the Siberian side of Bering Strait. Aleut, inhabitants of the Aleutian Islands stretching westward from Alaska’s southern peninsula, speak a language that is part of the Eskimo-Aleut stock but so different from Yupik-Ihupiaq/Inuktitut that Aleuts must have separated from the ancestral Proto-Eskimo-Aleut population several thousand years ago. Surely the Arctic Coast is the most challenging environment colonized by humans. Half the year is ice-bound dark winter, the sun appearing only dimly, or not at all, in midday, the temperatures far below zero – centrigrade or Fahrenheit! – with howling blizzards. Short summers are beset with biting insects. Few edible plants grow. Abundance of sea mammals lured people into the zone, ingenious technology kept them alive and prospering. The pioneer anthropologist Franz Boas lived for a year, 1884–85, with Inuit in Nunavut, discovering that far from being miserable scavenging brutes, they relaxed in snug thermally engineered iglus enjoying poetry, songs, dancing, visual art, and jokes...
