山脈と海に囲まれたアラスカ最大の都市アンカレジは、手つかずの大自然の美しさでも多くの人を魅了しています。地球最北部の都市の一つであるアンカレジにも、大都市ならではの利便性と魅力がいっぱいです。素晴らしいなレストラン、博物館、劇場、そして様々な音楽シーンなどの文化的要素に加え、サーモンの漁場としても有名なクック湾や米国で3番目に大きいチュガッチ国立公園の1524m以上の山々など大自然の恵みにも溢れています。 ダウンタウンから少しドライブすれば、原生自然を満喫できるアドベンチャーが12ヶ所以上で楽しめる他、水上飛行機を利用すればあらゆる種類のアドベンチャーにも挑戦できます。それゆえ、アンカレジのフッド湖は世界で最も離発着の多い水上飛行機の基地ともなっているのです。
アンカレジには、284,994人の住民が暮らしており、都市の利便性と周辺の原生自然を謳歌しています。彼らはアンカレジの全ての公園のように友好的で、195kmにも及ぶ自転車道のように活動的です。 暖かい海洋性気候の中、ダウンタウンのシック・クリークで終日釣りをしたり、山々で氷河を見ながらハイキングをしたりとアクティブなアウトドア・アドベンチャーを終えた夜は、4つ星レストランで本格的ディナー・コースを楽しむこともできます。ダウンタウンから15分程ドライブすれば、アンカレジで最も人気のあるフラットトップ山の樹木が生い茂るトレイルの入り口に辿り着きます。冬は、辺り一面が白い雪の野原へと変わり、山中では130㎞にも及ぶノルディック・スキー・トレイルや犬ゾリ、アイススケート、スノーモービルを楽しめる他、氷の彫刻なども展示されます。アラスカで最高とされるアルペンスキー・リゾートのアリエスカ・リゾートには車で45分程です。
アンカレジは、先住民の集落エクルートナからポーテージまで面積は5005㎢にも及んでいます。ダウンタウンの南西には、アラスカの主要空港テッド・スティーブンス・アンカレジ国際空港があります。ダウンタウンから北東のフェアバンクスやバルディーズへは 州の主要高速道路であるグレン・ハイウェイを利用して行くことができます。また、南のキナイ半島へはスワード・ハイウェイを利用します。
かつては英冒険家キャプテン・ジェームス・クックがアンカレジ周辺を船で通過し、1800年代後半には金鉱探索者たちが埋蔵量の多いシップ・クリークを発見してはいましたが、アンカレジが公式に制定されたのは アラスカ鉄道が建設基地を設け、アンカレジが2000人のテント村になった1915年の時でした。 その後、第二次世界大戦の軍事的整備により、アンカレジはアラスカの鉄道、航空、ハイウェイ網の中心となり、 1950年代にはクック湾での石油の発見により安定的な成長を遂げました。
1964年グットフライデー地震の後再建に多大な努力を払う中、プルドーベイで100億ドルの石油資源が発見され、アンカレジに新たな可能性が生まれました。アラスカ横断パイプラインは、アンカレジの周囲480kmには近づかないものの、様々な石油関連サービスの会社の本部所在地がアンカレジに置かれています。アトラクションや博物館を回ったり、いろいろな方面にデイ・トリップを楽しんだり、アウトドア・アクティビティを満喫したり。 アンカレジは短期間の滞在にしても、暮らすことにおいても大変理想的な都市と言えます。
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Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum
On the south shore of Lake Hood, the world's busiest floatplane lake, is the Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum. The museum serves as a tribute to Alaska's famous bush pilots and is home to 25 planes along with historic photos and displays of pilots' achievements, from the first flight to Fairbanks (1913) to the early history of Alaska Airlines. You can view early footage of bush planes in the museum's theater or step outside to its large observation deck and watch bush pilots begin take off with a roar on Lake Hood.
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Alaska Botanical Garden
Alaska Botanical Garden is a colorful showcase for native species, where gentle paths lead visitors through groomed herb, rock and perennial gardens in a wooded setting. The mile-long Lowenfels Family Nature Trail is designed to teach visitors about native Alaska plants.
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Alaska Native Heritage Center
The
Alaska Native Heritage Center is a 26-acre complex that allows visitors to experience Alaska Native culture without having to go to the Bush to find it. The main cultural center includes exhibits on traditional arts and sciences as well live performances of native song, storytelling and dance. Outside around a picturesque lake is a village of typical structures from the Aleut, Yupik, Tlingit and other tribes from Alaska where visitors can watch artists practice their ancient skills from carving ivory to intriguing beadwork.
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Alaska Public Lands Information Center
The
Alaska Public Lands Information Center is the place to head for information and maps on hiking, mountain biking, kayaking, camping, renting a wilderness cabin or just about anything else you might want to do outdoors in Alaska. There are also excellent wildlife displays, free movies, fun dioramas, and a daily guided Captain Cook walk to Resolution Park, covering the sea captain's travels in Alaska.
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Alaska State Trooper Museum
One of Anchorage's most unusual attractions is the Alaska State Trooper Museum. Dedicated to preserving law enforcement starting when Alaska was a territory, the exhibits at the museum range from a 1952 Hudson Hornet cop car and state-issued sealskin cop boots to a tribute to Fran Howard, the nation's first unrestricted female police officer.
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Alaska Zoo
The unique wildlife of the Arctic is on display at the Alaska Zoo, the only zoo in North America that specializes in northern animals. The zoo focuses on Alaska Native species, ranging from wolverines and moose to caribou and Dall sheep. The most popular species with visitors, naturally, are bears. The Alaska Zoo has all four Alaskan species (brown, black, glacier and polar).
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Anchorage Coastal Wildlife Refuge
Located 12 miles southwest of Anchorage, Potter Marsh was created in 1916, when Alaska Railroad work crews dammed several streams during construction. Today it's officially
Anchorage Coastal Wildlife Refuge, Anchorage's best destination for birding where from boardwalk trails you can view ducks, songbirds, grebes and gulls.
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Anchorage Fur Rendezvous and the Iditarod
Anchorage Fur Rendezvous, or simply the "Rondy" as most locals refer to it, is one of the best winter festivals in Alaska. Participants sculpt ice, ride the Ferris wheel in freezing temperatures, or watch the Running of the Reindeer. Following the two-week Fur Rendezvous is the ceremonial start of the 1100-mile Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race when 30 to 40 teams depart from downtown Anchorage.
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Anchorage Market and Festival
Anchorage Market & Festival is a popular outdoor market held downtown on Saturdays and Sundays throughout the summer. Along with more than 100 vendors selling everything from giant veggies and birch syrup, there is also great food and live music.
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Anchorage Museum of History and Art
Recently renovated to the tune of $75 million, the
Anchorage Museum of History & Art is Alaska's cultural jewel. The first floor is dedicated to the arts and has the Art of the North Gallery with entire rooms occupied by Alaskan masters Eustace Ziegler and Sydney Laurence. The Alaska Gallery on the 2nd floor is filled with life-size dioramas that trace 10,000 years of human settlement from early subsistence villages to modern oil dependency.
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Delaney Park
Delaney Park is a narrow slice of park stretching from A to P Streets that is known by locals as the Park Strip. It was the site of the 50-ton bonfire celebrating statehood in 1959 and Pope John Paul II's 1981 outdoor mass. Today it's the site of numerous festivals like Summer Solstice.
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Earthquake Park
Located on the west side of Anchorage, Earthquake Park was a rubble of barren land after the 1964 Good Friday Earthquake. Today visitors have to poke around the bushes to see evidence of tectonic upheaval at this delightful park but interpretive displays still tell the story of what Anchorage went through on the ill-fated day.
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Far North Bicentennial Park
Far North Bicentennial Park is like a slice of wilderness in the middle of Anchorage. The 4000-acre preserve includes forest, muskeg and 20 miles of trails. During the summer the streams are full of spawning salmon while visitors often see moose and bears here in the spring and brilliant fall colors in mid-September.
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Flightseeing tours
A wide range of flightseeing tours are available in Anchorage, each offering an eagle-eye view of the wilderness, glaciers and mountains that lie outside the city. Many head to Prince William Sound for tours of Blackstone Glacier or even Columbia Glacier. Others head north for Knik Glacier or Mount McKinley.
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Goose Lake
Goose Lake is where residents and visitors in Anchorage head to on a hot summer day. The park is the city's most developed lake for swimming with lifeguards, paddleboat rentals and a small cafe.
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H2Oasis Waterpark
H2Oasis Waterpark is a three-level amusement zone of watery fun with palm trees, water slides and a wave pool. The 505-foot Master Blaster is the wettest roller coaster in Alaska.
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Heritage Library Museum
The Heritage Library Museum is home to one of the largest collections of Alaska Native artifacts in the city and includes costumes, baskets and hunting weapons. There are also original paintings covering walls, including several by Sydney Laurence and lots of scrimshaw. The museum's collection is so large that there are displays in the elevator lobbies throughout the Wells Fargo Bank where it is located.
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Kincaid Park
Kincaid Park is the southern terminus of the delightful Tony Knowles Coastal Trail, making it popular with cyclists most of the year while hikers love the 1400-acre park as trails wind through a rolling terrain of forested hills where there are views of Mt Susitna, Mt McKinley on a clear day and fiery sunsets in the evening. In the winter cross-country skiers invade Kincaid Park.
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Oscar Anderson Home
Oscar Anderson was the 18th person to set foot in Anchorage and built his house in 1915. Today his home is the city's oldest wooden-framed house and has been preserved as the Oscar Anderson Home. Overlooking the delightful Elderberry Park, the museum is open June to mid-September.
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Potter Section House
Located southwest of Anchorage along the Seward Highway is the Potter Section House. The structure began as a dorm for workers building the Alaska Railroad. Today it doubles up as the
Chugach State Park headquarters and a free museum with a snowplow train and other railroad-era artifacts.
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Russian Jack Springs Park
Named after the original homesteader of the site, Russian Jack Springs Park is spread over 300 acres and features tennis courts, hiking and biking trails, a picnic area and the Mann Leiser Memorial Greenhouses that are full of tropical plants, exotic birds and fish.
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Semipro baseball
Anchorage 's hometown teams in the Alaska Baseball League are the Anchorage Bucs and Anchorage Glacier Pilots. Both semipro teams play at Mulcahy Ball Park, where living legend Mark McGuire slammed a few homers.
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Ship Creek Salmon Viewing Platform
From mid- to late summer, king, coho and pink salmon spawn up Ship Creek, the historical site of Tanaina Indian fish camps. The Ship Creek Salmon Viewing Platform is the best place to witness this natural phenomenon in Anchorage. Or arrive with a rod-and-reel and try to catch one.
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Wild Salmon on Parade
The wildest fish in Anchorage are found along streets as part of the Wild Salmon on Parade, an annual event in which local artists turn fiberglass fish into anything but fish. The art competition has resulted in a fish with boxing gloves titled "Socked Eye Salmon" and "Marilyn MonROE" to "Fish & Chips," a poker-playing halibut. The 30 or so colorful fish appear on the streets in early June and stick around until September.