Anchorage Audio Tours

Anchorage was staked out in 1914 as a tent city for workers building the Alaska Railroad, and within a decade it had become the territory's commercial capital. Today it is home to roughly 40 percent of Alaska's entire population, a sprawling city of 288,000 pressed between the Chugach Mountains to the east and the shallow, tide-ripped waters of Cook Inlet to the west. The mountains are not distant backdrop here; they begin almost at the city's edge, and on clear days the Alaska Range and even Denali are visible 130 miles to the north.

The 11-mile Tony Knowles Coastal Trail runs along the waterfront past the inlet's dramatic mudflats, where tidal fluctuations of 35 feet can strand anything that wanders onto the exposed sand.

Moose wander freely through suburban neighborhoods and are involved in more annual injuries to residents than bears are. The Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center anchors downtown and offers a serious account of Alaska Native cultures alongside the territory's colonial and Cold War history.