Gates of the Arctic National Park

Gates of the Arctic National Park, covering much of the Brooks range in northern Alaska, is one of the finest wilderness areas of the world. With a surface area of 8.4 million acres (336 thousand squares kilometers), it is four times the size of Yellowstone, and only slightly smaller than Switzerland. What is remarkable is that such a large chunk of land has remained one of the most remote and unspoiled places in the world. No roads lead into the park, and there are no trails or bridges inside. One has to find and earn his way into the tundra, immensely vast but still subtle in the texture and wetness variations of its miniature habitats.

The Brooks range is so vast that each of its mountains have a different character, however the Arrigetch Peaks area, a place of gothic black granite spires and pinnacles reaching haphazardly into the clouds, is considered by many to be the most spectacular part. Shosh Moalem and I flew into the frontier town of Bettles, then used an air taxi to be dropped off and picked up at Circle Lake. In eight days, we backpacked to a base camp near the Arrigetch Peaks, and explored three of the surrounding valleys. Our timing of mid-August let us admire the dazzling splendor of the tundra in fall colors. See also the pictures of backpacking.