From north of the Arctic Circle in the Brooks Range to the Southeast Alaska archipelago, NOLS knows Alaska.
Photo: Allie Barker
An Alaska Backpacking course is a wilderness expedition in every sense, allowing you to explore beautiful landscapes in either the Talkeetna Mountains or the area just east of Denali National Park in the Alaska Range, where the trees disappear and the land stretches into alpine tundra plains with a backdrop of rugged and heavily eroded mountains.
Out here it’s still light at midnight, and you’ll follow the tracks of the seasonal caribou migration. How to hike on tundra, identify the birds, flowers, wildlife and plants of the North Country, and keep warm, dry and happy even when it’s wet are all part of your backcountry curriculum.
You’ll become a seasoned wilderness traveler, learning how to read a map, navigate off trail, and scan the horizon for grizzly, black bears, moose, wolves and Dall sheep.
Effectively leading your peers in the backcountry will transfer to life back at home as well.
Photo: Shawn Stratton
“People talk about wild areas all the time,
but Alaska has a wildness and beauty unlike anywhere else. When
our group finally made it to a summit, we just went wild. I’ll
never forget that feeling of being on a mountain where hardly anyone
else has ever been.”
Ryan Hughes
Semester in Alaska, 1999
University of Maine Student
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NOLS ALASKA...
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