America’s frontier state may be the last place on Earth for a true pioneer-style adventure (easy to reach from any major airport).

While icons like Columbus, Cortez, Pizarro and Balboa are well known to students of exploration, the name Bruno de Hezeta is likely unfamiliar. It might be said that de Hezeta drew the short straw as an 18th century explorer—or more accurately, that he was given the cold shoulder. Unlike his Iberian counterparts charged with riding warm breezes in search of tropical gold, de Hezeta was dispatched to Alaska with orders to claim it for Spain. One of his ships actually made it into Sitka Sound and performed a “possession ceremony,” but the long-term success of that venture is evident in the fact that only the state’s Malaspina Glacier and town of Valdez carry Spanish names.

If the Spanish were happy to abandon their claim (and they basically were), most Americans are content to ignore theirs. Despite it being arguably the most dynamic state in the country, it’s also one of the least inhabited and least visited. More than three times the size of France, it has just over one percent of that country’s population—roughly 710,000 people spread over 656,000 square miles.

What that leaves is a whole lot of wild, with not many people to see it. Disney World gets near 16 million visitors annually; Alaska gets 2 million. In traveling terms, that means opportunity. And with planes, trains, uncluttered endless highways, rivers for rafting and even horses to get around, there’s no excuse for not visiting. It’s America’s last frontier, it’s beautiful, and these days you can even bring your golf clubs.

ANCHORAGE

If you visit Alaska, you’ll likely fly into Anchorage, and it will probably be spring or summer. Winter is challenging to say the least, with long spells of darkness and freezing temperatures even in the state’s southern regions. In summer it can be incredibly pleasant, with interior temps hovering in the high 60s and low 70s for most of the long, long days. Near the summer solstice (June 21) there’s enough light in the sky at 2am to easily read a newspaper outside—and you’ll have plenty of company. Alaska’s biggest city by a longshot, Anchorage’s 260,000 inhabitants make up more than a third of the state’s total. Fairbanks and Juneau are a distant second and third with just over 30,000 each, and it drops off sharply from there into the thousands and then hundreds. Due to its relative standing as a metropolis, Anchorage is where you’ll find most of the state’s fine dining, performing arts and other “big city” accoutrements. It’s less rustic than the rest of the state, to be sure, but you’ll know you’re not in Kansas any more by the surrounding mountains and wildlife downtown (some of it enjoying the state’s excellent micro-brewed beers).

There’s plenty to do in the city proper, but most of it can be easily found in guidebooks. We think of Anchorage as a jumping-off point for the rest of the state, and so that’s how we’ll treat it here. A night or two should be all you need before heading out to the Kenai Peninsula, Denali National Park or to even further adventures.

Stay: When it comes to accommodations in Alaska, it’s important to remember that you’re basically on the frontier and as such you shouldn’t expect five-star amenities or service. Any notion of actual luxury is more apt to be found in smaller towns’ B&Bs, with their typically friendly innkeepers, cabin or lodge-style accommodations and usually hearty and tasty breakfasts. The “big name” hotels in Anchorage include the usual suspects—Hilton Garden Inn, Sheraton, Embassy Suites, Holiday Inn Express, etc.—and they all pretty much stick to the story. We prefer the city’s quaint Copper Whale Inn, which is beautiful, clean and as friendly as they come. The included morning coffee and fresh muffins were all we needed to get our days started.

Eat: If you like your food big, fresh and bold, this is your state. While delicate sauces and carefully crafted Lyonnaise table fare may not abound, there’s a surprising amount of excellent quality food in Anchorage. For seafood, we like Simon & Seaforts. Bering Sea Red King Crab isn’t exactly rare in Alaska, but they do it right. Same with the Tableside Seafood Etouffee, which adds andouille sausage, braised greens and cheese grits to jumbo sea scallops, black tiger prawns, fresh mussels and clams. Glacier Brewery is another good option, with a grill and barbecue that will definitely satisfy, not to mention a great selection of house-made beers.

Wherever else you dine, you can’t leave Anchorage without stopping by Humpy’s Great Alaskan Alehouse. Too many beers on tap to count and all the buffalo wings, fried halibut and live music you could want. One of those great locals’ spots where you’ll feel right at home, even if it’s your first time in town.

Golf: There’s a Palmer Golf Course here, but it’s nothing to do with Arnold Palmer. Rather, it’s in the town of Palmer, about 40 miles northeast of Anchorage and just down the street from Wasilla. Though Russia is not at all visible from the fairways, Palmer Golf Course is considered one of the best around, rated one of the top public courses in the state by Golf Digest. They take particular pride in their greens, have a new fleet of carts and offer less congestion than other Anchorage area courses. Other options include Anchorage Golf Course and Moose Run GC, “The World’s Northernmost 36-hole Golf Facility.”

KENAI PENINSULA

Seward

Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula (“The Kenai,” to locals) is only 55 miles from Anchorage and it’s one of the most adventure-packed bits of land on the planet. It’s 15,000 square miles of bears, glaciers, cold winds off the sea, great fishing and history. Hotspots like Homer and Seldovia define a specific kind of laid-back Alaska living, but we couldn’t help but fall in love with Seward. This seaside town sits at the head of Resurrection Bay and is the gateway to Kenai Fjords National Park. From Seward, one can embark on a cruise, a kayak adventure, a glacier hike, “flightseeing,” a ride on the Alaska Railroad and so much more. We booked with Kayak Adventures Worldwide kayakak.com, and had an incredible day on the water seeing brown bears charging up the side of a mountain, numerous birds on land and at sea, and even calving glaciers—all from a kayak. (Note: Don’t make the same mistake one guest did and ask your guide, “What’s the elevation here?” while sitting in a kayak) If you want to stick closer to land, Exit Glacier Guides ExitGlacierGuides.com will get you on the local ice sheet for a day hike or more, while if you’re anxious for more on-water action—whale watching, perhaps—Kenai Fjords Tours kenaifjords.com or Major Marine Tours majormarine.com can help.

Stay: Cruise ships and buses regularly come into Seward, and there are a number of accommodations there to meet them. Skip the mass-market tourist boxes and head to a place we’ve found to be rather exceptional: Bear Paw Lodge sewardbearpawlodge.com. Wendy and Dave, the owners, are the best kind of people: friendly, knowledgeable and helpful in the extreme. Their lodge is clean, comfortable, and incredibly well appointed with Wi-fi and other modern comforts. It’s close to everything you want to see and do in Seward, including the excellent Kayak Adventures Worldwide (which the couple own as well; book a trip and save on your lodging). After numerous visits here, it has to be said that the overall experience staying at Bear Paw Lodge is so good that we’re not even suggesting an alternative.

Eat: We’ll make this plain and simple: Smoke Shack. If you like barbecue and eating in an old train car, don’t miss it. They do breakfast as well. Ray’s Waterfront is a local staple, and the harbor views are nice, but somehow Seward had us feeling hearty and so we couldn’t stay away from the Exit Glacier Salmon Bake. Great seafood, steaks and microbrews—and you get to pick your own pickle from a barrel. After a day of hiking on the glacier, we’re sold.

Western Kenai Peninsula and Nina If you’re headed to Homer or any spot on the end of the peninsula, one place we cannot recommend enough along the way is the Samovar Café and its lovely (if eccentric) patron, Nina, in the town of Nikolaevsk. Only the natives were in Alaska before the Russians, and the town of Nikolaevsk harkens back to the state’s early days. Though this particular town was founded relatively recently, in 1968, most of the inhabitants are part of the Old Believers Church, adhering to a form of Russian Orthodoxy that predates church reforms introduced in 1666. Consequently, the town appears out of the wilderness as a sort of “frozen-in-time” enclave of old world living. Nina’s café is the one bit of color offered tourists, and it’s welcome in an otherwise imposing, though striking, atmosphere. Be prepared to dress in costumes, sup tea, eat borscht and piroshki and fend off pitches to buy everything from matryoshka dolls to DVD documentaries on Nina herself. Truly an experience not to be missed russiangiftsnina.com.

Golf: There’s only one full-service 18-hole course on the Kenai Peninsula, the obviously named Kenai Golf Course kenaigolfcourse.com. Fun, though you’re as apt to get an award-winning wildlife photo here as you are to hit an eagle, if you’ll pardon the pun.

GLACIER BAY & JUNEAU

If you don’t fly into Anchorage, chances are you’ll come to Alaska on a cruise ship. If you do, you’ll almost definitely stop in Juneau. Glacier Bay, photos of which feature on most “Come to Alaska!” brochures, is a temperate rainforest region that features eye-popping glaciers to be sure, but it also functions as a sanctuary for whales, bears and a massive host of wildlife. It’s one of the largest protected Biosphere Reserves in the world, it’s recognized as a World Heritage Site, and we could fill a book with information on its wonders. That said, we’ll leave more Bay info to whatever tour you take, because there’s plenty to see and do in Juneau and the surrounding area. If you want to get up close and personal with a glacier but don’t have your sea legs, Mendenhall Glacier is a quick drive (just 13 miles) from downtown Juneau. One of Alaska’s top attractions, it’s just one of 38 glaciers that flow from the Juneau Icefield in the mountains just above the town. Drive, hike or take a “flightseeing” tour in a plane or helicopter, some of which actually land on the glacier and let you walk around. Fishing near Juneau is popular as well, as is whale and wildlife watching. Companies like All Alaska Tours alaskatours.com can sort you out for any of it, and there are a number of others, all of which can also help with activities around the nearby town of Sitka. Fishing is paramount in Sitka, but we also like the available Russian history. The city dates to 1799 and was the capital of Russian America. Evident today are the Russian Bishop’s House, the oldest original Russian building in the area, St. Michaels Cathedral and the site of Baranof Castle, where the formal transfer of Alaska from Russia to the United States took place in 1867. Whether you visit these, head out to catch a fish or just watch them swim, there’s no doubt you’ll enjoy this active corner of the state.

Stay: We don’t always go for the big-name hotel chains, but Best Western Grandma’s Feather Bed in Juneau is something special. Along with being “the smallest hotel in the largest hotel chain,” it’s downright gorgeous, 14 suites in a Victorian-style farmhouse. If you’d like something independent, check out Pearson’s Pond pearsonspond.com. As comfortable as it is picturesque, there’s even a spa on property to work out the kinks of a glacier hike.

In Sitka we like Otters Cove Bed & Breakfast otterscovebandb.com, not only because it’s clean and friendly but because it sits at the water’s edge on—you guessed it—a cove where you can regularly see otters. Nice.

Eat: Grandma’s Feather Bed has a pretty good restaurant on site. We also like Chan’s Thai Kitchen because it’s inexpensive and as authentic as you’re going to get this far north. Also, Tracy’s King Crab Shack is a winner: “Only five items but lots of ways to try them!” You can get crab, crab, crab, crab or crab, served in cakes, bisque, rolls or buckets. A lack of selection was never so appealing.

Golf: Not a lot going on here in Juneau, but the view from anywhere on the 9-hole Mendenhall Golf Course can’t be beat. Pair that with friendly locals and a strong cross-course breeze, and you’ve got a seriously fun afternoon.

ALL POINTS NORTH

If your personal ambition to head north continues once you land in Anchorage, there’s no reason to turn around now. You can drive—that’s right: drive—all the way to the Arctic Ocean if you like. Along the way you’ll hit Fairbanks, Alaska’s other big city, before you jump on the Dalton Highway on your way to Prudhoe Bay, the Beaufort Sea and views of the Arctic Ocean. But before you do, you must visit Denali National Park, home to Mt. McKinley. We suggest stopping, eating and staying in Talkeetna while you’re visiting the park. Denali’s main attraction, which stands more than 20,300 feet tall, lords over six million acres of some of the most beautiful land anywhere. Apart from on foot, the best way to see it is with a “flightseeing” tour on a plane that can not only circle Mt. McKinley, but can land on one of the glaciers surrounding it. Talkeetna Air Taxi talkeetnaair.com is one of the best.

Five hours from there you’ll hit Fairbanks. While the city has its charms, we kept moving, jumping on the Dalton Highway en route to Prudhoe Bay. More than 400 miles of mud, ice and heart-stopping scenery, the Dalton is nothing if not a challenge—hence it being featured on the TV show Ice Road Truckers. You’ll either have to take your own vehicle or rent one from a specialist; Hertz, Avis and the rest of them don’t want their cars on this road. If you decide to brave it, you can look forward to hours of Muskoxen (a contemporary of the Wooly Mammoth and one of the oldest types of animals on the planet), Arctic Fox, Caribou, Snowy Owls and more, along with miles of stunning landscapes. The town of Coldfoot is basically a truck stop, though it does feature the northernmost bar in the country (no alcohol is allowed in the town of Deadhorse at Prudhoe Bay, which is essentially an oil camp). Stay in Wiseman, just down the road. The old mining town with a current population of roughly six people dates to 1919 or so, and the Arctic Getaway B&B arcticgetaway.com is in one of the town’s original buildings. Rustic but incredibly comfortable and homey, and the hosts are fantastic. From there it’s up, up and away to Deadhorse, where you’ll pay big money to stay in the oil camp and take an oil-company-run tour of the area, which culminates with a 10-minute stop on the sadly anticlimactic shores of the Beaufort Sea.

Still, if you can look beyond all of the industrial machinery, the area is stunning, and the drive up is once-in-a-lifetime—unless you’re a local trucker, in which case it’s likely less inspiring.

Stay: The Talkeetna Roadhouse was built in 1914, and it’s still serving up great rooms and great breakfasts talkeetnaroadhouse.com. In Fairbanks we like Pikes Waterfront Lodge pikeslodge.com, with its sauna, riverside deck and friendly staff. The Arctic Getaway B&B in Wiseman, referenced above, is fantastic, while the oil camp accommodations in Deadhorse are limited, similar and similarly expensive.

Eat: There are options, but we’re sold on the West Rib Pub in Talkeetna—tasty fare and one of the best beers we’ve tried: Ice Axe Ale, only available here, and worth traveling for. In Fairbanks we have to recommend the Aloha BBQ Grill. The Hawaiian menu isn’t just a break from typical hearty Alaskan chow, it’s actually good. Choices north of Fairbanks are limited, but basic food can be had at the camp/fuel stop in Coldfoot, while you’ll eat with the oil workers in Deadhorse.

Golf: You won’t be doing much golfing up here, but if you want to play North America’s Northernmost USGA golf club, you’re in luck: North Star Golf Club near Fairbanks is your place northstargolf.com. Links-style play and helpful staff make it worthwhile, plus it’s the only golf club we know of that includes an animal checklist on its scorecards—no kidding!