We’ve visited some rather remote parks and preserves in Alaska to complete my Treasured Places quest, many of which required chartering a bush flight and consulting with maps and the pilot to figure out where we might be able to land1. Sometimes that’s on a lake, sometimes on a beach, sometimes it’s a gravely flat spot…but it’s nearly always a unique experience.

Here are a dozen such landings.

Misty Fjords National Monument

A seaplane with red and white detailing is docked on a lake with a mountainous backdrop.

Aniakchak National Monument

A small seaplane is parked at the edge of a serene lake surrounded by rocky terrain and green hills under a partly cloudy sky.

Gates of the Arctic National Park

A small plane with the registration N4244S is parked on a rocky riverbank with mountains in the background.

Admiralty Island National Monument

A person stands by a lake with a seaplane, viewed through a window with metal buckets on the sill.

Alagnak Wild River

A person in waders is pulling a small seaplane towards the grassy bank of a river.

Katmai National Park

A small seaplane with the registration number N9608G is parked on the water's edge of a gravelly shoreline under a cloudy sky.

Bering Land Bridge National Preserve

A small plane is parked on a deserted, sandy beach under a cloudy sky. (And yes, those are indeed grizzly bear prints on the right side of the beach)

Cape Krusenstern National Monument

A small airplane is parked on a grassy field under a cloudy sky.

Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve

A small propeller airplane is parked on a gravel surface with a forest and building in the background.

Denali National Preserve

A person is standing in shallow water inspecting or working on a seaplane near a lake.

Noatak National Preserve

A small airplane is parked on a rocky terrain with mountains in the background under a cloudy sky.

Kobuk Valley National Park

A small propeller plane is parked on a sandy landscape under a cloudy sky.

  1. While flightseeing is an excellent way to experience many of these remote landscapes, for the purposes of completing my quest, I wanted to set foot within each protected unit—and yes, including both the park and preserve sections if it was a combined national park unit. ↩︎