Lake Hood (World's Busiest Seaplane Base), Denali Flightseeing & Katmai Bear-Viewing Flights

Because 82 percent of communities in Alaska are not connected to any road system, the bush plane is the lifeline of the Last Frontier; Alaskans have six times as many licensed pilots and sixteen times as many aircraft per capita as the rest of the US. Right in Anchorage, adjacent to Ted Stevens International Airport 12 minutes from downtown, sits Lake Hood Seaplane Base (LHD): the largest and busiest seaplane base in the world.

1. Visiting Lake Hood for Free & the Alaska Aviation Museum

• Walk the Lake Hood Canal & Gull Island Viewpoints: drive or take a ride-share around Lakeshore Drive and Aircraft Drive. Walk along the grassy canals where nearly 800 colourful De Havilland Beavers, Turbine Otters, Cessna 185s and Piper Super Cubs sit tied in slips, taxiing down channels and taking off every few minutes. You can also dine on the outdoor lakeside deck of the Flying Machine Restaurant inside The Lakefront Anchorage Hotel as floatplanes taxi past your table.
• The Alaska Aviation Museum (4721 Aircraft Dr on the South Shore): features four hangars of historic bush planes, a 1928 Stearman biplane, WWII aircraft, simulators, and a Control Tower Observation Deck overlooking the main water runway (check admission online).

2. Half-Day & Full-Day Flights Departing From Lake Hood

Board a floatplane or wheel-ski plane at Lake Hood with established operators such as Rust's Flying Service, Regal Air or Trail Ridge Air (check operator websites for fares and schedules):

1. 3-Hour Denali Flightseeing + Glacier Landing: instead of driving 5 hours each way to Denali, your plane flies above the clouds into the Great Gorge of the Ruth Glacier, circling the 1.6-kilometre granite cliffs of Moose's Tooth and 6,190-metre Denali before landing on hydraulic skis on an alpine snowfield inside Denali National Park.
2. Half-Day or Full-Day Wild Bear-Viewing Floatplane Safari (June to Sept): fly 60 to 90 minutes across Cook Inlet to Redoubt Bay (Wolverine Creek), Lake Clark National Park (Chinitna Bay) or Katmai National Park (Brooks Falls), splashing down on a wilderness lake to watch wild Coastal Brown Bears catching sockeye salmon.
3. 30-Minute Chugach Glacier & Wildlife Seaplane Safari: experience a water takeoff and landing on Lake Hood while flying over Chugach glaciers and Cook Inlet.