4 Best Sights in The Bush, Alaska

The largest of the Pribilof Islands at 40 square miles, St. Paul Island is home to the greatest concentration of northern fur seals in the world—500,000 of them—and more than 180 varieties of birds. The island offers a guaranteed treat for folks who love birds and marine animals. The Unangax̂ people lived in the Aleutian Islands south of St. Paul and traditionally traveled to the Pribilofs seasonally for hunting. Russian fur traders claimed and named St. George, St. Paul, and St. Peter islands, and then enslaved and relocated Unangax̂ people in Atka, Siberia, and Unalaska to the islands to hunt for fur seals. Hundreds of descendants of these first nation people live in St. Paul year-round now, and the community has many elements of Unangax̂ culture as well as Russian Orthodox influences, easily seen in the Saints Peter and Paul Church, built in 1907. There's a small museum nearby.

About 140 miles southwest of Bethel and separated from the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta by the Etolin Strait, Nunivak Island is part of the Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge. The terrain includes interior craters and deep lakes from the island's volcanic origins, plus over 40 rivers and a tundra that gives way to shorelines and lagoons. The island sustains a large herd of reindeer managed by residents of the only permanent settlement on the island, the Cup'ik village of Mekoryuk. There's also a transplanted herd of musk ox, along with vast seabird colonies, migratory birds, and an array of sea mammals. For information on the island and travel options, contact the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Bethel.

Tiny green islets rise out of the surging waters of the Bering Sea in the misty, fog-bound Pribilof Islands, where seabirds and northern fur seals breed and feed. Treeless, the small land masses display rippling belts of lush grass contrasting with volcanic rock. In early summer, seals return from far off Pacific waters to mate, and the larger islands, St. Paul and St. George, are overwhelmed with frenzied activity. Although St. Paul and St. George are less than 50 miles apart, the island group itself is a 1,600-mile round-trip from Anchorage, over the massive snowy peaks of the Alaska Peninsula and north of the rocky islands of the Aleutian chain.

Few visitors go to the Pribilofs except commercial fishermen and dedicated bird and animal watchers. Yet together, St. Paul and St. George Islands are seasonal homes to hundreds of thousands of fur seals (about 80 percent of them on St. Paul) and nearly 250 species of birds, some who migrate from as far away as Argentina, while others are year-round residents. Most spectacular of all is the islands' seabird population: each summer more than 2 million seabirds gather at traditional Pribilof nesting grounds and about 90 percent of them breed on St. George.

St. George Island is home to more than 100 people and sustains an array of bird and animal life, including fur seals and millions of seabirds. The volcanic landscape features steep cliffs that rise over 1,000 feet above the shoreline. Rarely visited, the island offers bird and animal watchers a remarkable experience. The weather and limited transportation mean flexibility and planning are essential. Saint George the Great Martyr Russian Orthodox Church was built in 1935 and is on the National Register of Historic Places.