Experience the best of Sitka

Sitka sits on the west coast of Baranof Island in south-east Alaska, facing the Pacific across a sound dotted with islands and overlooked by the volcanic cone of Mount Edgecumbe. It was the capital of Russian America, known as New Archangel, and in 1867 Alaska was formally transferred from Russia to the United States on Castle Hill. The onion-domed St Michael's Cathedral and the Russian Bishop's House, built in 1842, recall that past.

Sitka National Historical Park holds a forest trail lined with Tlingit and Haida totem poles beside the site of an 1804 battle between the Tlingit and the Russians. The Sheldon Jackson Museum shows Alaska Native art, and the Alaska Raptor Center treats injured eagles and owls. Humpback whales, sea otters and bears live in the sound and nearby forests, and the Tongass National Forest, a temperate rainforest, surrounds the island. No road links Sitka to the mainland.

Salmon, halibut and black cod come off boats at the town's harbours, and in spring herring spawn turns the water of the sound pale. The climate is mild and wet, with some of the heaviest rainfall in Alaska, and mist often hangs on the mountains. Summers are cool and long in daylight; winters are mild for the latitude.