Experience the best of Soldotna

Soldotna stands on the Kenai River in the lowlands of the western Kenai Peninsula, where the Sterling Highway crosses the water on a long bridge. It began as a homesteading settlement after the Second World War and is now the commercial centre of the peninsula, with shops, a hospital and the offices of the borough government. The river here runs wide and cold, a milky turquoise from glacial silt.

Anglers line the banks from early summer for the sockeye and king salmon runs, and the stretch of river through town is among the best-known fishing waters in Alaska. The headquarters of Kenai National Wildlife Refuge are here, with a visitor centre and trails, and the forests, lakes and mountains of the refuge stretch east. Seward and the glacier-lined Kenai Fjords lie over the mountains to the south-east.

Salmon dominates dinner, grilled on cedar planks or smoked, alongside halibut and the berry pies made from wild blueberries and cranberries of the peninsula. Midsummer light is long, and winter is cold, snowy and quiet.