Record number of people visit national parks in Alaska

ANCHORAGE, Alaska – A record number of people visited Alaska’s national parks in 2018, the Anchorage Daily News reports.

The National Parks Service says visits to its parks in Alaska topped 2.9 million, the highest number of visits recorded for the state, and up from about 2.7 million in 2014.

The Daily News reports that the Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park in Skagway had the most visits in the state last year, and it was the only national park site in Alaska to top 1 million visits. Aniakchak National Monument and Preserve, a remote volcano crater park site on the Alaska Peninsula, had the fewest, with 100 visits, the newspaper reports.

The Daily News says a booming cruise industry bringing more passengers to the state in recent years is a major reason for more visits to the parks.