Major companies recommend it as a destination
Travel Lemming recently named Juneau the No. 18 best place to travel globally. Yes, that's "globally".
Juneau is the jumping off place for small towns and villages in Southeast with their own unique heritage and history. Here pictured is the tiny M/V Taku, gone but not forgotten.
"Harnessing of the Atom" totem pole was carved in 1967 by Amos Wallace and erected outside Juneau- Douglas City Museum in 1967. He was a Tlingit artist from Juneau, whose name was Jeet Yaaw Dustaa, and was of the Tlingit Clan Raven Moiety, T'akdeintaan Clan of Hoonah.
The Alaska Governor's Mansion is worth a tour, especially during the holidays.
In a winter surprise, Juneau was chosen by two travel outlets to be included in their list of best places to visit.
Travel Lemming, a U.S.-based online travel publication with more than 10 million yearly readers, announced in December its list of the 50 best destinations in the world for 2025. Juneau was named the No. 18 best place to travel globally. Yes, that's "globally"!
The article calls Juneau "a must-see if an Alaskan adventure is on your horizon." It invites travelers to take a glacier tour or whale-watching cruise, ride the Mount Roberts Tramway, eat fresh salmon and crab legs, pan for gold and visit the Alaska State Museum.
"We are so pleased to have been selected as one of Travel Lemming's top 20 travel destinations for 2025," said Kristi Switzer, Destination Marketing Manager at Travel Juneau.
"Juneau has unlimited opportunities for adventure, education, hiking and fun. From whale watching to flightseeing and glacier trekking to dog sledding, Juneau mixes unique outdoor recreation opportunities with Alaska Native art and culture as well as gold rush history. We look forward to hosting visitors in any season."
The New York Times chimes in
New York Times Frugal Traveler columnist and avid skier Elaine Glusac, who focuses on budget-friendly trips and journeys, moved to Juneau for a month last winter to up her chances of finding deep snow conditions.
"Though better known as a cruise port welcoming 1.6 million ship passengers annually between May and October, it's also a ski town in the low (and budget-friendly) season," she writes.
"Climate-wise, Juneau is renowned for rain. Surrounded by the Tongass National Forest, the world's largest contiguous temperate rainforest, the destination gets 230 days of rain a year, some of them in winter.
"But when the conditions are right, the rain turns to snow and freshwater to ice, creating a wonderland for winter fans, like me, who appreciate downhill and cross-country skiing as well as skating, hiking, cultural diversions off-piste, and culinary intrigue after dark."
She points out that winter airfares can run a third of the summer season prices, and hotels and Airbnb reservations usually drop by $75.
Nationally acclaimed theater
In September, the New York Times also picked Juneau's Perseverance Theater's production of "Cold Case." The play, by Cathy Tagnak Rexford, tells of an Inupiaq woman from a Native village in Alaska, who battles to retrieve her aunt's body from an Anchorage morgue.
The script won the Barrie and Bernice Stavis Playwright Award.
Rexford is also a producer of HBO's "True Detective: Night Country," starring Jodie Foster, who won a Golden Globe Best Actress award in January for her role as Chief Danvers.
Taking place in imaginary Ennis, Alaska, but filmed in Iceland, the investigation centers on eight men who operate the Tsalal Arctic Research Station and vanish without a trace. It's well worth watching and stars an Inupiaq woman from Utqiagvik, Nutaaq Simmonds, who plays the so-called "crazy laundromat grandma," and who also stars in "Cold Case."
Perseverance always offers exceptional theater.
Sailing further on the ferry
The Alaska Marine Highway has an extensive sailing schedule to Southeast Alaska and beyond to Bellingham, Washington.
In 2023, the Federal Transit Administration awarded more than $285 million of investments to improve the reliability and service of Alaska's ferry system, which serves more than 30 communities across 3,500 miles of coastline. The funding, all awarded to the Alaska Marine Highway System, is designated to replacing an aging vessel, upgrading ferry dock infrastructure in rural communities, modernizing four vessels, procuring an electric ferry, designing a new mainliner vessel, and for generating sustainable operations. This landmark funding was made possible by H.R. 3684, the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which Senator Murkowski played a lead role writing and negotiating for Alaska.
Plus, in September, the AMHS was awarded $177.4 million to go toward operational costs, bringing Wi-Fi to passengers and replacing the oldest ferry in the fleet.
