Having traveled to nearly half of the states in the country I can say that without a doubt, Alaska is by far the most raw, the most natural, and the most beautiful place in the country. When you first show up to the main Juneau airport in Alaska, you immediately realize that you are truly in the middle of nowhere and civilization is much smaller than the wilderness around it. It is really humbling because you always think about your life and how much it matters but when you see the grand scale of things you realize it is ultimately insignificant.  

Once you step off of the plane, you feel like an ant compared to everything around you. You look one way and you see massive mountains shooting vertically into the sky with bald eagles and bears gracing the landscape inside of rainforest timber that is so thick that it looks dark in the daytime when you are inside of it. 

You look the other way and see a vast sand beach with trickling brackish water flowing through it cutting paths like a knife through butter. Inside of the river you can see salmon of every variety swimming upstream with every ounce of energy left in their soul in order to lay their eggs and die. It is a really raw and kind of beautiful ecosystem in that way. The salmon know that they are swimming to their deaths but accept it and still press on for the ultimate goal of starting new life by laying eggs and sustaining the population. Not only do these salmon create new life for their species, they also provide energy for all other species around them. 

You can see a vast variety of birds, including bald eagles and frigates, black bears, brown bears, grizzly bears, and kodiak bears absolutely feasting and gorging themselves full of the salmon because it is basically an unlimited buffet for them and soon food will once again be very hard to come by. 

Not only that, but the food, the people, the fishing, the hunting, the hiking, and the natural beauty are things that you will remember for the rest of your life. Reaching the top of a mountain peak and being inside a cloud in the early morning and then watching as the sun burns through like a light at the end of a tunnel and watching the sunrise as eagles fly below you is a sight you will never forget. In conclusion, I would recommend going to Alaska, it will change your life forever.