Yup'ik Community

Many small villages are found at the mouth of the Yukon River where it flows into the Bering Sea. These villages range in size from under 100 people to 800 year round residents. The Yup'ik Eskimos have inhabited this area for over 10,000 years, crossing from Russia on the land bridge after the last ice age.

Their culture has been rich with tradition, much of which is still carried on today.

The villages located in the Lower Yukon Delta area are fairly isolated. Between October and May the river is frozen, leaving the area accessible only by air. Small passenger planes make the trip from Anchorage daily and cargo planes fly in food, mail and other supplies four days each week. Residents travel between villages by snowmobile during the months when the river is frozen over. Once the ice leaves the river, commonly referred to as "break-up", barges and other motor vessels travel up and down the river delivering cargo to the villages. The first barges each season are filled with fuel, vehiclees, construction supplies, dry goods, and supplies for the comercial fishing season.

For a bit of perspective, Alaska is the largest state in the United States with 591,000 square miles and is larger than Texas, Montana and California combined. Alaska's population, however, is only 626,000. The state's coastline exceeds the combined coastlines of all the other states, including Hawaii. There are 3 million lakes and more than 3,000 rivers. Much of the state is accessible only by air on a year round basis and by water only during the summer months before the rivers freeze over. None of the remote areas in western Alaska have roads linking them to the rest of the state or to each other (Alaska's highway system goes only as far west as Anchorage and Fairbanks.) Some villages, in fact, have no roads but strictly boardwalks.