Alaska.com: Alaska's Travel Website

Alaska has a couple of big passenger railroads and some that are just for fun.

Alaska Railroad

The Alaska Railroad carries passengers between Seward and Anchorage and then Anchorage, Denali National Park and Fairbanks. An excursion is available from Anchorage to Whittier through a 2.5-mile-long tunnel.

Passenger service is also available for people who want to go shorter distances, say from Anchorage to Wasilla or Talkeetna. The railroad also carries freight inland from Anchorage. It hauls refined petroleum from North Pole (located on a spur from Fairbanks) to Anchorage. Northbound trains deliver coal, mined at Healy near Denali, to Fairbanks.

During the winter, the railroad's only passenger service is a whistle-stop train that goes from Anchorage to Fairbanks on Saturdays and back on Sundays.

White Pass and Yukon Route -- Skagway

The White Pass and Yukon Route railway once was a bustling freight hauler, but now it's an excursion line carrying passengers only during the summer between Skagway and Lake Bennett, British Columbia. There also are shorter excursions.

The rails generally follow the route taken by Klondike gold rush prospectors in the late 19th century.

In general, however, you can't reach Alaska by rail.

On the bright side, the Canadian passenger rail system does go to Prince Rupert, British Columbia, where tourists can catch the Alaska state ferry for the trip north.