You’ll arrive in Anchorage on a Boeing 737 or some other big generic jet crammed to the bulkheads with fellow passengers, flight attendants cranky because of all the carryons and pilots made manifest only by a disembodied voice emanating from the ceiling.

If you fly out of Anchorage into the Bush, however, you’ll be traveling on anything from a Twin Otter (fourteen passengers) to a Piper Super Cub (just you and one pilot and your knees will be crammed into the small of his or her back).

Another big difference is that before you board you will be asked how much you weigh.� Tell the truth!� This is necessary to calculate the payload of the aircraft and is essential for a safe flight.� If the flight service crew think you have, um, underestimated, they will march you over to a scale, one of which every air taxi I’ve ever flown with has on prominent display in the office.� Although my friend Rhonda Sleighter says she knows someone who claims to weigh three hundred pounds on every flight, just to make up for all the liars.

Alcohol is a huge problem and a hot-button issue in Alaska.� Bush villages have the option under state law to declare themselves wet, damp or dry.� Dry means no alcohol allowed for any purpose at any time.� Damp means you can have it for personal consumption.� Wet means it’s for sale.� The councils of dry villages have been known to create airport greeting committees empowered by local ordinance to search your plane, your luggage and you.� � If alcohol is discovered in any one of these locations, you will be summarily shot.

Well, okay, not really (sorry, a little wishful thinking going on there), but you will be summarily deported, generally via the same plane you came in on.� Even if you are in a wet community you may by imbibing offend those who are trying to make it a dry one.� Why risk it?� My suggestion is that you act as if all villages are dry and just don’t drink during the time you spend in the Bush.� Save it for when you get back to Anchorage, where the bars are open until two in the morning.

If you have a problem with hunting or trapping, stifle it.� Rural Alaskans wear fur as a matter of survival.� Rural Alaskans hunt as a matter of subsistence.� Check your politically correct sensibilities at Anchorage International.� You can pick them up again on your way out of the state.

I was in England last October and someone admired my storyknife brooch and wanted to know what it was made of.� “Ivory,” I said, and I will never forget the look of horror that flooded her face and the faces of the people with her.� “You’d better be careful,” she said sternly, “they’ll confiscate that at customs.”� For a moment I thought she was going to call them herself then and there.� I gaped at her, until the light dawned.� “It’s not elephant ivory,” I said, “it’s walrus ivory from Alaska.”� Alaska Natives harvest walrus and sell art made of ivory from walrus tusks.� You’ll see it in every gift shop you walk into.� It’s legal.

My friend and fellow author Michael Armstrong tells of arriving in Barrow to work on an archaeological dig, and one of the first sounds he heard was of an automatic rifle going off in the distance.� Although my father, a charter member of the NRA, and I went round and round over gun control (“You don’t need an Uzi to shoot a moose!”), the reality of the situation is this:� A firearm in the Alaskan Bush is a tool, not a toy.� You’ll see a lot of them.� Relax.

There is a story, probably apocryphal but no less true for that, about a vegetarian who moved to the Bush and starved to death in a month.� Anchorage won’t be a problem for vegetarians but the Bush could be.� Alert your hosts before you get on the plane, don’t wait until you’re offered a moose steak or the large claw off a King crab and have to turn them down.

Or, alternatively, you can take me along.� I’d be happy to scarf up your leavings.

Speaking of food.� During your sojourn, you may be offered maktak (whale blubber).� You may be offered blood stew (just what it sounds like).� You may be offered Eskimo ice cream (seal fat mixed with sugar and blueberries).� These are delicacies; it is a compliment to you that they offer their best.� Alaska Natives have thrived on this diet for thousands of years; one bite to be polite won’t kill you.� (If you are offered alodiks (fry bread) and turn it down, you’re too dumb to travel here.� Same goes for smoke fish, hard smoked, the real stuff, the kind that makes your jaw ache for a week and your house stink for a month afterward.)

If such a situation arises during your stay, as the guest you will probably be served first.� If you really can’t bear the thought of putting any of the above into your mouth, my friend Dee suggests this:� Accept the serving, find the oldest person in the room and offer it to them.� This will show that you have good manners, if not good taste, and that you respect your elders.� Then quick grab a plate and fill it yourself.

They don’t call the Gulf of Alaska the Mother of Storms for nothing.� Getting weathered in in remote sites is a regular occurrence for the people who live here.� Do what you should do when you travel anyway:� Pack extra underwear and a toothbrush into your carryon, and be prepared to learn how to play pinochle until the whiteout is over.

Whenever I fly into the Bush, I pack my own survival kit.� In summer it’s a bottle of water, a box of waterproof matches, mosquito repellent and a Swiss Army knife.� In winter it’s a bottle of water, a box of waterproof matches, a Swiss Army knife, parka, boots, and a pack of firestarters.� Small aircraft operators by law are required to carry similar kits in each of their planes.� Make the pilot show it to you.� This might ruffle her feathers, but too bad, it’s your ass if the plane goes down and the emergency locator beacon malfunctions, or Search and Rescue is late getting there.

My friend Linda points out that littering in Bush Alaska doesn’t mean exactly the same thing that it does Outside.� Nothing ever gets thrown away in the Bush.� There is a local joke about the 55-gallon drum being the Alaska state flower, but it’s no joke that said drum can be made into a stove, a cache, a dog pot or a dog house.� Blazo tins are beaten flat and used for roofing, Blazo boxes are used for furniture, one-pound butter cans are used for piggy banks, parts jars, ashtrays.� Dead engines of any and every kind are scavenged for parts.� Scrap lumber is never thrown away; too much of Alaska has no trees.� You’ll see a lot of what looks like trash piled around village housing.� It isn’t, for the most part; it’s good stuff that the owner is going to put to good use someday.

Last and most important:� Alaska Natives and in particular Native elders move at a slower pace than the rest of the world.� They take a while to answer a question; don’t rush them.� Don’t insist on looking them straight in the eye.� Don’t stick out your hand for them to shake.� Wait, watch and take your lead from your hosts.

So.� Are you scared yet?

Don’t be.� Alaska is `a wondrous place, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross.’� It is the last place left to show us what our planet looked like a thousand or even a hundred years ago.� It is an extreme landscape, three mountain ranges, thousands of streams, creeks and rivers, rolling tundra that stretches on for hundreds of miles, thirty-six thousand miles of shoreline.

Such an extreme landscape inevitably breeds extreme personalities.� You put four Alaskans in a room, you’ll have five marriages, six divorces and seven political parties.� They are capable people, they have to be, Alaska won’t tolerate anything less.� But they don’t suffer fools gladly, and to them, everyone who doesn’t live in Alaska is a fool.

Enjoy them.