The Chugach National Forest is a 17,450,578-acre (70,620 km2) United States National Forest in south central Alaska. It is located in the mountains surrounding Prince William Sound including the eastern Kenai Peninsula and the delta of the Copper River. It is the second-largest (third-largest if the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest is considered as one entity) forest in the U.S. national forest system, and is the northernmost national forest. The Chugach National Forest envelops Prince William Sound and is surrounded by the Chugach Mountains. It was originally designated in 1907 by Theodore Roosevelt and was originally 23 million acres (93 000 km²) in size. Approximately one-third of the area of the forest is rocks and ice. The supervisor's office is located in Anchorage. There are local ranger district offices located in Cordova, Girdwood, and Seward.
Though the Chugach forest is largely wild, with only 90 miles (140 km) of Forest Service roads, none of it is currently designated as wilderness.
In descending order of land area within the forest it is located in parts of the Valdez-Cordova Census Area, Kenai Peninsula Borough, Anchorage Municipality, Matanuska-Susitna Borough, Kodiak Island Borough, and Yakutat City and Borough.
Famous quotes containing the words national and/or forest:
“A good man will not engage even in a national cause, without examining the justice of it.”
—Samuel Richardson (1689–1761)
“A lady with whom I was riding in the forest said to me that the woods always seemed to her to wait, as if the genii who inhabit them suspend their deeds until the wayfarer had passed onward; a thought which poetry has celebrated in the dance of the fairies, which breaks off on the approach of human feet.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)