Iliamna Lake
The largest lake in Alaska
Iliamna Lake, in remote southwestern Alaska, is the largest lake in the state and one of the largest in the entire United States — about 1,012 square miles (2,622 km²) of cold, deep water set in a roadless wilderness between Bristol Bay and Cook Inlet. Deep enough to reach nearly 1,000 feet (301 m), it dwarfs most lakes in the lower 48 yet is known to very few outside Alaska.
The lake is the heart of one of the greatest salmon runs on Earth: its waters and the rivers feeding it are the nursery for the enormous sockeye salmon runs of Bristol Bay, the largest in the world. That fishery — and the lake's pristine wilderness — sit at the center of a long fight over the proposed Pebble Mine, a vast copper and gold deposit nearby whose development many fear would imperil the salmon. Iliamna also harbors a small, mysterious population of freshwater seals.