Fur Rendezvous

Fur Rendezvous, known locally as Fur Rondy, is an annual winter festival held in Anchorage, Alaska, in late February, styled as the largest winter festival in North America. Named for historic fur-trapper swap meets, the festival grew out of a 1935 community sports tournament and now includes more than 100 events, from the World Championship Sled Dog Race to whimsical competitions like Outhouse Races and the Running of the Reindeer.

Fur Rendezvous traces its name to swap meets where fur trappers once gathered in mid-February to sell their winter harvests, a rendezvous folded into a new community event in 1935, when Anchorage resident Vern Johnson organized a three-day Winter Sports Carnival to lift spirits in a small, isolated city of about 3,000 people.