The Arctic landscape is the main attraction. Sylvia Grinnell Territorial Park is a 30-minute walk from the centre, where the Sylvia Grinnell River tumbles over rocky falls and caribou graze on the tundra plateau above. In summer the park fills with wildflowers and migratory birds; in winter snowmobiling and skiing are the draws.
St. Jude's Cathedral — the Igloo Cathedral — is Iqaluit's most distinctive building. The Nunatta Sunakkutaangit Museum, housed in a former Hudson's Bay Company building moved on tracks from the village of Apex, holds the best collection of Inuit artefacts and prints in the eastern Arctic.
For ambitious travellers using Iqaluit as a base, Auyuittuq National Park on the Cumberland Peninsula requires a charter flight or long snowmobile journey but rewards with spectacular fjords and the dramatic Akshayuk Pass. Quttinirpaaq on Ellesmere Island is one of the most remote national parks on Earth.