I can hardly complain of tourists when I myself walked all over the Inside Passage with a full backpack and two cameras slung around my neck. But it was a nice retreat from the hustle and bustle of hoards of people and touristy jewelry and souvenir shops when we hit the streets of Petersburg.

There is no huge main attraction here. There aren't expensive restaurants. And shopping, well that may be in one of at least three hardware stores. But Petersburg was one of my two favorite towns out of the five I visited. It's very proud of its Norwegian ancestry, established when Norwegian Peter Buschmann built the town's first cannery in 1898. He picked the area because of its resemblance to Norway.

The lack of tourism is a result of the narrow waterways leading into Petersburg. The larger cruise ships require wider and deeper waters than those of the well-known Wrangell Narrows which lead directly into Petersburg's Frederick Sound. But the town of roughly 3,000 residents gets by without the cruise ships and even possibly prefers it that way.

There are three harbors in Petersburg. The main industries are commercial fishing and seafood processing. Calling itself "Little Norway," its motto is "Little Norway Big Adventure." I'm not so sure about the adventure part, but it's a charming town, and I loved it.