Hi All,

I've recently taken an interest in the history of the Arctic and Arctic exploration. I have become aware that there was some history of communication between Siberia and Alaska.

For example, when the first Europeans landed on the Diomede Islands in 1648 (as per wikipedia) they were inhabited, and since they are so close to both Alaska and Siberia it seems reasonable that there were established connections between the two for a long time before that.

Naively I would have thought that this knowledge would have found its way South, and lead to the "Discovery" of the Americas from the West before Columbus was able to do it.

Were these places just too cold and too remote for non-natives to travel to? When was the first contacts between the natives and the rest of the world established?