Date: 25 June 2001 (Monday)
Start: Denali Grizzly Bear CG, near Denali NP, AK
End: River’s Edge RV Park, Fairbanks AK (130 miles)
It was 50f and cloudy when we got up. Late in the afternoon in Fairbanks, it reached 72f under totally blue skies, the light blue that reminds you that you’re up north. Sunset tonight will be at 12:45 am, and sunrise will be at 3:01 am. Fairbanks claims that there is "functional" daylight 24 hours a day until July 16th.
We hooked up after eating breakfast and scurried to Fairbanks. The clouds decreased as we got farther north. There was considerable smoke in the region of Nenana from forest fires; after we passed Nenana, the skies turned clear.
We scurried because we didn’t have reservations at the RV park we wanted to stay in, so we wanted to be the first party present without reservations.
It worked; we got a good space 25 yards from the Chena River and still fairly close to the office, the phones for e-mail, and the showers. We can see a little of the Chena from the "little house" in the cottonwoods (they are shedding their cottony seed pods right now). We also see lilacs blooming (again, for the umpteenth time) but they’re reaching the end of their time.
We wandered downtown to the visitor’s center and gathered brochures and information. Then we selected a few items from the driving tour to visit quickly so we’d find our way around town, and to see if we wanted to do anything in-depth with them. We saw the statue of the first family next to the visitor's center. The catholic church across the river is interesting; it was originally down river and was hauled up the river on the ice.
The Creamer Fields wildlife refuge is an old dairy farm (till 1966), with acreage added, and now houses transient birds and wild animals. We didn't see anything there today.
The Large Animal facility of the UAF (University of Alaska – Fairbanks (I’m only typing that once)) has fields of musk ox and caribou that they study. Normally, you can get close to the animals. But, with this year’s Foot and Mouth disease scare, the tours are closed and proximity to the animals severely restricted. But we did get pictures. The musk ox only come to your waist – I had always thought they were larger, like bison. The caribou look small, too. They had a few baby caribou running around, staying close to mommy, which were cute. We also saw a few sand-hill cranes.
We went to the army post, Ft Wainwright, and took a tour of that base. It looks as though it has the necessary support buildings, and they all look as though they are built for cold weather.
In wandering around the city, we saw that the houses (and business buildings, for that matter) are built more for function than for looks. There are a lot of log houses, new and old, fancy and unattractive, big and small.
The town is dusty, which reminds us we’re in the arid interior of Alaska. They haven’t had much rain here, either.
We returned to the little house. We went through all the materials we have and selected a bunch of activities to do or see during the next few days.
The park here is divided into two sections, one for RV’s and one that has cabins for car driving tourists. The cabins are quite up-scale, very nice, with porches facing the river. That end of the park has a different office, banquet room/meeting hall, and it has a restaurant and pub that looks nice, so we’ll walk down the riverbank for dinner.
We’re back! We sat on the deck overlooking the Chena River. Dolores had a snow crab on strip steak combination and I made do with salmon, and we had a California Riesling. All quite good, and with this weather, and viewing the small boats going up and down the Chena, very nice indeed.
Now we’re relaxing in the little house and just plain taking it easy.
