Back to Fairbanks

From Chena Hot Springs we returned to Fairbanks via the North Pole. Which was not as big a detour as you might imagine given that that the North Pole in question is a village about 15 minutes drive east of Fairbanks.

The village has a bit of a Christmas theme to it, surprisingly enough, with street names like Santa Claus Lane and Kris Kringle Drive. Plus the street light poles are built to look like candy canes. The only thing to see was Santa Claus House, which is a large gift shop full of toys and such.

"Santa" and friend

However Santa himself must have still been recovering from his last Yuletide dash as he was not due to front for work again until mid May. This gave Sam the chance to sit in Santa's chair so that Keira could sit on his knee!

After returning to check-in at the same motel as our first night in Fairbanks we took it pretty easy knowing that we had another late night outing to try and see more of the Northern Lights. This time we headed out around midnight to a spot called Cleary's Summit, about 20 miles north of town on the Steese Highway. However it was a fruitless wait of about two hours before we gave up and returned to base. Luckily we could turn on the car heater every 15-20 minutes so that it didn't get too uncomfortable.

Not surprisingly we didn't make an early start on Friday either, although at least I managed to make it to the complimentary breakfast before the 9:00am deadline. Once everyone was up and about we returned to the Tourist Office downtown before starting a self guided walk from there to some of the nearby sites of interest. One of these was the headquarters of the Yukon Quest, the other famous dog sled race that runs a few weeks before the Iditarod and alternates each year between running from Fairbanks to Whitehorse in Canada and vice versa. Many say it is an even tougher race, partly because of the number of mountains that have to be crossed, though it doesn't seem to have quite as much international fame as the Iditarod.

After lunch at a cafe, which looked a little like a 50's diner minus the jute boxes, we did some shopping at a couple of nearby gift/souvenir shops. The first one was quite an interesting little establishment with a large and eclectic collection of bric-a-brac. Luckily for Laura this included a couple of small carved lizards. The second shop was more your standard modern tourist fare and so wasn't nearly as charming.

The Trans-Alaska pipeline

Afterwards we went for a drive part of the way back out towards Cleary's Summit to see part of the trans-Alaska Pipeline. The pipeline was built in the 1970s to transport oil from the rich (but frequently ice bound) Prudhoe Bay fields in the north to the shipping port of Valdez on the south coast. (Yes, the oil from the infamous Exxon Valdez spill would have come through this pipe.) The pipeline is about 1.2m across and almost 1,300 kms long and runs through some pretty remote and inhospitable terrain. In some places it is underground as protection from avalanches and rock slides but otherwise it is raised a couple of metres above ground on special posts to keep the heat of the oil (it is 49C when it starts flowing, cooling down to about 42C by the time it  reaches Valdez) from melting the permafrost. When underground it is layered in special insulation for the same reason.

Muskox at the research farm

Next stop was a drive around a research farm on the southern outskirts of Fairbanks where we managed to get a pretty close look at some muskox, albeit through a couple of wire fences. They are amazing looking creatures, directly related to prehistoric mammoths and showing it. Their wool is used in quivet lacing, a native Alaskan art, and very expensive.

Later in the evening we went back to the International Ice Sculpture exhibition for the 8:00pm announcement of the winners of the multi-block sculptures we had seen being carved on Tuesday morning. The finished articles were all very impressive and it was interesting to see how some of them had been completed. It was also interesting to see them at night with coloured lights used to add an extra dimension. Somewhere along the way Sam & Keira also worked out that the secret to sliding properly on the ice slides was to invest in a plastic toboggan - which allowed for much faster progress down the icy lanes. Sam, Keira and Laura, and sometimes Sam & Keira together, took turns in trying out this new past time with lots of laughs and a minimum of bumps and bruises (some of the lanes were smoother than others). On this occasion yours truly was content to try and capture some of this hilarity for posterity. After an adjournment to the "warm room" for thawing hot drinks it was back to our hotel for a night-time nap before the next adventure.

One of the amazing ice sculptures

Sam & Keira trying out their new tobaggan

This was another trip out to Clearys Summit in the early hours of the morning, despite the unpromising forecast, for yet another attempt to see the Northern Lights. Laura was adapting well to these excursions by smuggling out to the car one of the doonas from our room to ensure that she stayed nice and toasty during our wait in the car. Sadly, it was another fruitless wait and after about an hour and a half we returned to our hotel to sleep for what remained of the night.

Being a Saturday the breakfast next morning was available until 10:00am. Well, allegedly. The woman in charge of it started shutting things down about 20 minutes early, presumably to give herself more time to get to one of the other two jobs she apparently had. However we did at least manage to get her to give us enough milk for our cereal.

Today's first adventure was to walk some of the nature trails at Creamer's Dairy - a former dairy farm that had been preserved as common parkland as a result of a public campaign by local residents. It was another lovely, calm, sunny day so despite being very cold it was still quite nice being out and about. When we had completed the walk the attendant in the Information building showed us a muskrat that had been rescued and was being cared for before being released back into the wild in late spring.

A snow covered footbridge on the Creamery nature trail

A visit to the Natural History Museum on the grounds of the local university was the next port of call and it provided a wealth of information about the geological, historical and biological history of the region. A special exhibition on the first ascent of Mount McKinley was particularly interesting, especially as the elevated position of the museum gave a panoramic view of the Alaska Range, including Mt McKinley. The displays of native Alaskan artifacts and lifestyles within the Arctic circle were also fascinating.  The day would not have been complete without another visit to the Ice Sculpture park - might as well make good use of our family pass and try out that toboggan some more! This time we included a contest to see who could slide the furthest - a contest that was easily won by yours truly, with Keira second. On my first effort the toboggan took a break to the right at the bottom of the slides and I nearly took out one of the plastic posts marking the edge of the end zone. I managed to stay straighter the next time and eventually had to apply the brakes to avoid taking out a woman looking at her smart phone while standing (she thought) well back from harm's way. On another occasion Laura narrowly avoided slamming into a small child who had decided to turn around and walk right back across the end of the slides - succeeding only in sending his toboggan spinning about five metres away. As well as all that fun we took the time to have another look at the multi-block sculptures by daylight. They were no less impressive.

Laura takes out a child's toboggan!

The "children" having fun on their toboggan

Our last adventure while in Fairbanks was to have one last attempt to see more of the Northern Lights. So once again, after a nap, we arose after midnight to drive out of town. This time to decided to have another shot at going up Murphy's Dome Road, now that we had a better idea of how far it was. So we drove about four miles past where we had been last Monday night, all the way to the top of the mountain. This time luck was with us as we saw a much better display than last time. The only problem was that the temperature - if it wasn't already negative Fahrenheit - most certainly was negative by the time you factored in the bitter wind chill. And tonight of all nights I'd forgotten to wear my ski pants, and my cotton pants (without thermals underneath), weren't really up to the task. Even worse by the time I had set up my camera on the tripod I had to dash back to the car and turn on the heater to defrost my fingers. It was freakin' freezing!! However the lights display made it all worthwhile. The aurora calmed down for a while shortly after we arrived, but then started up again further to our left. Later another strand started away to our right and the two gradually stretched across the sky to meet. It was awesome. We were all delighted that our persistence had paid off and we had been rewarded with a good viewing of one of nature's most spectacular phenomenona. It was a great way to end our time in Fairbanks.

A wonderful sight