We spent two nights in Fairbanks which in truth, wasn't as exciting after all the great places we'd already seen. We also had lunch there with Pete Buist, then President of the Alaska Trapper's Association, whom we'd never met but had exchanged some emails with him.
Pete Buist & Gary
Pete's another interesting guy who holds the only Guiding license issued for north of the Arctic Circle. He was from New England, stationed there in the Air Force, got out when he was 21, and never left. He stands about 6'6" tall.
We considered driving (or flying) up to the Arctic Circle from Fairbanks, but neither of us really had much enthusiasm by that point for making the trip just to say we'd been there and have our picture taken by the sign. On our way back down to Anchorage, stopped for dinner at a restaurant on the highway back from Fairbanks to Anchorage, which was a neat place.
A dog actually sauntered in the front door, then came over to the table and I fed it my leftovers, at which point a little beagle showed up too. No one seemed to notice, or care, that the dogs were there eating dinner with us. Only in Alaska!
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The Alaska Railroad Train |
The Pipeline |
Overall, I was surprised somewhat by the lack of "woods" or forests as we have around here. I hadn't realized (or paid any attention to) the fact that most of AK is a tundra and is generally so barren. Especially north of Anchorage, things in general looked pretty seedy. Maybe a better word is "quaint". I 'spose its partly because of everything i.e. roads, driveways and parking lots being gravel and dirt except the main highway (notice that is singular, there is only one main highway). Nenana and the other small towns we drove through reminded me of the small towns in South Carolina in a way, seems like people are either rich or poor, and not many in-between. Along the roadways there are all manner of places with junk strewn all over the yards. It can be a tough life up there, and a LONG dark cold winter.
As for glaciers, after the first few 50 or so, the novelty of seeing them up close and personal sort of wore off. By the 3rd week it had really turned to Fall, lots of snow at night up in the mountains and the lichen and shrubs were turning beautiful colors on the mountainsides. They call the first snow on the mountain tops "termination dust"...the end of another tourist season. I think early fall must be one of the best times to visit!
It really started to pour rain on our way back down to Anchorage so we just decided to keep on driving and hang out at Dansie and Kim's for the last couple days. The truth is partly that we had gotten got a little travel weary by then.
On our last night Dansie had made arrangements for two of her "interns" (one from WI who will be in Baja, Mexico with her for 4 months on her Blank Brant research project) to go with us to a place called the "Fly-By-Night". It's main claim to fame is that people take their pictures, in all kinds of weird places and locations all over the world, with cans of SPAM in their hands and send them to the bar so they can tack them to their walls. They also have a nightly show spoofing all things Alaskan, which was hilarious.
entrance to the Fly-By-Night
The subject came up that that there are 20 or so men to every woman in Alaska, to which Dansie said the standard reply is "The odds may be pretty good, but the "goods" are pretty odd." If the men at the Fly-by-night were an accurate example... it seems to be true . It's the first place I've ever been that the dance floor was packed with men, all dancing around by themselves to fast and slow songs, seemingly in their own little worlds. And it wasn't that they were gay either...just a little odd...Alaska tends to draw people that march to the beat of their own drummers. It really was a hoot to be there and a fitting end to our trip. We'll definitely go back again sooner or later!
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A couple more sites to visit :-)