Gold Rush - Day 12 @ Alaska

Our last day of tour.  It has been an incredible two weeks filled with amazing sights and experiences.  And like all good things, this also comes to an end.

But we still had the final day left.  And set off to cover the one thing that we hadn't looked at during the last two weeks - the Alaskan Gold Rush.

Independence Mine lies off Palmer - around 80 miles away from Anchorage and in the beautiful Hatcher Pass.  The greenery and the view from the top of the hills alone is enough to take that 16 mile ride on Fishhook road.

Hatcher Pass

We went for the 1 hour ranger tour at independence mile.  Ms Joyce Hyatt was the volunteer officer who took us to the tour.  Had an hour of extra-ordinary experience living through the eyes of miners who braved weather and land slides to make their fortune.  The dilapidated mine buildings, the far-sighted ideas of Mr. Stole resulting in a great workplace for the miners and the tale of Dorothy Finch!

Independence Mine

We caught the evening flight back to Dallas.  Two weeks flew by before we realized.  We plan to be back - maybe for a winter visit next time?

Lakes and rivers - Day 11 @ Alaska

Spent another hour at the pool this morning.  And then started on our drive to GlenAllen with a detour to Tok.

We traced our way back to Delta Junction from Chena Hot Springs.  This is where the 1422 mile Alaska Highway ends.  We then took our detour to Tok - the gateway to the Top of the World highway and the nearest we will come to Canadian border this trip.  Canada is around 100 miles away from Tok.

At Lake Louise

We then drove back towards Glenn Highway and drove back to GlennAllen.  We had a room waiting at Lake Louise Lodge.  Lake Louise is around 16 miles off Glenn Highway on the way towards Palmer.  We had a view of the lake from the room and spent a quiet evening at the pier enjoying the sunset.

We wrap up our tour tomorrow.  Off to Anchorage in the morning.

Sunset or sunrise?

Hot Springs! - Day 10 @ Alaska

Woke up late in the day after our long day to Arctic. Turns out most of the restaurants were closed as it was independence day.  But found a small Thai restaurant - Siam Thai - nearby that had surprisingly great and fresh food.  Fairbanks most likely has the most number of Thai restaurants in a city outside of Thailand - found at least 5 of them in the two streets that we walked through.

At the ice museum

And then had a great evening at the pool and hot springs.  We drove down an hour to Chena Hot Springs resort.  A rustic setting but gave a nice break post the hectic couple of days of travel.  We spent an hour at the nearby Aurora ice museum  that had fantastic ice sculptures.  And then had a great evening at the pool and hot springs.

Santa and Arctic Circle - Day 9 @ Alaska

We woke up to an overcast sky and intermittent drizzles.  Guess the weather had to catch up on our plan some day. 

Drove two hours up Park Highway on our way to Fairbanks.  Couldnt see anything much outside due to heavy fog that settled in soon.  We reached Fairbanks in a couple of hours and drove on to the nearby city of North Pole.  My son was thrilled about our trip to Santa House. He got more excited at the sight of the large Santa cut-out outside the building and the  enclosure with four reindeers!  We went inside to see a shopping area filled with Christmas goodies and souvenirs.  And Santa himself was patient enough to answer all my son's questions and requests for the next few minutes.  We also sent out few post cards - they will have the North Pole postage seal of course! Well worth the hour we spent there - my son was never so happy last few days.

House of Santa , North Pole, Alaska

The rain still didnt let up and we were worried about our next trip getting cancelled.  We were scheduled to go on an Arctic fly/drive adventure.  Luckily enough, the flight took off as scheduled even though the overcast clouds meant that we couldn't see much outside during the initial 30 minutes.  We flew from Fairbanks to Coldfoot  - a distance of close to 500 miles.  It was an incredible sight to watch Yukon river tracing its path from Canada, Brooks ranges outlining the horizon and the Dalton Highway lying alongside the shiny trans-alaskan pipeline. 

From Fairbanks to Coldfoot and back

We started our drive back from Coldfoot - named after prospectors who got cold feet after reaching this far - around 3 PM.  It will be an almost 12 hour drive back through the Dalton Highway and worth every minute of it.  We crossed Arctic Circle -  rather hopped, jumped or danced our way across in a nice "ceremony" - after an hour's drive. Arctic Circle is the southernmost point where one can see the sun at midnight during the summer solstice.  It felt a privelege to be one among the few to cross this imaginary line. 

Arctic Circle - with our guide Chris

We stopped shortly to take a walk across the Tundra. Chris - our guide - cut a portion of the soil out and showed the permafrost lying underneath. It is incredible that the whole expanse was built on a permanent layer of ice with an overlay of a feet of soil along with a symbiotic pool of vegetation.  We stopped for lunch at Yukon river camp. 

View from Dalton Highway

The river and the bridge provided a great background against the late afternoon sun (it was around 6 PM!).  Yukon is the 5th largest river in the world and this is the only bridge across it for the entire 1400 mile span it has in US.  Trans-alaskan pipeline, a near 500 mile engineering miracle built in the 70's, lay alongside the Dalton Hwy through the trip. Intentionally built in a zig-zag manner to account for sharp climate variations and earthquakes, it has been a controversial project due to its possible impact on environment.  Will be interesting to see if it will be dismantled once the oil is exhausted per the original clause.

Trans-Alaskan Pipeline - Blessing or bane?

Our guide - Chris - was an encyclopedia of information and made the journey lively through his stories.  It was funny to hear the story of how a bear made itself home at the Yukon camp restaurant during a winter.  We also heard the story of Joy - a homestead in Alaska - and marveled at the determination and superstitions of miners.

We reached Fairbanks around 3 AM.  The sun had set completely around 1 AM and the darkening sky had gloriously been replaced by the morning sun seamlessly.  We found ourselves looking at early dawn at the time of check-in.  Literally no night at all!!

The "high one" disappoints - Day 8 @ Alaska

Tundra Wilderness Tour was supposed to lead us through the magical world of Denali national forest teeming with wilderness.  And the hope was to cap it off with a beautiful view of Mt. McKinley. 

We did see grizzlies from afar including a bear with two adorable cubs.  We also saw few Caribous and moose.  The trouble was Alaska already has spoiled us - after seeing bears from 25 feet away at Homer, it was a great let down to strain to see grizzlies  a mile away through high power binoculars. An aside - the smaller grizzlies of Denali, the bigger coastal brown bear and the giant kodiak bear area all the same species - what a difference protein content in food makes! 

Tundra Wilderness - Grandeur and Scale

And the day didnt get better as we couldnt see Mt. Mckinley due to the cloud cover.  Probably we should have covered TWT first before going south to Homer.  Having said that, did get a great view of the Tundra during the day.  The vast expanse has sparse vegetation growth and is open only 4 months during the year. 

Also heard about the sad plight of Caribou who lives in eternal fear of insects who have found innovative ways of forcing a parasitic existence during winter at its cost.  It was painful to watch a Caribou stand motionless for minutes on a ridge for fear of alerting insects to its presence.  One should applaud the effort of national parks service and its rangers in ensuring the preservation of this beauty.

Caribou - Patience personified!

Came back from the tour late evening.  And thanks to the long summer, went mountain biking. Well worth the two hours spent driving the ATV up two trails including a glacial valley with huge sand columns and vast braided river bed.  It was a pleasure to brute force our way throught the trail after the slow journey on the gravel road enroute to see Kuskulana river two days back.  Definitely a stress reliever - need to look up options to do this in Dallas as well.

ATV Racing at Dry Creek

We move on from Denali tomorrow.  Off to Fairbanks for the last section of  our Alaska trip.  How time flies when we dont need it to!

The "high one" beckons - Day 7 @ Alaska

Started off late today after the long drive yesterday.  We had a 5 hours drive ahead of us to Denali Bluffs hotel.  Started around noon from Anchorage and took the Glen Hyway and 3 North towards Fairbanks. 

A beautiful drive that definites provides a contrast to the snowy slopes of Sterling and Seward highways. The roads had long stretches of greenery flanked by pink and white flowers lining the roads.  Moose & caribou sightings and occasional glimpses of Mt. Mckinley (also called Denali or the "high one") adds to the experience. 

View from Parks Hwy - more green than white

However, the scenery changes around Milepost 200.  Vast meadows with large snow capped mountains at their end takes over. The scale of the landscape is astounding.  We were also amazed at the rapid weather changes.  Within an hour we drove through three cycles of pouring rains interspersed with sunny weather. 

Moose view at Denali

Checked into the hotel and immediately went out for rafting at the Nenana river.  Had two hours of exhilarating time rafting down the river.  The brown slit filled glacial rapids were great to raft down.  The coasts also had few breath taking views of surrounding mountains.  Didnt get to see any animals though. 

Definitely hoping to see some animals - maybe a wolf? - tomorrow.  We have a day long trip to Denali National park planned.

The road trip - Day 6 @ Alaska

The longest drive of the tour so far.  We started around 8 from Valdez and drove close to 425 miles to reach Anchorage.  Great drive though with beautiful views of Keystone canyon and multiple glaciers including Worthington glacier and Matanuska glacier.  Could get close to both of them and it was evident that both faced the same effects of climate fluctuation that we saw earlier at Exit glacier.  Worthington is expected to be the last man standing though. 

Kuskulana Bridge - walking the plank

The highlight of the day was the drive to Kuskulana river bridge through Wrangell - St. Elias National Park.  The bridge overlooks a 250 ft canyon.  We had to drive 18 miles post Chitina through a gravel road to reach the bridge.  Well worth the effort and risk though.  And to think that the one lane planked bridge didnt have guard rails till the 90's!! 

View from Glenn Hwy

Crashed as soon as we checked into the hotel.  Should have checked in at an earlier place like Copper Landing or Palmer.  Few miles too many.