We took a rest day on Sunday in Fairbanks. By resting, we mean we visited areas of the city that we had never been to before. We spent some time at the Morris Thompson Cultural and Visitors Center, which houses the Alaska Public Lands Information Center and the Fairbanks Convention and Visitors Bureau. After spending time in the Alaska Geographic bookstore (naturally) and the Dena-kkanaaga gift shop, we looked through some of the Alaska Pipeline original documentation. The center has an almost complete documentation library for public use.
The small log cabin shown above is located at 105 Dunkel Street, just to the west of the visitors center. It is a unique part of the downtown Fairbanks cultural landscape, being one of the oldest structures in the area that is still in its original location. When the cabin (now known as the Gould cabin) was constructed in about 1910, Dunkel Street was on the edge of Fairbanks, just upstream from the riverfront business district. Photographs of early Fairbanks show a sawmill (gone by 1910) about where the visitors center is now, and at the river’s edge end of Wendell Street, just east of Dunkel Street, there used to be a ferry to the small settlement of Graehl across the river, and to the mines in the hills beyond.
Located behind the Cultural and Visitors Center in downtown Fairbanks, the Antler Arch has become a popular local landmark. It is composed of 100 pair of antlers collected from all over the state. It is at the gateway of the Downtown Riverwalk.
This monument features Russian and American pilots of the mid-20th century, and celebrates the strategic and social importance of Alaska as the staging ground for the America-Siberia Airway element of the program that ran from 1942 to 1945. The memorial honors the lend-lease program, which was part of a worldwide scheme that saw the United States end its neutrality before officially entering the war alongside its allies. It is located on the Fairbanks Riverwalk, just north of the visitors center. The only monument to highlight what it looked like for the United States to officially become part of World War II, the ribbon-cutting ceremony that took place in 2006 hosted officials from Russia, France, Canada and the United States to honor the program’s veterans. It continues to cultivate attention from audiences and officials from around the world, highlighting what it can look like when monuments celebrate history in such a notable and profound manner.
I found the original library located near the Gould cabin.
After spending a week at Fairbanks, we moved south to the town of Palmer. The sun was attempting to come out, so I pulled over on a wide spot on the Parks Highway, somewhere after Cantwell and walked down the hillside to try for a shot. As I stood there, I realized I was standing on a hill full of blueberries, in grizzly territory no less. I quickly took a couple of photos and high-tailed it back to the motorhome.
After arriving in Palmer, we made a short tip up the valley towards the Knik Glacier. We wanted to find the outfitter and make reservations a day or so in advance.
We started our glacier journey in a “deuce-and-a-half”, and traveled on land for a while.
Soon we were crossing rivers.
This is Cathy, standing by our ride. She is outfitted for the weather!
Since we were at the end of the road, we made a short walk to a couple of jet boats to continue or trip upriver to the glacier.
Our first view of the glacier, the river and the countryside.
We rode around amongst the icebergs for a while before stopping at the outfitter camp for a snack.
Icebergs, more icebergs, and more icebergs.
And more icebergs. The Knik is a very large glacier, with a multi-mile width as it enters the lake. We actually heard one roll over while we were at the camp.
And even more icebergs. We also came across these as we returned downriver.
This was our guest at the outfitter’s glacier rest area. He seemed to really like the M&M’s that someone was feeding him! Walking about amongst the nearby bushes, we “discovered” evidence of moose and bear!
We attended the Alaska State Fair and were amazed by the amount of people, before realizing that we were there on a weekend, when school was out. We had always attended this event on a weekday, boy what a difference. We had to go to Millie’s Garden to see the displays. It was interesting to note that all of the edible plants were destined for a local food charity.
I took the pictures, Cathy pointed out the plants. I don’t really know what these are, your best guess.
After the gardens, we headed to the lumberjack event. The participants were all Alaskan and the big guy throwing the axe had just become the World Champion Woodsman at the championships in Europe. This is always an entertaining venue. The tree climbing was a measly 30 feet, they climbed 75 feet during the championships.
This guy was recently featured on “America’s Got Talent” and had an array of very different unicycles.
We spotted a couple of Alaska-sized frogs in the topiary.
There are not many state fairs the have a view like this from their parking lot.
We took a ride up Fishhook road to see the Independence Mine, which was totally fogged in during our previous trip with Brent and Tina. We stopped at Summit Lake and watched several para-gliders flying about.
Summit Lake was iced over just a couple of weeks ago.
These are several views of the countryside on the way up. Blueberry picking was in full view, we saw people everywhere picking bucketfuls of the berries. Too many people even for the bears!
Independence Mine is in the distance. Since it was a relatively good day, the state park was operating it’s entrance pay station, so we elected to turn around and view it from a distance.
Leaving Palmer and heading to Glennallen, we had this nice view of Mt. Wrangell emerging from the clouds.
Heading south on the Richardson Highway, we had view after view of the Wrangell Mountains in the Wrangell-St. Elias National Park.
Approaching Valdez, we had this view of the Worthington Glacier.
Travelling with the Schinglers 