This morning we boarded our tour coach at 8 AM for a tour of Fairbanks. Our bus driver was a good teacher and gave us lots of info on the city. Fairbanks is considered a sub -arctic desert, they have an average of 11 inches of rain a year. To be a desert 10 inches or less qualifies. Alaska can have seven million acres of forest fires a year and Fairbanks also gets smoke from Siberian fires.
We cruised the Chena River on the paddle wheeler Discovery. Capt Wade Binkley is a 4th generation river boat captain. The boat is 156' long, 34' wide, sets in the water 39 inches and carries 900 people. The family company of riverboats, mines & trading posts was started in 1898. We were given a thrill while on board, bush pilot Steve took off and landed beside the boat. And he did it just for us (and every tour). He flies a Piper Super Cub that he restored, it took him 1,500 hours. We were informed bush pilots aren't fancy dressers, if their socks match and their hat's are dead they are happy. We passed the home of Susan Butcher, 4 time Iditarod Champion. We stayed on board while her husband, Dave, and his two daughters gave us information on their dogs via microphone. Dave had a team hooked up, they knew they were going to work and were they ever excited! The "sled" was a 4-wheeler. Dave and his 10 year old daughter rode, he said the dogs were pulling about 600 lbs and going 20mph. Our next stop was an Athabascan (Indian) village. We left the boat for demonstrations and explanations of how they lived, fished, hunted, tanning, made clothes and did bead work.
For lunch we went to The Pump House. It pumped the water for strip mining. The food was great!
After lunch we were driven to see the Alaska pipeline (in the rain). The oil comes from Prudhoe Bay to Fairbanks. When it comes out of the ground the oil temp is 148 degrees and by the time it reaches Fairbanks its temp is 100. It travels down the pipeline at a rate of 4mph.
Our next adventure took us to the El Dorado Gold Mine. On an open sided train (good thing it stopped raining) took us thru a tunnel set up like an underground mine. Then we panned for gold. YES! We got flakes! And it was flakes. When we panned in Chicken it was gold dust. They would weigh our gold and tell us what it was worth and I had $31.00 worth. I had it put in a necklace that cost $60 - go figure! The train had live entertainment, two guys played banjo, guitar and sang. They were very good. It was a great time!
We then returned to the campground ending a very interesting and exciting day.
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