Our Adventure Continues, Alaska and Beyond: Left Denali, on to Fairbanks!!!

July 25, 2013

Left Denali this morning, about 10:00, rainy and gloomy when we pulled out, but just a few miles up the road it cleared up and was WONDERFUL! From a damp, chilly 60 degrees to a SUNNY and warm 85 degrees!

As we came into the city of Fairbnks, this heart shaped area of Gold Rocks greeted us! Fairbanks is known as folks with the hearts of gold, AND this was also the Heart of the Gold mining for a while.

Staying at the "River's Edge RV Park" , along the lazy, pretty Chena River, which runs through the downtown area. As you can see, we have grass between sites, trees on most, we have wifi and GREAT cable! We are also close to Safeway grocery store and also a WONDERFUL Fred Meyer Grocery store! Also close to downtown stores like the usual tourist shops, upscale jewelry and clothing stores, and different places to visit, like Museums, Pioneer Park, North Pole and Chena Hot Springs.

Found out some folks who are from our area are staying in this same park! We first met them in Homer and have sort of been running into them at almost every place we stayed at since! We invited them over for dinner, so I quickly threw some things together and popped open a bottle of wine and we had dinner! Talked till almost midnight...

July 26, 2013

This morning, we decided to drive up to Circle on the Yukon River - Be prepared if you DO this, there is only ONE potty along the way and no place to have lunch till you get to Central... This was about a 175 mile trip - ONE WAY!
These pretty flowers in a planter are near our park - just a Preview of coming attractions!

Leaving Fairbanks on Steese Highway - nice road for about 20 miles, then ran out of paved road - for the rest of the run out to Circle.

Along the way, we saw areas that sort of make me think of movies we have seen of parts of Ireland!

Gentle, rolling hills, deeply carpeted with Tundra grass (much like moss - often a couple of feet thick) and spongy to walk on.

These areas through here are in and around Eagle Summit, and we began to see the wonderful purple weeds, Fireweed, COVERING the hills.

After about 5 hours of driving, we came upon the small settlement of Central Corner. This bar/grocery/restaurant was JUST where we needed it to be! Great Alaskan Amber Beer and GREAT $10.00 burgers - let me tell you, that sounds like high price, but there was a HALF pound of beef on that puppy, and onions grilled with garlic and all the maters, lettuce, pickles you could want - AND the burgers came with about a pound of french fries as well... Really worth the price and the wait - and they were very busy, being the only place within 150 miles to eat! LOL!

Finally rolled out of there to continue our trip up to Circle. Stopped at the Chena River for some stretching and photo pix ( and to see if we could find some heart shaped rocks!)

As we drove farther into the wild, we came through the beginning of more 'drunken forests.. These Black fir trees are very skinny, fast growing and have a shallow root system, and when they get started and the permafrost is too deep, it prevents the moisture from draining off and the trees die, as they cannot live in the continued moisture... and the fall over - thus, the term Drunken....

Saw several mother Ptarmigan and their babies going across the road in one area.

Finally got to Circle City on the Yukon River. As the sign says "the end of the road''..
Population 73.... 596 feet elevation....Yukon River is 1979 miles in length, 1866 of which are navigable.. the Yukon river is the 4th longest N. American waterway.... Yukon Flats starts here and they are more than 200 miles long and 10-20 miles wide...

Looking downstream on the Yukon.. this will eventually flow down to Dawson City, where we ferried across the river and went across the "Top of the World Highway" and crossed from the Yukon into Alaska.

Looking upstream towards the Arctic circle. Not much action goes on here now, but this used to be VERY busy, back in Gold Rush days..

This is an interesting building, built of logs, and never finished and now abandoned... Could not find anyone to ask about it - kind of a very private group of residents...

another LONG time abandoned log home..

And another.....

This is a "Fish Wheel, used to harvest salmon.. not sure if the natives still use this or if it was just Abandoned, like so many pieces of history here in this area....

And still ANOTHER falling down long home....

Fire Department looks like it is well taken care of ! and probably the ONLY one within many miles.....

Post Office in Circle looks adequate to take care of the 73 folks who live here...

No more to look at without getting VERY strange looks, so did not take any pix of the 'homes' of people..
More purple Fireweed!

This area was burned of a few years ago, and still has not grown back very well - except for the Fireweed...

A "drunken tree'' about to fall down across the road in front of us, as we headed back home

Stopped in Circle Hot Springs and found out it had closed in 2008!

A few empty cabins behind the 'closed springs' sign.

Central Corner Post Office.

Back through Eagle Summit again.

Loved this Cliff on the Summit!

And finally, home and the wonderful sunset here back at the park at 11:00 P.M. Had a nice visit with our friends and a glass of wine as we watched the sunset!