Alaska: Up A Lazy River to a Chena Village in Fairbanks

On the afternoon of July 12th we journeyed to a boad landing and boarded the Discovery III, a nicely appointed paddle wheel steamer,  for a trip up the Chena River. Five generations of the Bingley family have taken a "supply the local inhabitants business"  and turned it into an immaculately oiled tourist machine that shuttles hundreds of folks at a time up the river and through a reconstructed native Athabaskan village.

You were barely clear of the dock before you got an up close demo of a bush plane landing and taking off from the water next to the boat. 






The next stop was the sled dog kennels of Iditarod winner Susan Butcher and her Dave. Susan died of leukemia in 2006, but her husband is right there on shore with a wireless mike and he gives you a quick run down on the care and training of sled dogs and the fine art of mushing. 

Then they harness up a team to an old ATV and zoom out of the yard with wild barks and yelps breaking the way. 

They tear across the back forty and pile back into the yard again.

 As the dogs are unhitched they all bound into the river for a refreshing cool down.  It was a marvelous show. 

Further on we reach the confluence of the Tanana and Chena rivers and can clearly see what happens when a milky silt laden glacial fed river meets up with a normal run off river.  Interesting.










This is the turnaroud point for our cruise and now we slip back to the Chena Village reconstruction and dock.  Here we get off and are neatly broken down into several groups of about fifty to a hundred.








Each group gets a lovely young Athabaskan girl guide and she moves you through exhibits on native dress,  housing,  transport, food gathering, and hunting.

Back on the boat we get one more demo from shore on how to butcher a salmon and ready it for the drying racks.

















 From the Chena village we steamed smartly back to our original dock where we were greeted exhuberantly by all our bus drivers.

Our driver Toni was exceptional and she clearly didn't want to lose a single one in the parking lot.











Back aboard the coach we made one final stop a few miles out of town to take a peek at the famous Alaska Pipe line that snakes its way down from the north slope to Valdez. Again a fascinating stop.

From there it was back to the Westmark and dinner.  I'm sorry I didn't think to take a picture, but I had a huge bowl of squid ink colored black pasta smothered with clams, shrimp, scallops, and various chunks of fish.  Delicious!

P.S. Did I mention that the wild and cultivated flowers were everywhere and at their peak?

Next we will board the Alaska Railroad for a trip to Denali National Park. 

Alaska Here We Come

"How did you enjoy your latest trip?"
" Gee, don't know, I guess I'll ask a."  

With that cornball opening we begin  our  "Road Scholar" trip of a lifetime to the great state of cold storage pleasure--Alaska.  In order to get a bit of an edge on jet lag we flew a day early  from Chicago to Anchorage and then hopped a commuter flight to Fairbanks where our program began.

Off we go!

Alaskan glacial field from air outside of Anchorage

Fairbanks Airport

Fairbanks, on first impression. has a kind of gritty frontier ambiance.  From the small airport the ride down to the central part of the city was along a stream of dingy strip malls,  punctuated wth a  fair number of abandoned buildings and fast food eateries.  A walk through the downtown shortly after our arrival revealed a similar feeling.  The buildings were mostly old and there was an almost total lack of auto traffic or pedestrians.  Nothing slummy but nothing that electric or brimming with life either.  Our hotel, the Westmark, was quite nice though. Their bar had some kickin Alaskan beers on draft and the restaurant put out gargantuan size meals at quite reasonable prices.   

We hit the hay early.   I woke up at midnight and it was still light out.  Woke up again at 2:00 AM and it was still kind of like twilight.  Around 4:00 AM it looked like the sun was ready to rise again. Welcome to summer in the near Arctic.  We learned that Fairbanks has about 22 hours of daylight and 2 hours of twilight during June and July.  This is cool until you think about the real cool that comes when you have the reverse of that in the dead of winter.
 
After a lumberjack buffet breakfast, we decided on a trip out to the University of Alaska campus to see the Museum of the North.  A cab from the hotel priced out at over twenty bucks so we puddled off to the local bus station where we discovered that all seniors ride the public transport system free of charge and that a bus goes right out to the university.  Buoyed by that discovery we jumped on.

Our local bus driver

Our bus driver, who grew up in Indiana, was the epitomy of Alaskan friendliness.  She greeted everyone who got on and said good bye and have a great day to everyone who got off.  Although there are  formal bus stops on he route, you can flag one down anywhere and it will stop for you. That is public transport with a heart. For us, as we were literally going to the end of the line, our driver kept up a constant patter about the town, its weather, the people, and the cost of gas, food, and electricity.  We felt that we had received a good education by the time we got to the university.





A three block energetic uphill walk on the hilly Univesity of Alaska campus brought us to The Museum of the North.


 It is striking architecturally (as is the rest of the campus)  and inside we found a treasure chest of delights that covered Alaskan geology, history,  and the native populations both human and animal.  There was also a gorgeous collection of historic and contemporary Alaskan art.   You could pace your viewing efficiently as every hour they had a thirty minute film playing in the auditorium.  If your feet got a bit tired you could take a short rest and watch the film. We watched one on the Northern Lights and another on Winter in Alaska. 

We literally spent the rest of the day in the museum even  opting for a tasty sandwich in the snack bar for our lunch. 

 

Museum Foyer with striking stairway

This horse was made from bent wood pieces

Jim and Jan pose with local fauna

Another more modern take on local animal life

Jan enjoys a sound and light creation

A whale skull gives you some size scale

Out to hunt in a small boat

A native mask

The free bus got us back right in front of the hotel in plenty of time to meet the other members of our Road Scholar group for dinner.   We are off and running.

Peoria's Wildlife Prairie Park Continues to Please

 

Peoria's Wildlife Prairie Park continues to please both young and old alike, but it more than returned its value a coule of weeks ago when it hosted a magnificent Medieval Faire alongside its normal fauna and flora. Everywhere you turned colorfully garbed period royals, palace stalwarts, yeoman, and peasants were on view.     

The costume was not period but the ardor was evident

When it got too warm for the open field you could always take to the cool of the wooded trails and enjoy the animals.  

The cougar was on the prowl.

The Bison herd seemed oblivious to all excitement

As did some of the celebrants.  Good night fair knight!