Tangle River to Fairbanks, AK Part 2 (6/27/2017)

Tuesday, June 27, 2017 (continued)
After lunch, we drove through Fairbanks, up Steese Highway/AK-2, and then east on Chena Hot Springs Road.

The wavy yellow lines show frost heaves in the road

This path to the tors and tamaracks disappeared
into the underbrush, so we did not go on

Entrance to Chena Hot Springs Resort

The hot springs were discovered in 1905 by two gold miners looking to ease rheumatism, and by 1911 it was already a resort with a bathhouse, stables, and a dozen cabins. In 1998, the owners were environmentally conscious, and began to use only geothermal energy to power the resort. The Chena Hot Springs Resort is now employee-owned.

The Aurora Ice Museum (2005, featuring ice sculptures) uses a
unique energy efficient absorption chiller, powered by
the geothermal water; it is only open for guided tours

We were able to join a guided tour to the hydroponic greenhouses;
Chena Hot Springs Resort strives to be a self-sustaining community,
and not only grows its own vegetables, but plants for landscaping as well

Whimsical landscaping

The Massage Therapy cabin (KSS)

The Skating Pond, is not fed by hot springs

With English and Japanese signs, we know where most visitors are from!

Actually the ideal time to visit the Chena Hot Springs Resort is in the winter, when you benefit most from the warm pools, and can see the aurora borealis/Northern Lights!

There is an indoor pool, and an outdoor rock lake that is for adults only

Cuddling couples

This duck family is in a hot springs-fed pond (KSS)

View of the outdoor rock lake with the indoor pool behind it (KSS)

Another source of thermal energy, there is an opening
on the other side where a grill is hidden

Overflow stream from the hot springs pools,
where algae is happy to grow

Some sort of geothermal contraption;
at the resort there is ongoing research on
geothermal and alternative energy sources

The temperature is about 175 degrees F

Old army ammo boxes? (KSS)

Chena Hot Springs Resort has its own airstrip,
and its own plane?

The ridge has two odd formations, which may be "erratics,"
or gigantic boulders left behind in odd places by the ice age

Back on Steese Highway/AK-2, we turned north.

Felix Pedro Monument (1952), Felix Pedro was
born as Felice Pedroni in Italy, and it was his
goldstrike in 1902 that gave birth to Fairbanks

Felix Pedro's goldstrike was in this creek, now called Pedro Creek,
16 miles from Fairbanks; these folks are trying their luck panning for gold

Tamiko holds up the crude oil pipeline (KSS)

This is another section of the 800-mile pipeline from Prudhoe Bay to Valdez

A mock-up of a "pig" in the pipeline, used to clean and inspect the pipe

Back in Fairbanks, AK.

Creamer's Field Migratory Waterfowl Refuge Visitor Center
is located in the former dairy farmhouse

Okay, where are the waterfowl?

The University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) Observation Point
of the Alaska Range; Denali is not seen to the right!

Kent with a 2.7 m/8'9" Ursus arctos/Brown Bear/Grizzly
at the Museum of the North on the UAF campus

The Seal Stone, a mystery still not solved
about a petroglyph found on an Aleutian island

Lagopus muta/Rock Ptarmigan in summer
and winter plumage

A mastadon tooth (about 8" long)

"Blue Babe," /a 36,000 year-old mummified Alaska Bison priscus/
Steppe Bison, had been preserved in the Interior permafrost since the
Ice Age; discovered by gold miners in 1979; it was apparently attacked
by an Ice Age Panthera leoatrox/American Lion

The largest public display of gold in Alaska

Blanket Toss (1968, by Moses Milligrock)

Yup'ik kayak

To Eskimo or not to Eskimo. Depending on the interpretation of the word 'Eskimo,' it can have a derogatory meaning, and thus the "Eskimos" of Canada and Greenland prefer their proper name of Inuit. However, the Eskimos of Alaska are the Iñupiat, and there are the Yup'ik of Alaska and Siberia. The word 'Eskimo' is still used in Alaska, as the accepted interpretation of the meaning is "netter of snowshoes." Yet in all the museums we visited, we never saw the word Eskimo, as everything was more specifically related to either the Iñupiat or Yup'ik/Cup'ik.

Great Alaska Outhouse Experience (2005, by
Craig Buchanan, using found objects) (KSS)

Museum of the North (2005, designed by Joan Sorrano);
the building is meant to evoke images of alpine ridges, glaciers,
the ice breakup on the Yukon River, and the aurora borealis

Denali (1980, by Christiane Martens)
(Denali, the mountain?!) (KSS)

Remember the Pump House we saw on the Riverboat Discovery tour? That's where we had dinner.

The Pump House Saloon; so this is an 1890's Gold Rush atmosphere!