Fairbanks - Heart of Gold

Day 25 we disembarked the ship at 7.30am in Whittier. It is a tiny town on the coast with a permanent population of 40 people! It the summer it swells to 200 for tourist season. The town consists of a hotel, 2 shops and 1 apartment building that houses everyone that lives there! Even the Police and fire department are housed in the same building.
The only way you could access Whittierbin days gone by was boat or train, and they have now converted the rail tunnel into a one lane highway to make it suitable for cars and buses. It only opens every half hour to each side, so if you miss the tunnel opening you have to wait another hour for it to open again. At 2.5 miles long it is the longest tunnel in north America. Our bus from Whittier to Anchorage was a narrated tour so we had a great guide who filled us in on the facts about Whittier. We saw several Beluga whales on the way up that were super close to the shoreline so really easy to see from the bus! We also saw loads of bald eagles perched in the dead trees that lined the road on both sides.
As we got closer to Anchorage the highways were all fenced off from the trees and bushes that line the roads, apparently that is to try and keep moose from wandering onto the highway.
Anchorage was a lot bigger than we had expected with a population of 300k people! We only saw the bits we drove through on the way to the airport, but the airport was really nice with plenty of shops and eateries!
Once in Fairbanks the first port of call was picking up the rental car
We were staying quite a way out of town and with no public transport options a car was essential. We did a quick grocery shop and were surprised by how fancy the grocery store we went to was - a lot fancier than at home with beautiful organic sections and pick'n'mix deli treats!
It was a lot more expensive though, most items were around triple the price of everywhere else we have been as they have to ship everything in at quite a large cost! A bag of chips was around $6-$8!
Once we were stocked up we headed out to our little log cabin in the woods....which did not disappoint! It was only about 10-15 minutes drive from downtown so not too far out of the way and super cute! It was on dirt roads and with a heap of other log cabins with permanent residents living in them. They were all spaced apart quite well and each surrounded by Bush, and spruce trees. This made for lots of wildlife. Sitting on the rocking chairs on the front porch we could watch rabbits, birds and squirrels going about their business. The squirrels were really loud! They chirp like birds and drop the cones from the spruce trees on the ground once they have munched the seeds out of them.
I want too impressed by the toilet situation, I didn't want a dry cabin as it would have been a pain and having to go outside in the dark to go to the loo would have been hazardous to the health with goodness knows what animals hanging around - so our cabin had an inside loo......it was pretty much a permanent portaloo which Logan thought was hilarious.
Our main reason for heading to Fairbanks and staying in the cabin out of town was to see the Northern Lights. Contrary to the forecast which was for cloud and rain, we had beautiful clear blue skies and sunshine. I was hopeful this would mean we could see the lights as that is the biggest thing that needs to be right is the weather, then you need to be away from light pollution (hence the cabin out of town) and they need to be active. After a day of travelling we were quite tired, so we crashed out of the couch and set the alarm to wake us up at 11pm as sunset is not until 9.45pm at this time of the year.
When the alarm went off I checked out the windows and it still didn't look dark enough (it has to be properly dark to see them which is why you can see them in summer) so I snoozed the alarm for another hour. We finally got up at 12.30am and headed outside to our little clearing to try and spot the lights. We were expecting them to be weak as it was a full moon and the season officially starts on the 21st August so we we were pretty early on.
Once we wer out there it was probably less than a.minute before we saw them, beautiful green ribbons of light dancing across the sky. It is a little like a light show but natures own version, so beautiful and graceful. They really are quite a special phenomenon to witness. I tried to take some photos and onlyamged to capture one really fuzzy image....then I decided to leave it to the professionals and just enjoy the show. We watched them for around an hour dancing around in all different formations, and then they started to slow down. It really is quite difficult to describe what they look like, quite unlike anything else we have witnessed and we felt extremely privileged to have seen them. When we spoke to some people the next day they said they had been trying for several nights to see them but the weather had been no good, and that night was the first viewing of the season so we were extremely lucky!
Fay 26 wasn't looking so hot weather wise so we decided to head to the Chena Hot Springs and Aurora Ice Museum. It was around an hour and a half drive from Fairbanks along a road that supposedly has the best options for spotting Moose.....well they have proven very elusive and we have yet to see one!
I hadn't realise that Chena Hot Springs was a full resort. They have cabins, yurts and hotel rooms for a rent an a full Aurora Borealis viewing room so people can stay indoors and view them. There are also loads of hiking trailheads that start there so a lot of hikers base themselves at the resort (it is literally in the middle of nowhere). We started off with a tour of the Ice Museum which was quite cool (no ounce intended). They had some of the worlds best ice sculptors based there and everything is made out of ice
...the stairs, the seats, the bar, the glasses. They even have an igloo, and a few bedrooms that you can rent out and sleep in...all made from ice! They all have patterns carved inside them, or flowers frozen into them, or lights inside them so they can light everything up. The place is there year round and is inside a big warehouse that is kept at -6°c with ammonia gas. We got appletinis as part of our package that were served in ice martini glasses. It is quite similar to the Ice Bars around NZ but a lot bigger and more impressive, and you can stay in there a lot longer.
To warm up after that we went for a swim in the hot springs which was lovely. I could imagine how beautiful it would be in winter when all of the surroundings are covered in snow. The springs had a gravelly bottom which was unusual an a beautiful backdrop of hills covered in spruce trees.We didn't last too long as it was super hot water!
After that we headed to North Pole which is a tiny town about 20 minutes out of central Fairbanks. It is super cute...all of the streets are named after Christmas with Santa Claus Lane, Snowman Street, and of course St Nicholas Drive where Santas House is.
All of the street lights are shaped and painted like candy canes and the whole town is in on the theme...every bollard and fire hydrant in sight is also decorated like a candy cane. Santa's House is basically a massive year round Christmas store, but with beautiful stuff. I had to get a copy of one of my favorite books as a kid 'The Night Before Christmas' and got Santa to personally sign it for Isla. He even let me sit on his knee so I could prove he signed it for her 😊
Just across the paddock was the area he keeps his reindeer, and they are absolutely beautiful creatures!
We headed into downtown Fairbanks which was pretty underwhelming, and apparently nothing is open on a Sunday night. The riverfront has been done nicely but the Chrna River that runs through the middle of town is very reminiscent of Waikato River. It's the same dirty brown, just not as wide. All over town they have markers of where the river flooded to in 1967. It wolf gave been a pretty deveststi g flood! Because of the lack of anything being open in town we headed to a little Italian place not far from our cabin for dinner. It was probably the most bizarre Italian we have ever had!
Day 27 was pretty cruisy, mainly a travel day but managed to squeeze in a bit more moose hunting (to no effect) and a few other areas around town.
Pioneer Park was quite cute, just a randiw collection if old artifacts put into one park. They have an old Denali rail carriage, airplane museum, paddle steamer and collection of old log cabins that have been turned into a goldrush town. That part I a lot like our Historic Village where people run little businesses out of the cabins.
We also took a walk around Creamers Fields, and old dairy farm that is now a wildlife reserve. A lot of it is swampy forest and the Sandy Cranes and dunes is migrate there so through summer there are loads of birds! Apparently you can also spot foxes and moose there as well but I am beginning to think we deter them for a place that supposedly has do many of them they are bloody hard to find! Hopefully we have more luck spotting them in Canada!

Photos: https://1drv.ms/f/s!AsbHvsl8mGaZgd8-g_v41g2B4D-Czw