There is a large building there called Santa's House which, from what we could tell upon going inside of it, is a massive, year-round Christmas store. I bought a few post cards there and spent a lot of time browsing around. They have a Santa Clause there during all of their business hours to talk with children who come in, no matter what time of year. We're practically on the complete opposite side of the year from Christmas, anyhow, so I figure there was no better time to be coming here. The temperatures outside were in the 60s, though, so even at North Pole it was still a pleasant day.
We then stopped at the North Pole post office to mail a few postcards. They have a special "North Pole" postmark on them that apparently is much sought after by many people. Tyler and I spent some time talking with the lady who was working the counter at the post office (there was no one else there, oddly) who told us about all the different kinds of letters and odd things people do with the Christmas and Santa Clause lore surrounding that post office. She described how apparently some people will just send a shoebox completely full of their Christmas cards addressed to various people and ask them to postmark them all from "North Pole" and then send them out. They have a special program there where you can send them whatever you want to be postmarked by them at any time in the year and they will hold it until December 1st when they will start sending it all out. Apparently, it's an AMAZINGLY big deal for some people. The lady (who had a strong Brooklyn accent, oddly...) also told us that we had just missed this family who had come into the post office with an odd plan. Apparently this mother and father and their now 18-year-old son are visiting the Fairbanks area. They had kept a letter that their son had sent to Santa when he was four years old because it apparently had been a dream of theirs to get a response from "Santa" in North Pole, Alaska (I don't understand...). So, the father came in yesterday and asked them if they could have the Santa over at the Santa's House store write a letter back to their son, addressing this letter he had written when he was four, and then postmark it and all of that. And the people in the post office and Santa's House all agreed and they did just that. Then, today, the family came in, with their son, and went to the counter saying that their son had sent a letter to Santa at North Pole and had never gotten a response, so could they check and see if they had received it? And all the while apparently the son was being all exasperated and saying, "Oh, come on...why are you asking about this?" and so on. But, sure enough, they came back with the letter and the response and there it was, in his own four-year-old writing, with the response written by Santa that just "had never gotten through." Apparently the son was amazed and everyone was happy and they took pictures. And that was the story. I won't pretend to understand, but, I suppose it is just something some people want to do. And they're very accomodating at North Pole...
Tyler and I left North Pole around noon and returned to Fairbanks to have lunch. We got subs from Subway. Note that the much hyped "Five-Dollar Footlong" apparently doesn't apply up here...
We found a park in downtown Fairbanks to eat. There was a trio of women there who were performing music they had written. One played the guitar, another the violin, and the third the mandolin. Considering that these are three instruments that I can play, am trying to learn how to play, and would love to learn how to play, I rather enjoyed this little concert. At least, until a downpour came and forced them to end early. The park we were in had a large statue of Eskimos in the middle of it and there were benches all around. The performers played at the base of the statue.
We then found our way to the Fairbanks Visitors Center. The city of Fairbanks has started to grow on me a little bit. I don't know. I felt more secure sleeping here than I have yet to feel in Anchorage. Maybe it's the proximity to the ocean or something. My knowledge of weather and geography often subconsciously goes into the comfort, security, or "shelter" I feel when I spend the night somewhere. Some places are bad--I did not feel "sheltered" in Winnipeg or even to this day in Anchorage. Some places are excellent--I have never felt more sheltered and secure in my sleeping than when I stayed in a hotel room in Colorado Springs. Not that I can't sleep at any of these other places--I sleep quite fine. It's just a feeling. And I felt unusually secure here in Fairbanks. That feeling alone greatly improves the city in my sights. Who knew? Anyhow, I grabbed some literature on Fairbanks and Anchorage at the Visitors Center (I acually grabbed more on Anchorage than on Fairbanks--the titles like "Summer Activities in Anchorage" will apply far more to my life than anything in Fairbanks, I'm afraid...). I also bought a very nice map of Gates of the Arctic National Park.We then decided that, since tomorrow we were going to be heading up the Dalton Highway in our shuttle van, we might want to get some photos now. At least, I wanted a picture of my car on the Dalton Highway and to be able to have said that I have driven on the Dalton Highway. Even if it's just for a mile. I suppose I should interject to explain this Dalton Highway.
Starting about 70 miles north of Fairbanks, the Dalton Highway is a 414-mile long, mostly gravel road, that parallels the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline northward to the oil rigs at Deadhorse and Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, on the Arctic Ocean. It is the only road that goes this far north and the only road connection to the Arctic Ocean. There are little to no services on the road and some 250 miles between gas stops. Because of this, and because the road is mostly gravel, I was not going to take my car on that highway. Instead, we've found a shuttle company that mostly shuttles scientists to various research locations in the upper Arctic along the highway, and they are going to take us up tomorrow and then back again on Sunday. This will accomplish many things--we will get to cross the Yukon River (in Alaska), cross the Arctic Circle on the Summer Solstice, go pretty darn far north, and hopefully, if the skies are clear, be able to witness the midnight sun. We will not be going all the way up to Deadhorse (they don't allow you to go all the way to the Arctic Ocean without special permission from the oil companies), but we will go up to the North Slope and camp at a location called Galbraith Lake. This is on the northern slopes of the Brooks Range, which has long been my favorite mountain range and now I finally will get to see it. Very exciting.
Anyhow, I still wanted to take my car to the Dalton Highway. So we drove for an hour north of Fairbanks through the winding "hills" of the Yukon-Tanana (which is apparently pronounced Tah-nah-NAW) Uplands on the Elliot Highway to its junction with the Dalton. The drive was more scenic than I expected, winding through tree-covered hills.
Leaving Fairbanks, we drove through a storm that had fired up. I've talked about the convection forming up here, but then we got something I did not expect--hail! There were small pea-sized hailstones in this downpour, making the familiar smack-ing sound as they hit my car. It's difficult to see in this photo, but if you look closely you can see the hailstones falling outside the car.
That downpour didn't last for long, and soon things cleared up. We also got our first glimpse of this great Alaskan engineering achievement--the Trans-Alaska Pipeline!
The pipeline at this point goes underground for the rest of its journey up that hill. It looked kind of funny at first because it seemed like it just ended. I didn't take many pictures of the pipeline since the Dalton Highway parallels the pipeline north and no doubt we will be seeing much, much more of it. But, it's still a fun thing to photograph. After the hour of driving, we made it to the beginning of the Dalton Highway. I rather like this photo. The marks on the sign are actually stickers put there by various people and groups that presumably have traveled down the highway.
The road almost immediately became gravel and I drove down it for about a mile, so I can now say that I (and my car) have driven on the Dalton Highway. In the photo below, you can see the mileage sign saying it is 414 miles to the end of the highway at Deadhorse up on (or, rather, "near") the Arctic Ocean. You can also see the pipeline snaking its way up over the hill in the background. At this point here where the mileage sign is, my car is at the northenmost point it will probably ever be. A momentous occasion--that car has brought me a very, very long ways. And this is one of the extremes of its travels.
It was a pleasant drive back as well. Tyler wanted to do some driving (and also say that he had driven on the Dalton Highway) so I let him drive the way back. On the way, we passed the other side of Pedro Dome (where the Fairbanks radar is) and I got a very distant view of the radar at the top of the hill (which you probably can't see in this photo, but it's there...).
We passed the Silver Gulch restaurant where we ate last night on the way into Fairbanks again. I got a picture of it this time. Note the exterior that does not match the ritzy restaurant within...
We grabbed some food at Safeway and made preparations for the journey tomorrow. We will depart Fairbanks at 6 AM and won't get into Galbraith Lake until 6 PM. A long day on the road, but at least none of us will be driving. And I'm sure there will be plenty of photos taken and things to look at. Of course, this means I will be out of internet and cell phone coverage for the next 48 hours or so. But, to go this far, that's just what you have to do...
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