Our couple of days in Fairbanks worked out well. We explored the town, bought supplies for the next wee while, and made food and chilled out at the place we were staying, which, thanks to the magic of Couch Surfing, was here:
This photo was taken at midnight, as dark as it's got since we've been here. It's slightly disorientating but certainly makes jet lag the least of your worries and means you don't have to worry about being caught hitching at nightfall.
After our day exploring, we decided to thumb a lift back out to the cabin as we'd been walking all day and it was another 5 miles. We got chatting to our lift and they extremely generously took us out to dinner! There are a lot of Thai people and therefore Thai restaurants in Fairbanks. I have no idea how the human geography of that works, but I'm really glad it does, as the food was amazing. We followed it with local home made ice cream and had a great evening with our Alaskan hosts.
The next day we visited some Musk Oxen at a research place- they're very cool animals, gigantic sheep-type things with huge foreheads, stoic expressions and a defense mechanism that consists of standing very still.
Early Thursday morning, we hitched north. We got lifts pretty easily to the start of the Dalton Highway
and then sunbathed and killed mosquitoes for a while before getting picked up by some tourists headed to the Arctic Circle. They too seemed to think we needed feeding, and we munched Alaskan Salmon by the spectacular Yukon River.
Like a lot of people it seems they were going as far as the official Arctic Circle and then going back. It's not actually the nicest spot on the road, mostly just trees and not much of a view, just a big sign saying where you are. Shows how much people love the lines we draw ourselves even if we basically make them up.
It did mean we sat at the Arctic Circle for a long, long time. Trucks and other commercial vehicles on the haul road aren't allowed to pick you up, and could be risking their jobs if they do. A lot of them obviously feel bad about this, illustrated by one guy pulling over an eighteen wheel tanker just to apologise and give us a can of green tea (with added sugar and ginseng). But lifts were starting to look unlikely. About four hours into this, we were starting to rationalise- 'the Arctic Circle is still a long way.' 'If we don't make it to Deadhorse, we don't make it. There's a lot more Pan American to go.'
But when a guardian angel in a beaten up contractors truck pulled up to check his load and had (his words) 'a moment of weakness', and I was stuffed in the back with his beautiful dog while C climbed in the front, we could admit to ourselves that's all bollocks. It's the start of the road! You gotta get there!
The scenery got more and more stunning, and none of the pictures I've got do it justice. It moved from trees to tundra to sweeping mountains and more moments like this
So the journey to Deadhorse was beautiful, and I guess the journey is more important than the destination. Which is good, because the destination in this case was pretty horrible. It was light at two am but fog made it a ghost town, and there is literally nothing there but trucks and marshes.
Concluding there was nothing for us here (though I did see an Arctic fox) we started hitching again. Four and half hours and a lot of commercial vehicles with apologetic shrugs later, I was onto my seventh layer of clothing and C was shaking so violently they could have converted him into drilling equipment. We were actually starting to budget for tour buses or small planes, and feeling once again like we'd fallen at the first hurdle. But eventually a woman in a standard passenger car who'd just come for the drive pulled over. Shivering and offering to clean the car/marry her/give her our loved ones, we tumbled in and barely noticed that the journey had officially begun.
We got her to drop us off at Coldfoot, which is halfway down to Fairbanks, as we'd actually made record time and had a day free for hiking. We climbed a big hill. Sweaty, but a win. (NB: Camera and computer have ceased to play nicely, no more pictures for this entry. Which is a shame 'cause the hill had a good view!)
Saturday evening we got a ride 20 miles south to the mosquito INFESTED South Fork of the Koyokuk river. A name engraved upon us for some time to come as we sat and stared at that sign for two days, only surviving because a pipe fitter took pity on us and brought us lunch bags, and some nearby miners gave us Grayling we could cook on their fire. But eventually more guardian angels in a small campervan brought us back to Fairbanks last night, where we restocked on supplies and thought we'd try hitching as it was still light at 11pm and neither of us were tired. We struck it very lucky, getting one lift out to the motorway in about ten minutes, and then picked up by a guy who let us stay in his house and take a shower and then bought us a breakfast of reindeer sausages this morning.
Currently, we're in Delta Junction, where the Alaskan Highway which runs from here to Dawson Creek in BC. We're only traveling it as far as Whitehorse, which is good, though it may still be complicated... because recently this happened... hmmm. We may have to improvise.
Alaska is definitely beautiful, and being here now also makes you want to come back in the winter, when it is like a different planet. But it's also very expensive, especially to do and see those big 'Alaskan' things. It's not really a place where our chosen type of travel, on the cheap and always looking for the alternative, really gels. Having said that, the best part for me has been meeting the locals, and hitch hiking has actually been pretty easy. There's a real sense in people from here of being part of the place and wanting to show you around, and we've learnt, seen, and tried so much already just from talking to people from here and letting them be hospitable.
No bears or moose yet. But the Yukon to go so plenty time... We'll probably update next in Whitehorse.
Love to all!
xxx
The kindness of strangers eh? Keeps the world turning.
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