Alaska - Taylor Highway and Fairbanks - June 24-30

After crossing in to Alaska, we traveled south a bit on the Taylor Highway to join back up with the Alaska highway near Tok.  We continued on to Fairbanks, where the smoke was still thick.  This route is surrounded by mountains, but we couldn't see them at all.  Luckily, shortly after we got to Fairbanks there were a couple of days of rain that washed much of the smoke out of the air.

We made it to Alaska!

Pedro Dredge #4 in Chicken

Pedro Dredge #4 in Chicken.  You can see how hazy the landscape is in the background.
The weather was actually sunny, the haze was from the wildfires.

We stopped for dinner in Chicken, Alaska.
 There were a couple of RV parks, an old gold dredge, a gift shop/bar/restaurant,
this chicken statue and not much else.

We spent 5 days in Fairbanks. The first couple of days were rainy, but as you can see, the rain washed out the smoke so when the weather finally cleared, we had blue skies.  While in Fairbanks, we also visited a couple of breweries - Silver Gulch in Fox and HooDoo Brewing in Fairbanks.  We liked Silver Gulch a lot and thought HooDoo was only OK. 

Gold Dredge #8 in Fairbanks.  We toured the dredge and tried a little gold panning

Alyeska Pipeline near Gold Dredge #8 in Fairbanks

We took a tour on the Riverboat Discovery while in Fairbanks.  One of the stops it makes is at a re-created Athabascan Village called the Chena Indian Village.

A woman's winter parka.  The inner fur on the hood is wolverine.
Wolverine is prized for this purpose as the moisture from your breath will not freeze in the fur.
The outer fur around the hood is wolf and the remainder of the coat is mostly caribou with
other fur and materials used for decoration.

Reindeer - which are actually domesticated caribou

Cache - small shed raised above the ground used to store goods away
 from animals and and to keep them dry.

Native cabin

Celina in front of the Riverboat Discovery