Fairbanks, AK

AHHHH!!!! The Orb! It has appeared! We are thrilled to have beautiful weather this morning in Wiseman.  LJ goes fishing early and checks a new species off his bucket list. He caught a grayling.

The Orb shines on the Dalton

Bunny breakfast

Dolly Varden

A warrior returns

We had a delicious breakfast, Uta and Berni had friends from Germany in town so we met them, as well as a group from Anchorage that was up to do some hunting for the next few days. Uta and Berni’s kids were headed to Fairbanks and left during breakfast.

Alaskan voicemail

Inside the restaurant

Coldfoot Camp

Outside in the mud

Departing Wiseman, Melora started driving. We did enjoy the sunshine very much and stopped in Coldfoot. We met a cyclist there from Colombia who was headed south all the way to Argentina. From the furthest point north you can drive to the furthest point south. He said it would probably take him approximately 9 months, maybe longer. It would really be interesting to follow him along the route, maybe I’ll be able to find something about him online.

I wasn’t feeling great and the road wasn’t kind to me, first time I felt carsick in many years! We stopped at Finger Mountain since the weather was still fairly nice and made the quick hike up. The rain started quickly though so we had to get back to the car but not before we got to see a beautiful rainbow!

Once back in the car, the rain started pretty steadily. We saw another cyclist there in the parking lot, he also was on his way to Argentina. He did not seem quite as prepared as the first cyclist we met, he didn’t know how far it was from where we were to Yukon Camp or whether there was lodging there or not. He said he had already had an encounter with a grizzly bear along the way (I wish we had asked more questions about that one!)

Great group traveling the Dalton

Inside Yukon Camp for lunch

Off we went, our next stop would be Yukon Camp for another lunch. Our burgers from two days before had etched a memory in our mind so of course, we wanted another. Sara and I decided to split one this time. It didn’t live up to the first visit (does anything ever live up to greatness like that?), but it was a good lunch and the rain had stopped again so we went down to look at the Yukon again before heading out.

Better weather for our Dalton Highway pic!

Leaving the Dalton Highway

A few more photo op stops, and of course, many false alarms for porcupine herds, but we continue to hold out hope. LJ made a great radio call over the CB as we left the Dalton declaring Tropicana was off the Dalton. We were starting to feel confident that we might actually arrive at a hotel at a decent time, eat dinner at a decent time and maybe even get some rest!

We decided to go on to the hotel first before switching the cars out so we could unload the luggage and not have to repack it all into Julie’s Mercury Mountaineer. I believe Sara came up with this idea, which definitely saved us a few headaches I believe.

It was raining again and the hotel we were staying in this time was downtown, with a parking lot on the side so we unloaded and got inside. LJ and Sara went to return the car. They also had to refuel it and pick up the other car, which took longer than any of us thought. They made it back and got ready to head to dinner at Silver Gulch, we made it there at 9:30 PM. The restaurant closed at 10 PM and after we finally got someone’s attention to request a table, he informed us we’d have to order quickly because the kitchen staff had already started leaving because they had been there all day and were tired (they do not open until 4 PM). We were all disappointed in the welcome but wanted to eat there and our server did a good job taking care of us.
Over dinner we decided to adjust our schedule for tomorrow. We were all road weary from our 1,000+ miles in the car on the Dalton. Bellies full and we headed back to the hotel for some much needed rest. More tomorrow!

Tropicana Drivers – Melora and Bev split the day driving

Bingo winner – Melora (grand prize winner overall)

Final Count for Wednesday

• 37 Passenger Vehicles
• 25 Tractor Trailers
• 2 Motorcycles
• 1 Bicycle
• 18 Waves
• 2 Pigs
• 6 tires
• 1 black bear
• 1 Grayling (caught by LJ)
• 5 planes
• 24 orange cones
• 5 Parkies (arctic ground squirrel)
• 1 sleeping with mouth open
• 1 snore
• 1 jerk face
• 1 tractor trailer honk
• 2 Snowshoe Hare