2017 - June 4th - Alaska - Fairbanks Princess Riverside Lodge

Our second day of Fairbank's adventure is to begin! We have been booked on tours to visit this morning The Gold Dredge No.8 with a stop at the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline and then this afternoon a sternwheeler boat tour down the Chena River. Our motor coach driver and guide is a most knowledgeable young man by the name of Will.

All along the route to the Historic Gold Dredge No.8, Will is giving us information, jokes, and keeping us alert for wildlife such as moose, bear and/or eagle sightings. We arrive at the parking lot for the Gold Dredge #8 and get our first glance at the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline. The trans-Alaska oil pipeline, one of the most ambitious construction projects ever undertaken, stretches hundreds of miles across some of the roughest and most remote terrain in the world. Crews began laying pipe in spring 1975 and laid the final stretch of the line on May 31, 1977. The first oil moved through the pipeline on June 20 of that year. More than 70,000 workers were involved in building the pipeline. It cost $8 billion in 1977 and was, at the time, the largest privately funded construction project ever undertaken. The pipeline stretches more than 800 miles from Alaska’s North Slope to the ice-free port of Valdez on Prince William Sound. There, at the pipeline’s end, the oil is transferred into storage tanks and loaded onto tanker ships for transport to West Coast refineries. Here we are lucky enough to be able to see the pipeline above ground and where it enters into the mountain underground as well.

The Alaska corporation commonly known as Alyeska Pipeline Company was founded in 1970 to design, construct, operate and maintain a pipeline to transport oil from the fields on the North Slope of Alaska where oil was discovered in 1968 to an ice-free deep-water port in Valdez, AK. A pig is a mechanical device that is pushed through the pipeline by the oil to perform various operations on the pipeline without stopping the flow of oil. This process is referred to as “pigging.” Alyeska runs two basic types or classes of pigs: cleaning and instrumented or “smart.” These devices help Alyeska clean and inspect the pipeline to prevent and detect problems. The cleaning pigs also known as scraper pigs, these pigs sweep the pipe of built-up wax, water or other solids that precipitate out of the oil stream. They prevent the buildup of a corrosive environment. Their use also makes the oil easier to pump. Instrumented pigs are in-line-inspection tools called “smart pigs.” The data they gather allows engineers to recommend intervention before wall loss anomalies become a problem. The smart pigs are used to detect and measure corrosion and metal loss internally and externally on the pipe wall. The cut out of the outer shell of the pipeline shows the workings of the "pigs". There are two kinds of gold found in Alaska, and both created stampedes to Interior Alaska and the Fairbanks area in particular. Our trip to Gold Dredge No. 8 gives us the opportunity to learn about both kinds. We have just learned about the second ... . this stampede came in the 1970s with the building of the trans-Alaska oil pipeline, which brings black gold (oil) from Prudhoe Bay through the Interior to the port city of Valdez. Now we board the replica of the narrow-gauge Tanana Valley Railroad and hear tales of the thousands of miners who swarmed the surrounding valley in the early 20th century searching for the big strike. Gold Dredge No. 8 is a National Historic Site, and the tour focuses on the history of small and large-scale mining in the Interior. As we travel in our rail cars, we see firsthand how dredges in Alaska sifted the gold from the soil, recovering 3.5 million ounces of gold during the time they were in use. This first Alaska rush, the Gold Rush, started in the early 1900s and in some form or another continued until almost the middle of the century. We passed reenactment of one of those gold dredging tent camps with a great live-action player explaining the total process. We approach the Gold Dredge No.8 dredge and dredge plant to be greeted by panning experts. They told us some history of the dredge, it's operation and the gold that it produced. One of the interesting facts is that the gold was melted into bars, wrapped in brown paper and mailed to San Francisco by US MAIL at the cost of $14 postage per bar for regular mailing. In all of the years of operation, not one bar was ever lost or stolen!!! We departed the train and went to our own gold panning stations. We were each given a bag of dirt and gravel that contains some gold nuggets. After swishing the gravel with water over several washes, we had our "gold find". As souveniers, bracelets were purchased to hold our finds for Mary Anne and Pam as a lasting memory of gold panning in Alaska!

We had time to walk around the dredge, dredge camp and gift shop and learn even more. We enjoyed the beautiful Goldstream Valley here at the home of Gold Dredge No.8.  

The gift shop had lots of interesting items and a great wall painting of Susan Butcher and her dog sled. The staff was all very social and friendly. As we boarded our Tanana Valley Railroad to depart, the staff all came to the platform to wave us a fond farewell.

We arrived back to our motor coach with Will waiting to whisk us off to our afternoon adventure. Our afternoon was to be filled with the sternwheeler boat tour aboard the Riverboat Discovery. We were taken to enjoy our lunch at Steamboat Landing at the Riverboat Discovery. The meal was outrageously delicious and was as-much-as-you-can-eat! It is served family style with a Hearty Miner's Stew, Rustic Roasted Vegetables, Sourdough Rolls, Apple Pecan Salad, and German Chocolate Brownie. It was GREAT!

We were ready for the Riverboat Discovery tour. We boarded at the dock in the Chena River and took in all of the beauty of this well maintained family-owned boat. The Binkley family’s steamboating tradition goes back over 100 years and five generations. In 1898, when Charles M. Binkley hiked over the Chilkoot Pass with other stampeders, he was not so much in search of gold as he was the chance to build and operate boats on the Yukon and its tributaries. He became a respected pilot and boat builder in the North. His son, Captain Jim Binkley, Sr., followed in his father’s footsteps and piloted freight vessels on the Yukon and Tanana Rivers in the 1940’s. As transportation systems changed in the north, railroads and airplanes began to carry much of the freight. In 1950, noting the coming changes in the freighting business, Captain Jim and his wife, Mary, began a river excursion business focusing on sharing their love of Alaska and its culture with visitors. Over the coming years, Captain Jim and Mary B’s business grew from the Godspeed, a 25 passenger vessel, to the Discovery III, a 900 passenger vessel. Today, Captain Jim’s grandchildren run the company and Mary B is still active in the business. As we settle in, we are given our first demonstration as an Alaskan bush pilot takes off and lands right next to the boat! The pilot shared his stories of village life and explained the vital role planes play in remote Alaska. As we steamroll down the Chena, we see many homes of all different architectural styles. They come in all sizes and shapes. The Chena River is a beautiful place to have as your front yard! We learned about permafrost and how it makes construction difficult as well as pipes and plumbing. Permafrost is permanently frozen soil, and occurs here in the Fairbanks region of Alaska. The permafrost classification is solely based on temperature, not moisture or ground cover. The ground must remain at or below 0°C for at least two years in order to be considered permafrost. It is extending from a few inches below the surface down to as deep as 1,000 feet. This makes it difficult to establish home foundations that are sturdy.  As we mossy down the river, we see sternwheelers from the past and we pass old dog kennels from abandoned camps. We stopped to view the home and kennels of the late Susan Butcher, a four-time winner of the Alaskan Iditarod. Susan Butcher was a pioneer for women in sled-dog racing. She influenced the training and treatment of dogs in the sport. Susan was the second woman to win the Iditarod, the annual 1,150-mile race from Anchorage to Nome, but the first to dominate the grueling competition through the Alaskan wilderness. She won three years in a row, from 1986 to 1988, and again in 1990 before retiring from competition. Among her many achievements, Butcher was the first to summit Mount McKinley, North America’s highest peak, with a dog team in 1979. She and her husband established Trailbreaker Kennels along the Chena River. Susan's husband and fellow musher, David Monson, spoke to us from the shore and gave us first-hand knowledge about kennel life and the challenges that go into making a champion dog sled team. David is a senior handler at Trailbreaker Kennels and shared stories of life on the trails as puppies play in anticipation of joining the team. We really enjoyed his talk and the dog mushing demonstration! We continued down the Chena River to where it joins the Tanana River and our guided tour of the Chena Indian Village. Approaching, we saw the herd of Caribou, or were they Reindeer? The difference ... well of course, Reindeer fly per Santa!!! Actually Reindeer are slightly smaller and they are domesticated Caribou. Once on land, we read the sign distinguishing the Caribou from the Reindeer and see them up close.

We were immersed in frontier living first hand with a guided walking tour of an Athabascan Indian village. We saw an Athabascan Indian village with cabins made of spruce logs, a cache used for storing supplies, a primitive spruce bark hut and fur pelts plus much more. Our guides were delightful and explained how the wolf, fox, martin and beaver were used to provide food and protection in the harsh Arctic climate. They shared how the Athabascans skillfully survived for over 10,000 years and how they adapted to village life and Western culture in the past century.

At the river's bank, Fish Camps were Summer homes for catching fish to sustain the people and the dogs during the long and cold winter months. The Athabascans and their dogs relied on having these fish camps as their source for permanent food using fishwheels to catch Salmon. The Salmon is cleaned and dried, then put in the smokehouse for curing. The centerpiece of every fish camp is the fishwheel which is capable of catching several hundred Salmon a day. Some other features of fish camp are white canvas wall tents, which is where families would sleep. Comfortable beds were made of spruce boughs covered with Caribou hides. The dog houses were an effective way to have the dogs act as alarm systems for approaching bear and other predators.

At the end of our guided tour had time to explore the village on our own, interact with our guides and visit dogs from Susan Butcher’s kennels. Susan Butcher's husband signs their book in the village while the tour is in port that they wrote about her lead dog Granite. He was the rtunt of the litter and many told Susan to put him down. She worked with him and he was the lead dog of all four of her Iditarod wins. A truely motivating story of accomplishment and being more that you can be. There is a statue of Granite in the Athabascan Chena Village.

And then it was off on the Riverboat Discovery to return to our beginning, meet up with Will and travel back to our Fairbanks Princess Riverside Lodge. It was a glorious day full of fun and adventure.

The complete photo album with all of the captioned pictures is at this link. To see the captions if they aren't there, just click on the circled i at the top of the first photo when you click on.