Bybee's Travels

June 12 to June 14

We have been in Fairbanks near North Pole, Alaska for the past 5 nights, June 10-14.  It seemed when we got there it would be a long time but went by like a flash.  The first full day Joe and I drove around and found a Fred Myer to do some shopping then went downtown and found a funky little place to have lunch, soup and salad.  When we came out there was a parking ticket on the car.  Joe wanted to mail it in but I said well we're close so let's go pay it.  He went in to do it and they asked for his driver's license and told him 'no charge'.  It was a $40. ticket so we were happy we didn't mail it in.  Is that a great place or what?  Fairbanks is a very military city.  They have Eielson Air Force Base and Fort Wainwright Army Base.  What a lucky place.  To have two bases of our finest and bravest.

Eilison AFB

Eilison AFB

Judy's Greek meal, yum!

Downtown, building Joe went to pay
ticket

The second day Larry, Judy, Joe and Roy went to view the pipeline and do some gold panning.  It was cold and rainy so Darlene & I wimped out and didn't go.  I now wish I had.  I didn't realize you didn't need to get in the creek bed and slosh around in the rain.  I stole this pictures from Judy.  When they came back we all went on a river boat cruise.  Interesting and a lot of fun.









These are pictures I took from the river boat, they had a man flying an airplane, taking off and landing, demonstrating how they get around up here, especially in the winter.  He was equipped with a microphone and talked to us from the plane.  The homes along the river were just breathtaking.

1951 Piper Super Cub

I don't know what I did to the pictures above but I do know I'm not going to do them over.  We also got a demonstration of Iditarod dogs owned by the Butcher family. The rest of these are of the Indian Village (replica) but characteristic of how people up here in the remote areas still live by subsistance.  Living off the land primarily.

         

We learned what makes a reindeer, it is just a domesticated caribou

The next day the Cottom's left really early to take a airplane up to the Artic Circle, one of the things on Larry's bucket list, Judy built up her courage and went along :-).  Batty's and Bybee's went to the North Pole and visited Santa's House and the wooden bowl making place.

The guys weren't interested, they stayed in the car and caught up on Fox News....bahhhh humbug!!

After that we went to a farmer's market, too early for fruit or vegetables but they did have homemade chocolate, fudge and honey.  While we were there Judy and Larry showed up (totally unplanned) and we heard about their adventure while eating pizza at a place they had found.  Then we all went to the Alaska University Museum.  The next day we did some shopping and went to Pioneer Park.  Restored old buildings, airplane museum and more shops.

I'm going to jump ahead a few days and show a picture I took last night, Monday June 17th.

I took this after we returned from a dinner theater, more about that later.  The time is 11:30 PM.  I really don't mind the summer daylight...it's the winter darkness that would send me screaming into the night.