Thursday August 12

Up and driving by 6:30a. Drove 632 miles today. Temp got as low as 36 degF at one point.

Stopped in Whitehorse and had the French Canadian treat called poutine. It’s fries covered with gravy and cheese. Totally unhealthy but totally delicious.

Saw some bison, eagles and more moose, even stopped to fish for a bit.

Wednesday August 11

Stocked up for the long drive south at Wal-Mart and headed for the Canadian border. On the way out I stopped at a place the guard at the Air Force base recommended called the Knotty Shop. With the advertisement in the Mile Post you could get a free ice cream…..which I, of course, did. It was big and good……so big I couldn’t finish it.

Also drove through another curious town called North Pole, AK. The place is Christmas all year. Every pole in town is striped like a candy cane. All the roads all like Santa Claus lane, etc, even the DPW building was candy cane striped. Another odd twist was that their mascot was the Patriot. They used the exact logo that the New England Patriots use.

Lost an hour today leaving Alaskan Standard Time. In total I drove about 8 hours today. While driving on a gravel road a truck blew past me and showered me with rocks resulting in a chip on the windshield in one spot and a full on crack in another. I was actually surprised it hadn’t happened sooner.

Some cool stuff I saw today included some swans, a coyote, and many moose. The highlight of the day was watching a large wolf check out the area all around the camper.

The drive through the Youkon is desolate and wonderful.

Tuesday August 10

Decided to hit Chena Hot Springs for the day on the way back to Fairbanks. After the intensity of the schedule over the last few days, the hot spring experience might be nice.

It turns out it really wasn’t. The largest pool was pretty nice. You could adjust the temperature by moving to different locations in the pool. The bummer was that there was no way to sit down. Some people were taking the plastic deck chairs and sitting neck deep on them in the pool. That worked but you’d think they’d have a better system. The rest of the pool area was pretty sketchy……in fact, I probably have hepatitis B or something. It only cost 10 bucks for the day so at least I’d be getting a shower for my money, but even the showers were screwy. They actually had natural hot spring water running out of them, not fresh water. Even when you were done showering you still felt gross.

Saw a couple of moose on the way back to Fairbanks. Washed my clothes and the camper and truck there and blogged a bit at the B&N again. An employee there has to wake the same guy up from a chair at closing time every night. The guy falls asleep reading Fantasy Football mags daily I guess.

Monday August 9

Into The Arctic

The Arctic Circle was a 4 hour drive each way from Fairbanks. The road follows more or less along the pipeline and was primarily dirt….. and after some showers, mud.

Took off around 9am and found I was exhausted after 3 days of all out, all day, activity and actually had to nap a couple of times along the way. On one occasion, parked basically in the middle of nowhere, the key would not turn and restart the truck. After several attempts the engine would just not start. This had happened to me before at home so I wasn’t panicky yet. The problem had to do with the ignition not reading some type of anti theft chip in the key. After about 20 minutes of restless sitting around it finally started…….whew. Something quirky there. “Yeah, hello Triple A???”

At one point I pulled the truck over at this scenic viewpoint and looked out. The weirdest thing was how quiet it was. I gave the call of the wild and it echoed for a while off the surrounding mountains.

The mud was so caked all over the camper and truck it was unreal. The side of the truck looked like the side of a chum salmon.

Anyway, I made it and have the pics to prove it. I drove out of the driveway in Sterling, MA and drove to the Arctic Circle in Alaska. That’s wacky.

Animals I saw included the Hoary Marmot and a Blue Grouse. also cool crossing over the mighty Yukon River.

Sunday August 8

I started my morning eating breakfast at the world’s northern most Denny’s. By day’s end my mental glass is so full I could barely function. Today I went to the Tanana Valley Fair. There were so many sights, sounds, and people that I will never be able to properly describe what I saw with words. The Fair was simply a mind blowing experience.

I wondered how many of the people I’d seen over the last month and a half all over Alaska, would pop back up at this official state gathering. The answer was staggering…..there were tons. Football players, coaches, vendors that I first saw 400 miles away in downtown Anchorage, the pony ride people that gave the kids such big smiles on the 4^th of July in Anchorage, families and folks I’d seen and even talked to around Fairbanks.…..the list goes on and on. You stick around here long enough and the world gets smaller right before your eyes.

The most incredible repeat personality was, if you’ll remember, the gold panner, hillbilly guy who helped me fix my tire and offered me weed 250 miles away near Denali. That guy had his own booth at the fair as, of all things, the guy who guesses your weight and gives you a prize if he’s wrong. I was a little disappointed. My image of this guy was now a little tainted. Here I thought he was this wreck loose woodsman type and he’s doing 14 hour days yapping away with a microphone in front of his face.

There were wild rock bands, marching bands, rides and foods of all kind…..all the usual fair stuff. But again, it was the people who stole the show. You can come to a lot of conclusions about a place just by checking out the faces of those who live there. This crowd makes the crowd at demo derby night at the Spencer fair look warm and fuzzy. I look at the kids here and I feel like so many just have no chance to make it. Either they are 2 years old and being sworn at and screamed at by their parents or they are a little older and are part of the incredibly high 50% high school drop out rate. The examples that are set for them are appalling and their role models are nonexistent. On one hand it makes me sad…….they deserve better and I wish they got it. But there sure are times at home, at school, etc., where you see kids get every opportunity under then sun and it’s still not enough, especially for their parents…..and that is even more sickening. Every high school kid from Fairbanks should have to trade places with every kid from Nashoba for a year. Man, what an experiment that would be. Talk about getting a lesson in perspective. All would be better for it.

The highlight of the day was the 63 act “Fairbanks Has Talent” contest. It took all day and I watched most of it. As you can imagine, some of the acts were awful, people who had no business singing or dancing. Some were so whacked out ,like really little kids doing the armpit farting thing for the full allotted three minutes. Other acts were fantastic. They included a ballet trio, a hilarious singer guy who sang songs about what it’s like to be Alaskan, a couple of younger girls singing or playing guitars, and a quadriplegic singing country songs in his wheelchair. All these acts were magnificent. However, one little girl stole the show. She was about 10 years old and did the best impersonation of Michael Jackson I’d ever seen. She’d watched his video 10 million times and had all the moves down pat. To top it off she was the cutest little thing. She had the outfit and everything. She moved around the stage effortlessly and worked the crown into a frenzy. I knew she was good and caught her outside the contest tent after round one and she took a photo with me. Her friends were in awe, they screamed, “You’re like a star!!!!” I even asked her to do me a move and she snapped into one of those famous MJ poses. She was an absolute sweetheart. When her name was announced as the winner she went wild with happiness. As the winner, she was asked to do her routine again which she did with a huge brace filled smile on her face and tears in her eyes. Towards the end she threw in some kisses to the crowd and made a big heart shape with her hands…….She was simply dynamite.

Here’s the story from Monday’s paper if you care…..comments are there also.

http://www.newsminer.com/view/full_story/9047260/article-Tanana-Valley-Fair-talent-show-attracts-Fairbanks--finest?instance=home_lead_story

Another funny performance about living in Alaska here...

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=mtsaley

It was a full day, 10am till 11pm. There’s just too much to say about the Fair. It was like nothing I’d ever seen, and it was overwhelming. Today was the sunniest and warmest day in Alaska that I’ve experienced, clear skies and 70 all day long. It was also another full day spent almost entirely outdoors. I’ve never spent more time outside than I have in the last 2 months. If I’m not in the camper, or blogging in some building, I’m outside, and it’s been so, so good.

What an insane last 3 days…….Tomorrow……the Arctic Circle. Can I drive there? We shall see.

Saturday August 7

Are You Ready For Some Football!!!

Bought 4 new tires this morning. I probably needed them. If I was going to attempt driving to the Arctic Circle I didn’t need any surprises. They are way better than the ones I had on there and I felt a lot safer just driving around. They had much thicker sidewalls to better support the weight of the camper as well. The kid that sold ‘em was maybe the best salesman I’ve ever encountered.

It was my goal today to visit two very different high schools and watch the first two high school football games in America for the 2010 season. By October in Alaska the place is inhospitable so they start the season way early. The first day of double sessions is the 3^rd week of July and the first game of the season is the first weekend in August. The students still have 2 more weeks of summer vacation.

Game one pitted the Kodiak High Bears against the Eilson Air Force Base Ravens. The game was on the Air Force base and the players were from the families of soldiers based there. I had to actually go into this office and get cleared to enter the base to watch the game. For the record, most states out here require you to carry proof of vehicle insurance card. Massachusetts has this wacky system where you can’t register your car without proving that you have insurance. As you know, it says the name of your insurance company right on the registration. This was a considerable curveball for the guy at the desk. He doesn’t get many visitors with Mass plates and he had to call in some higher up to get the a-ok………all for a high school football game.

The game was pretty good. Kodiak dominated and were lead by a group of huge Samoan kids. They pretty much trampled all over the field making plays both on offense as well as defense. Kodiak is an island about 800 miles south of Fairbanks. (Imagine Nashoba playing say, some team as far away as Georgia every season) The teams in Alaska are very used to long airplane flights and nights spent sleeping on the home team’s gym floor. Visiting teams are limited to the amount of players they bring as costs add up quick. Today Kodiak came with about 18 players and crushed them.

The crowd was small but enthusiastic. There were 5 cheerleaders who were great. There was even a guy from Kodiak doing play by play in the stands using his cell phone to deliver the signal back to the island. He was super talented and smooth. He sat there and called every play, using all the players names, interjected interesting historical Alaskan football facts, and even did the sponsors announcements before and after the commercial breaks….all on his phone.

Game two was held at a more traditional setting, West Valley Public High School across town in Fairbanks. The West Valley Wolf Pack were host to the East Anchorage Thunderbirds. The stands were packed and the game was a thriller. West had an unbelievably potent offence but was bogged down again and again by penalties. Had they been able to cut back on the penalties they would have won. West Valley made a few spectacular plays, both long passes and long runs to score enough points to hold off East. As seen in the photo, one old Eskimo guy could have cared less about the game. He spent the afternoon coloring in his grandson's coloring book.

It was a brilliantly sunny day. For 30 minutes there was a torrential downpour in the middle of the second game, but the sun was out again by games end.

A few interesting Alaska high school football tid bits.

-Way more passing then home. Lots of long effective passes.

-The sportsmanship was impeccable. Strangely better than I’d ever seen at a high school sporting event……….players helping each other up, pats on the back from opponents, hugs and handshakes at games end.

-Every players name was announced at the beginning of the game.

- When the players from Both teams leave the field the parents and fans of Both teams together, make 2 lines that the players have to walk through. More hugs and high fives for players from both teams.

-The prices to get into the games were the same as Nashoba’s.

- The players were big, fast, and rugged. All four teams would have beat Nashoba. West Valley and East Anchorage would kill them…and Leominster too.

By the end of the day I was toast……totally exhausted.

Friday August 6

Headed back to Fairbanks by way of Denali National Park. I stopped at the park again because they offered a free sled dog demonstration that I wanted to see.

After a traumatic dog experience as a kid, I was never a fan of dogs. However, the demo was excellent. They encouraged you pet all the dogs which I reluctantly did.

The dogs were pretty cool. They were working dogs, used to carrying heavy loads across the huge expanse of the park in extreme low temps. They were super fired up when the ranger hooked them to a sled and dragged him down a dirt road and back. Surprisingly, I enjoyed the whole experience way more than I thought I was going to.

After the demo I completed the 200 mile drive back to Fairbanks where I blogged a while at the Barnes and Noble. Bed after that.