I think I know what I did last summer, Part I: Convergence

Snow again. Does it have to come every year?

The white stuff fell first in early September, but we got a reprieve with above-freezing temps until late October.

But winter was inevitable, and yesterday morning the chill of -4 caused my limbs to shudder.

Not that I mind winter in Fairbanks. Already, folks on the street are a little bit nicer (Hey, that young man in a Gators shirt might not be a tourist after all!) and there’s this underlying sense that this town’s been faking it for the sake of appearances the past four months.

Don’t get me wrong. I love summer here. But with so much to do in such few days, the freedom of light and warmth almost becomes a burden. You can’t put fun things off to take care of the important things. Both must be done immediately or not done at all. The best most of us can do is squeeze trips and hikes in among work, chores and whatever sleep you can get during the sunny night.

If you’re broke and tired at the end of a Fairbanks summer, my best guess is that you did something right. That’s my case, and I feel satisfactorily accomplished.

Yet, there’s that nagging itch. Everything you did only makes you think of something you didn’t do.

I floated the upper Chena River three times and the Clearwater Delta River, but I only had one round of fly fishing and missed out on a three-day float through Chicken.

I drove to Valdez and Manley Hot Springs with James, but another summer went by without a trip to Dawson City or the Kenai Peninsula.

I hiked the Angel Rocks to Chena Hot Springs Trail and Granite Tors, yet the trails in Delta Junction were once again out of reach.

Yeah, rough times, huh? Guess you can’t do it all.

The main thing I’m proud of in the past few months is the 10 days I spent with my parents. They visited for two weeks around the summer solstice in late June.

The trip started off quite mellow. I showed them around Fairbanks, which fairly impressed my folks. Apparently, this blog makes Fairbanks sound like a desolate wasteland. Maybe that’s because I post mostly during winter.




Either way, they liked it. Here’s the highlights:

* I played nine holes from 10 p.m. to 12:30 a.m. on Fort Wainwright with my dad (the course was closed, and we played it for free). I forget the score. I remember landing a 3 wood shot 20 feet from the hole before three-putting for a bogey and the light of the sun setting over Birch Hill as we tried to find our drives from the No. 18 tee box.

* We went to the Midnight Sun Game. We found a baseball in the street (presumably from batting practice) as we approached the park, which we later marked with the date, game score and our signatures. We sat next to a middle-aged couple from Alabama and traded SEC barbs with them, though all five of us were united in telling the people standing on the dugout to sit down -- again and again.




* We drove to Chatanika and Angel Rocks and had drinks at the Big I (where dad played pull tabs, our version of scratch-off tickets) and the Boatel. We went to the Midnight Sun Festival and munched on kettle corn while watching a 3-on-3 basketball tournament.



The next morning, we hopped on a train to Denali National Park. The track cuts through the Nenana Gorge, one of my favorite sights from the Parks Highway that’s even more breathtaking from the train. This photo does it no justice.



At Denali, we met up with my friend Heidi, who won my folks over in about 3 seconds. Especially because she took us to see sled dogs.



A hiking guide at the park, she was awesome enough to give us a walking tour off the clock and tell me what plants were edible. I ate a lot during that walk.

The next day, we were up at the break of dawn (3:30 a.m.) to catch an eight-hour bus tour into the park. Luckily, we were on the right side of the bus, from where all the wildlife was easily visible. The people on the left were ticked.

It was a nice day, and Denali (aka Mount McKinley) was in clear sight the whole time. That’s rare, and we took advantage with loads of pictures. Most people who come to the park don’t get to see Denali, and if you’re one of the majority, feel free to cut and paste your head(s) over this:






We got better views of the mountains later, as we took a flying tour of the Alaska Range. I believe my initial reaction was mouthing the words “holy s---” to my mom as she snapped away with her telephoto lens.






We landed in Talkeetna and stayed there for two days. There’s not much in Talkeetna, but we found a startup brewery that served $3 pints of Alaska-made beers. That’s the best deal in the state. I can’t even get a Molson for less than $3.50 in Fairbanks.



Properly fueled, we tromped around the quaint little town, seeing some bald eagles as we strolled along a four-wheeler path along the railroad tracks.




The free time led mom and I to experiment with her tricked-out camera. We tried to find the best use for the wide-angle lens. This was my favorite:


We caught a train to Anchorage and grabbed a rental car to Girdwood, where we crashed at a nice little B&B and did some hiking.


The B&B owner told us of a nice, easy hike up Mount Alyeska. Her husband sometimes takes the hard way up, a path near the ski lift, which she called “completely crazy.” We wanted to take the easy way, but accidentally ended up being completely crazy. My legs were killing me, so I can’t imagine how my fiftysomething parents were faring.

There were many rests, including a conversation with a woman who casually talked about a black bear chasing tourists down the mountain a few days earlier; I’m glad we didn‘t know about that earlier.

Here we are at the top, tuckered and accomplished.




Later on, mom and I hoofed it to a hand-powered pulley bridge. I helped about five loads of people across before we went halfway out and back. It was a long way down to the river, and there was only metal grating between us and the drop. Freakin’ cool.



Dad’s got a bum leg, so he stayed behind after the uber-hike up Alyeska. He surprised us halfway back. “I figured I’d never get to see a hand bridge if I didn‘t do it now,” he said. Take note: That’s the spirit you should bring to Alaska.

On my final day, we drove to Whittier, where the only route is a one-way tunnel that is also used by trains. You have to enter and exit at scheduled times. We entered at 8:15 a.m.

From the docks at Whittier, we jumped aboard a six-person boat for Gerry Sanger’s Sound Eco Adventures, a daylong tour of wildlife and glaciers. It was a brisk, 60-degree day, and we got to see just about every checklist animal there was in Prince William Sound: otters, seals, humpback whales and bald eagles.



Gerry took us out to the terminal moraine of the Yale Glacier, a massive wall of ice that made violent noises as it receded in the summer sun. We saw several large, calving chunks crash into the water as we sipped coffee to combat the chill of the 36-degree water. We were a quarter-mile away from the glacier, but the moraine was so tall that it looked like we could touch it from the boat.



Hell yes.


I left that night on a flight from Anchorage. I could see Denali from the window. Still incredible.

Mom and dad continued, kayaking with an impromptu marriage proposal, bike riding with an impromptu moose, sampling more Alaska beer and other adventures. Ask them about it. It’s worth it.

The best part of my folks’ visit was that I got to combine both of my existences. For 10 days, my Florida life and my Alaska life were simply my life. Now, when I tell dad about how the greens stole 5 strokes from a nine-hole round, he can relate, and when I tell my mom that I’m heading north to Cleary Summit, she knows the way.