Mile 15100

 After breakfast this morning the first order of the day was to check our tortured tires.  As three of them were holding their pressure relatively well, the one we had damaged on the Dempster Hwy had lost over night more than 10 psi.  With the milage on all of them and the expected road conditions when entering British Columbia we decide to get four new socks.  So the guys at American Tire here in Fairbanks could accommodate us and we spent the rest of the morning waiting for our car to get new tires.  What a difference it is, the car is balanced again, the rear wobble is gone, and we are riding as smooth as silk over the asphalt.  After that it is a trip down to the Golden Heart Plaza to visit some of the monuments and sculptures celebrating the silver anniversary of Alaska's statehood in 1984.  

Golden Heart Plaza, Fairbanks, AK

Chena River Flood high water level mark, Aug. 15, 1967

Walter Harper Statue with the famous sledge dog 'Snowball'; Alaska - Siberia WW II memorial

Unofficial end of the Alaska Highway, MP 1523

(Official end is MP 1422 in Delta Junction, AK)

 Then, after a quick lunch we make a short stop at the supermarket and find our way to the George Parks Hwy (Hwy-3) to bring us into the Alaska Range.  At first we follow a little the Tanana River West, before making a turn South following the Lost Slough, an arm of the Tanana River.  We are somehow delayed because of the Goldstream Creek and Bonanza Creek wildfires north and south of the highway between MP 335.5 and MP 318.5 which we only can pass with a pilot car.  After about an hour of waiting the car arrives for the southbound cars and we  can continue slow speed.

Waiting for the pilot car, and more delays because of the fire crews working

But better safe than sorry, and at least the road is still open

 We make a stop at Nenana, AK, a little town at the river which has seen better times and lives of the remnants displayed when the golden spike was placed by president Warren Harden in 1923 to commemorate the completion of the Alaska Railroad.  As important as the railroad was then, today it just transports visitors to enjoy the scenic views of the Alaskan landscape.

Crossing the Tanana River, Alaskan Territorial Guard Statue 

 During WW II under the leadership of Major "Mukluk" Marston and 21 paid staff, 6,368 volunteer from 7 native ethnic groups and European Americans, including some 30 women watched the northern shores of Alaska for enemy movement and were instrumental in the battle for Attu, a foreign war battle fought on domestic soil.

Houses in Nenana, AK

 From there it is just a another hour or so to reach the Alaska range and the entrance to Denali N.P.  We look for our old campsite we used 2014, but things have changed here in Healy, AK and there are more lodges and motels now, a brewery, machine repair shops and more, but we can't find the campsite anymore.  No problem for today, we stop further down the road and get a nice site just at the Denali Borough.

The destructive and rejuvenating power of fire

The Denali Borough

49th State Brewing, the good stuff, hope it won't rain in my beer

159 miles to Sarah Palin's home

"Alaska is a great, solemn poem, set to music by glaciers and volcanoes, with an accompaniment of forests and aurora borealis."  -  John Burroughs, American essayist, naturalist, and poet, 1837-1921