Alaska 2014 Week 9

July 18 Today Jim and I rode out to the Artic Circle Outpost.  Ten years ago we went here and asked to park out motorhome overnight in their parking lot while we rode out to the Article Circle in our jeep.  We met the owner the Carlson’s and 4 of their 23 children.  I was fascinated by this family when I read a book written by one of their daughters, called The Homestead Kid by Cherie Curtis.  It is a wonderful story of how they got their start in Alaska.  You can order it off Amazon.com if anyone is interested.  I happened to buy my copy from their store 10 years ago.  I read it in one evening and could not put it down til I finished it.  I wanted to go visit them again this year and find out how they were and how children were doing.  I knew the children would be grown because the youngest, Molly, was 11, then and she is now 21.  And sure enough all the children are grown and married and all have moved away.  About half of the kids have left Alaska and half are still in Alaska but the live in Fairbanks and Anchorage.  It was fun catching up with their mom and dad and getting caught up with the kids.  The Carlsons now have 44 grandchildren.  How awesome is that.  Life is about to change for Nancy and Joe Carlson because of the renewed interest in gold mining in Livengood 16 miles from their homestead.  They are expecting power to come their way within the next two years.  Can you image, they have lived off the grid since 1974, have raised 23 children with no electricity, no running water, no sewer hookups and now that they have raised their family,  power is coming their way.  I don’t think they would change a thing though.  When I met their children 10 years ago they were very happy and content with their lives.  In fact I asked their 13 year old daughter how their parents survived raising all those children without TV or cartoons and she said we don’t need TV, we have our books and our animals that’s all we need.  I was so impressed.  We had heard that a company was gold mining in Livengood.  Supposedly, a billionaire, and a millionaire setup a gold mining business.  We met a miner at Chena Hot Springs who came up from Florida to work the mine.  He said there is lots of gold to be found.  Then when we were at the Artic Circle Outpost to young men came in and I started talking with them and turns out they are working for the goldmine in Livengood.  They confirmed they are finding gold.  We saw a couple of other gold mining operations along the way to Livengood.  They were small operations but they did have some large equipment.  So exciting times for folks in the Livengood area.  The pictures below show a picture of the store, Nancy and I in the store, and an old picture of some of the kids and  Nancy and Joe.  It also shows some of the pipeline we saw along the way to Livengood, and some of the gold mining operations we saw along the way to Livengood.  These are just some small operations.

July 19  Today Jim and I went with Mem and Larry to the Farmers Market then over to the Harley Davidson store.  It turned out to be a very nice day so we decided to go over to Pioneer Park which is a unique state park which contains lots of old cabins that were once located downtown Fairbanks and moved to the park.  There are signs hanging outside the buildings telling you who lived in them, where they were located and what they were used for.  There were a couple of museums, including an air museum which Larry and Jim really enjoyed (Mem and I chose to wait outside for them), lots of neat vendors, lots of  eateries, an antique car show, an actual river boat that contained awesome dioramas of towns of its actual route on the Chena River back in the 1800’s.  There was so much to see here that we ended up spending the whole afternoon here.   

 

July 20  From Fairbanks we went to Tok, Alaska we got gas and ate lunch at Fast Eddies. 

That evening we spent the night in a roadside pullout.

July 21  We continued on our way to Chicken, Alaska.  We stayed at a campground at Chicken where they offered more gold panning.  Of course I had to give it a try; but I came up empty handed.  I was too tired to do another pan.  It’s too bad because there was no charge for panning.  Jim and I got an ice cream sandwich and we were sitting out front of the little camp store eating our ice cream and we got to talking with another couple when another guy who was camping there with his family drove up in an authentic 1901 Duryea car and offered to give us a ride in the car.  I jumped at the chance.  We took off down the road and the next thing I know he turned the steering over to me.  I told him oh no please be ready to take over if it looks like I’m going to crash.  He just chuckled and said don’t worry I will.  Next he gave Jim a ride and Jim said he really enjoyed it.  The man told me he spotted the car in some lady’s front yard.  She was using it as a planter for flowers.  He asked her if it was for sale.  She said her husband thought it was an eye sore and asked if he would give $100 for it.  He said he couldn’t get his money out fast enough.  He fixed it up and has been driving it ever since.  He is from Kentucky.  He and his wife have an RV and he trailered the Duryea all the way from Kentucky.  He unloads it at every campground and gives rides everywhere he stops. What a treat that was. 

July 22  Today Mem and I have read the book, called Tisha, which is a true story about a 19 year old girl who came to Chicken in 1927 to teach school.  It is a beautiful story and we just loved the book.  Well it turned out the Campground owner owns the property where the original school and cabin is located where Tisha taught and lived in.  The owner’s father, Spike, is a retired school teacher himself, and gave a tour and took us over to see the school house and Tisha’s cabin.  We actually got to go inside these buildings.  It was pretty neat and Spike was a wealth of information and he liked to tell stories.  It was such a neat tour.  As soon as we got back from the tour, we jumped in our motorhomes and off we went.  We were headed to Dawson City, Canada and we wanted to make sure we got to the border crossing before they closed.  But first we had to tackle the Top of The World Road.  This road is 109 miles of mostly gravel road.  We had heard that 2 motorhomes had gone over the edge at two different times this month so we were a little apprehensive about the trip but we knew we would take it slow and easy.  And that’s what we did.  When a vehicle approached from the opposite direction, we just stopped and let them pass.  We think those motorhomes that went over the edge got over to far and the shoulders of the road are just soft gravel with no guard rails so it is very easy to go over.  We actually saw the areas where they went over.  It was kind of eerie seeing the spots where they went over.  Thank goodness they both hit trees rather than slid all the way down the mountains but they still slid down far enough to total their motorhomes.  Anyway we did just fine.  We got to the Yukon River and we drove our motorhome on the ferry and rode across to Dawson City.  You have to stay inside your vehicles when you go across on the ferry.  The dogs were a little nervous but they did just fine.  We are staying at the Bonanza Creek Campground.  We will be here for 3 nights.  Bonanza Creek is where all the gold mining is going on and it is the original creek that made Dawson City famous.

July 23  Today, Jim, me and Mem went out exploring the city.  Mem and I are collecting Passport Stamps for a chance at winning 5 ounces of gold.  We only need 1 more stamp.  It was kind of fun riding around getting our stamps.  It forces you to check out  places you might not normally know about.  On our way to Dredge #4 to get a number stamp, we came upon a Claim 33 Gold Mining Tourist activity.  We stopped in to talk to the people and they were so nice.  Next thing you know I decided to do some gold panning and sure enough I found some gold.  There were some good size chunks.  It was well worth the stop.  We continued on to Dredge #4.  Jim was so excited.  The dredge is huge and in very good shape.  It is not a working dredge anymore; they just use it to give tours now.  There is still a lot of mining going on today in various creeks around here.  The price of gold is causing people to start mining for pacer gold now and there is tons and tons of pacer dirt around Dawson.  This evening we went to the show at Diamond Gerties.  It was really a great show.  Before the show I played the slots for a little bit and played a little blackjack.  Back in the day, there really was a lady called Diamond Gertie.  She had a gold tooth and she had a diamond inserted in her tooth just because she could.  Supposedly the dance hall ladies charged $5 a dance.  And the gold miners would work in the gold mines all day and come to the dance hall at night and through nuggets at the dance hall girls on stage.  They said when the gold rush was over the miners left broke and the dance all girls left rich. 

July 24  Today Jim and I and Larry and Mem rode up the rode called Dome Rode.  It is the highest point in Dawson City.  It has awesome views of the city and the Yukon River.  It was beautiful up there. From there we went to the little town and did some shopping and then to Sourdough Joe’s for lunch.  After lunch we went to the Dawson City Museum.  We had stopped by there the other day and noticed they were showing some movies that we wanted to come back and watch.  Once we watched it we realized it was narrated by the son of an author of a  book that me, Jim and Mem had read called, I Married the Klondike by Laura Beatrice Berton.  It was a great book and we all three really loved the book,.  The movie talked about his father, Frank.  And the three of us realized Frank was Laura’s husband.  So at the end of the movie, we asked the man running the movie if he knew anything about Laura and where her house was in Dawson.  He knew all about the book, where her husband Frank worked (in the building we were standing in) and where her house was.  So needless to say we left the museum to take pictures of Laura’s house.  Jim and Larry went to look at a locomotive on display at the museum and before you knew it the day was over.  We all agreed it was a wonderful stay in Dawson City.