Land of the Midnight Sun

Travel log Date: 7-2-2010
Fairbanks, AK
Time: 4:30 am (Alaska time zone)
Temp: 62deg F -- Dew point: 57 deg
Wind: SSW @ 7
Sunrise: 3:14am -- Sunset: 12:38 am

If I were home it would be 7:30am and I would have been up for 2 hours. But here, not even the locals are awake. I sat alone on the outdoor deck at the hotel enjoying the solitude and looking at the incredible array of colors that populated the plethora of flower boxes with delicate poppies, buttercups and forget-me-nots. No one stirred in the early morning still…the streets were quiet…neither a tour bus nor tourist moved. The maudlin Fairbanks sky faded from a dark gray in the east to a crystal clear blue in the west. The sun’s rays pierced through holes in the clouds like a laser that burned through to the frozen tundra.

This was my third trip to the land of the “midnight sun”. Alaska is a place that has always beckoned me with its stark rugged landscapes and majestic beauty. The thought of surviving its harsh and unforgiving weather has a mysterious appeal that I cannot explain. But, this time it was different. I was a prisoner of the tourist industry and I knew it. My worries were not about…being eaten by a bear or surviving a forced landing, but were about retrieving my lost luggage from the airlines or which coat and tie I should wear to dinner.

I was unaccustomed to this type of adventure, this type of travel. Tipping all the bus drivers, tour guides, waiters, bellhops and doormen was far from what I was familiar with, at least, not in Alaska. I didn’t bring any survival gear; no sleeping bag, no hiking boots, not as much as a pocket knife for fear of airport security taking it. My only means of surviving was a VISA card and a handful of cash.

Yesterday, we witnessed a team of Alaskan huskies pulling a muddy 4 wheeler and a “real” Athabascan Native Village from the deck of an “authentic” riverboat paddle-wheel steamer; complete with diesel engine and hydraulic drive motors, bow and stern thrusters. It would have made Walt Disney proud.

Later, we visited the abandon Gold Dredge #8 and then actually panned for gold. After an exhausting few of minutes of backbreaking work…sifting, separating and washing gravel and dirt from a couple of tiny gold flakes…we were ushered into the gift shop where we left all of our hard earned money…just as the Stampeders did in days gone by.

All I could do was try to melt into the crowd and be lead aimlessly from gift shop to gift shop. Attempting not to get swept up into the buyer’s excitement…I looked in vain for an Alaskan souvenir that was not made in China.

The following day it was a bus trip around the city of Fairbanks, then the train to Denali National Park, another six-hour bus ride thought the park to see “The Tall One” which was hidden by fog.

After Goggling Mass times on my Blackberry only to find places that were unreachable and at times that were unacceptable…I was really starting to feel trapped by the system. I was uncomfortable with the “you’re traveling” excuse and felt a tremendous urge to attend Sunday Mass. As we returned from our stimulating school bus ride through the cloud obscured Denali Park Mountains, we stumbled into a Saturday Vigil Mass in the Park’s theater. Thank you, Father Jack, for traveling the three hundred miles each weekend to serve your mission churches. Call it coincident or a mini-miracle; I just love it when God makes things happen that I can’t.

The next day it is Wasilla for lunch, through Anchorage, past Turnagain Arm (with it’s 40 foot tidal changes) and down the Kenai Peninsula to Seward. Planes, trains, and buses…every stop was crowded with people and that seemed to water down the awesome beauty of the landscape. The bus drivers/tour guides pointed out tiny dots on far away mountains identifying them as moose, bear, Dall sheep or caribou. I personally believe one would have needed the aid of an observatory class telescope to actually identify anything at that distance. I suspect that wildlife would shy away…far away…from the stream of motor coaches that clattered and cluttered the highway.

Tomorrow we sail. Across the Gulf of Alaska to Glacier Bay then down the Inside Passage to Haines-Skagway, Juneau, Ketchikan and finally Vancouver. I am looking forward to an adventure on the high seas and to visiting Southeastern Alaska…an area, which I have never seen.

“There are strange things done
in the midnight sun
by the men who moil for gold”…by R.W. Service


Thank you, Lord Jesus
For the mysteries,
For the miracles,
The land magnificent
And the midnight sun.
Amen