Life at the Leingangs': Alaska - Day Twenty-One: 5166.2 miles to Chena Hot Springs

Woke up early decided to head out before we even ate breakfast. Problem was that even at 9am, no one was in the office. Was the office closed on Sundays??? No posted hours and we weren't willing to hang around until someone showed up. We'd just get an address and mail the $15 to them from Fairbanks. We're pulling around front to leave and the OPEN light pops on. That wasn't good timing, it was God timing.

First stop: Nenana, an Athabascan word meaning "a good place to camp between the rivers" (the Tanana & Nenana). Nenana is known for its annual Nenana Ice Classic since 1917. Here's what they do...

The last weekend of February, they place this black and white tripod out on the ice on the Nenana River. The tripod is attached by a line to a clock atop a tower at the Ice Classic Office. Tickets are sold for $2.50 each throughout Alaska from February 1st to April 5th. Tickets can also be purchased by mail from anywhere in the world. Because of state gambling laws, your ticket cannot be returned to you by mail. But some sweet little old lady volunteer records your guess on a ticket and it becomes part of the annual book of guesses (about the size of a giant phone book). When the ice breaks up and the tripod moves at least 100 yards downstream, the clock is stopped and a winner/winners are declared and they split the pot from the entry fees. Last year in 2015, 294,000 guesses were entered. The ice officially broke up on April 24 at 2:25 pm AST. Twenty-eight winners split the $330,330 jackpot, each taking home $11,797.50.

If you are interested in getting in on the action, go HERE to find out how to enter.

Across the street from the Ice Classic Office/Tower is St. Mark's Episcopal Church. It was built in 1905 and is always open to the public.

The altar is decorated with Native beaded moosehide...

We had breakfast along with some locals at Rough Woods Inn & Cafe. By listening in on their conversation we learned an interesting tidbit... Bears are super attracted to gasoline. Apparently they will destroy plastic gas cans just to get to it. They claimed it was as bad as leaving out food. Who would have known???

Fairbanks claims to have the largest Fred Meyer's in North America. Obviously we had to stop and get gas and ice and check it out. The Starbucks didn't have wifi, so we drove to the Morris Thompson Cultural & Visitors' Center. It was like going to a museum with awesome internet and tons of travel brochures. We stayed quite a while longer than we had planned thanks to a terrific downpour of rain!

Being in the "big city" meant taking care of some necessary things like laundry, ordering a new dip stick for the van and making an appointment with a mechanic on Tuesday. A two day wait wasn't ideal, but it would give us some time to see the sights around the Fairbanks area. Our first choice was Chena Hot Springs about 70 miles east of town.

We got settled into our campsite and headed straight for a tour of the Aurora Ice Museum...

The museum was originally built to be an ice hotel, State regulations required a sprinkler system, which promptly froze and burst, destroying much of the interior of the hotel. They cleaned it up and reopened as a year-round ice museum. It was carved by world champion ice carvers, Steve and Heather Brice. The sculptures are all kept at a chilly 21-27 degrees. Thinking it could be cold in Alaska even in the summer, we came prepared. Thankfully for the Fairbanks residents who were enjoying the 83 degree day, the museum provides parkas. It really doesn't help a whole lot when you are still wearing skirts, shorts and flip flops.