Alaska Trip - Day 9

As I am typing this, I am further north than I have ever been. It is 9:45pm local time here in Fairbanks, but the sun is shining bright. This may pose a problem as we are sleeping in a glass gazebo at a hostel tonight.

This morning we left Anchorage after I got my precious Starbucks. We then stopped by Wasila to visit Sarah Palin, but she must have been next door in Russia, or something. On the way to Wasila from Anchorage, I got some great pictures.

We then headed north towards Fairbanks on the Parks Highway, which is actually in fairly good shape. There were only two construction delays on the way up here.

We stopped in Talkeetna, the town that supposedly inspired one of my favorite all-time shows, "Northern Exposure." It was basically a cool little tourist trap. I did like it, though. It seemed to be the "real Alaska," where locals actually spend the entire year there. Anchorage and Fairbanks seem to have a lot of temporary folks, probably because the military presence here.

Next, we headed up through Denali National Park, home of North America's tallest mountain, Denali (also known as Mt. McKinley, though I hate to call it that because he was a bad President). I was aggravated, because we couldn't see it! There were too many clouds, which I guess is normal for this time of the year. However, when we were almost to Fairbanks, I did get at least one picture of it.

The drive between Talkeetna and Fairbanks was very scenic, and thankfully it did clear up again.

We arrived in Fairbanks about 7pm local time, and arrived at a hostel that is now an apartment, and this guy looked at us weird when we walked in. After a little more searching, we the hostel we're currently at. There are lots of people here tonight. We ate at the furtherest north Denny's in the world. Yay.

Tomorrow, I don't know what we're doing.