[mobike008]

Prelude

Alaska has been on my bucket list for a very long time and like most people, the visualization of Alaska trip would be cruising along the famous glaciers.

But nope, it was not like that. It was a different kind of adventure trip that involved cars and driving in snow conditions.

I was casually chatting with BHPian CRACKHEAD who is an avid traveler and has been to Alaska before mentioned we can make a quick weekend getaway trip and not go to the atypical tourist places like Anchorage and around.

We decided to head even northern part of Alaska which is Fairbanks, Alaska and keep things simple and cover 3 major attractions in the 3-days we planned for this trip:

1. Dalton Highway: We decided to drive about 85 miles north of Fairbanks to a sign board of “Dalton Highway”

2. Denali National Park: The most popular national park in Alaska from the total 4 national parks in this beautiful state.

3. Chena Hot Springs : A natural hot springs that is situated in a remote place in Alaska outside of Fairbanks.

Alaska is massive...



Mobike008..



Crackhead..

[mobike008]

Setting the plan in motion…

A few things to do :

1. To set the plan in motion, we booked our flights from Seattle to Fairbanks for a Friday morning departure and return was scheduled for a Sunday
Redeye/Monday morning (1:30am) arrival back to Seattle.

2. Decided to book the best AWD in business as we were going to deal with some serious snow, so it was a 2020 Subaru Forester.

3. Hotel rooms was booked in Hyatt.

4. Car parking booked at a “Park & Fly” at SEATAC for 3-days.

With above taken care, we were all set for a rockin’ weekend in the most pristine and largest (shucks, I did not even know that Alaska was the largest state in US until that weekend. I always thought Texas is the biggest state).

Now let’s take a quick look at how big is “ALASKA.”

Alaska is by far the biggest state in the USA. It is 663,267 square miles of rich broad snowcapped, tree laden land that has produced billions of dollars of gold and oil.

I reckon they are also super popular for their fish (Alaskan Cods, Alaskan Crabs are exotics and expensive seafood) furs (plenty of furry animals in Alaska), and of course, timber.

I can tell ya’all one thing- Alaska is unspoiled, uncrowded and super pristine.

Well, Texas is the biggest state in the lower 48-states but, in the contiguous US, Alaska is massive.

Here are some basic stats of the how big is Alaska compared to what we all usually thing are biggest states in America.

1. Alaska: 665,000 Sq Miles
2. Texas: 268,000 Sq. Miles
3. California: 163,000 Sq. Miles

You see, a couple of Texas can easily fit into Alaska.

With that said, let’s go over this photoblog and since I am not much of a writer so like always will keep my textual content to the minimum and let you all enjoy the pictures depicting the pristine beauty of Alaska.

Landing into a bitterly cold Fairbanks, Alaska.



Our rental for 3-days in Alaska- 2020 Subaru Forrester.

[mobike008]

Day 1 (Friday, November 3rd, 2023)

We decided to reach the airport early and WFA (Work from Airport) from the Alaska's First-Class Priority Lounge.

Parked Crackhead’s car safely at the “Park & Fly” location at SEATAC, we enjoyed some breakfast and coffee in the lounge attending to calls and showing every bit that we are busy on a Friday morning as we hadn’t taken an “official leave” and luckily we both are in roles that let us open our “Dukaan” (Office/Workplace), wherever we are as long as we have a laptop and phone at hand.

Till this moment, I didn’t realize that flying to Fairbanks was a 3.5-hour flight which made me do some research on how big Alaska and all that info in aforementioned post.

Interestingly, I also didn’t realize till then there existed a 5th time zone in US (I am sure you are aware about the 4 time zones- EST, CST, MST and PST) but Alaska is 1-hour behind PST making it a 5th time zone.

I had to shake my head in awe and wondered how really big is continental US.

We landed on-time and coordinated with Casey (Subaru Owner) who hand-delivered the car just outside the FAI airport. We picked up the newly washed car and drove immediately to our hotel (Hyatt International) and checked in.

Post a quick wash & freshen up, we were out again in 30-minutes and our first stop was the world-famous drive up north to the signboard of “Dalton Highway”.

I’m sure most of us have watched the popular Netflix series “Ice Truckers” who drive on these world’s dangerous roads up to the ARTIC CIRCLE.

Check this video and this is how this highway looks like in peak winter (yup, this is not even winter in Alaska):

This is how truckers drive on this highway- Superb Video, Do watch till end.

https://youtu.be/NPdNAUOJEOs?si=aRlTb45LzHW-tiGl

This is the route they use and is famous for transporting fuel, timber and other key natural resources of Alaska. This entire route is splattered with Alaskan Pipelines that run all the way from north to south. This route is approximately 600 miles long from Fairbanks up to Prudhoe Bay (Artic Circle) and we drove part of it until the sign that says “Dalton Highway” which was about 80 miles drive through some harsh road conditions and extreme cold.

Post that signboard, the truckers drive on “Frozen Lakes”, Icy roads to reach their destination of Prudhoe Bay.

During our drive there was some patch that was in construction and only one side of the traffic was being allowed. Interestingly, one lady who was stopping the traffic approached us and chatted with us the entire “30 minutes” that we waited for the “Pilot Car” that escorted the vehicles to other side of the bad patch/road construction section.

That was one enjoyable conversation and she is a local Alaskan and working for 30 years in pipeline, manufacturing had some interesting anecdotes and perspectives to share with us.

The only hiccup “we had to keep the car window open” the whole time she stood outside that kind of froze me to the bones as the temperatures were in the -8 Celsius to -12 Celsius.

Imagine she was standing in the open (of course wearing the right gear) and doing a 12-hour shift. Kudos to such strong and brave women.!!

We took some pictures in front of the signboard and drove the 80 mile long stretch back into Fairbanks to some spirited evening of warm fuzzy drinks and an excellent dinner.

We called of this day at around midnight after that 160+ miles roundtrip through some of the most pristine landscapes portraying the wilderness of Alaska.

https://youtu.be/xPWqQFleMGw

T[i]his is the "Ice Truckers" route. They drive all the way to Prudoe Bay.[/I



We drove only until a safe point which is about 80 miles north of Fairbanks.





Beautiful Alaskan wilderness landscapes throughout the drive.







Snowy Mountains everywhere..



Alaskan Pipeline- This is what Alaska is most popular for and is their richest source of income- GAS.





Taking pictures is tough. It's challenging to stay out of the car for too long.



Somewhere on this route.

https://youtu.be/T40gV1deMEc

Pilot car leading the traffic for 12-miles on other side as that entire stretch was under construction with heavy equipment all over the place.



Iconic- Dalton Highway.







Sunset was at 4:30pm and weather at 7:00pm was 18 F/ -8 Celcius.



Enroute we spotted a strange phenomena in the sky. The skies turned orange/yellow and it was quite unique.





Back to Fairbanks and warmth of a warm restaurant interiors.





Burgers..



Calamari..



Butter Garlic Shrimps.

[mobike008]

Day 2 (Saturday, November 4th, 2023)

Today the plan was to visit one of the most popular destinations in Alaska.

Denali National Park

A short excerpt from Wikipedia:

Denali National Park and Preserve, formerly known as Mount McKinley National Park, is an American national park and preserve located in Interior Alaska, centered on Denali, the highest mountain in North America.

The park and contiguous preserve encompass 6,045,153 acres (9,446 sq mi; 24,464 km2) which is larger than the state of New Hampshire.

On December 2, 1980, 2,146,580-acre (3,354 sq mi; 8,687 km2) Denali Wilderness was established within the park.

Denali's landscape is a mix of forest at the lowest elevations, including deciduous taiga, with tundra at middle elevations, and glaciers, snow, and bare rock at the highest elevations. T

The longest glacier is the Kahiltna Glacier. Wintertime activities include dog sledding, cross-country skiing, and snowmobiling. T

The park received 594,660 recreational visitors in 2018.

Like many things that I got to know for the first time, till this visit, I was not even aware that Mt. Denali (20,500 feet elevation) is the tallest mountain in North America. Infact, some blogs say it’s taller than Everest (28,000 feet elevation) from a different perspective. Some weird explanation given:

Mt. Everest Base camp is at ~ 8,000 feet while Mt. Denali base camp is at just 2,000 feet. By some strange calculations, Denali’s summit is higher than Mt. Everest.

Ridiculous & Funny, isn’t it?

We had a nice breakfast of bagels, egg, biscuit & gravy and after that sumptuous breakfast, we headed out towards Denali National Park (Referred to as DNP in this photoblog).

DNP is 120 miles south-west of Fairbanks and about 2.5 hours drive. We headed out at 9:00am and started driving towards this park and this entire route was completely icy and roads had lot of ice, black ice and snow in most parts of the drive.

The scenery on this route was nothing short of spectacular. The road cuts through mountains (there is a railway track for those who wish to take a train from Anchorage to Denali National Park which is a 12-hour train journey through some breathtaking scenery).

We felt like stopping every few miles as we were left wonderstruck with the beauty that kept unfolding in front of our eyes.

We shared the driving between us (one-way the Subbarao (we fondly call it that way) was driven by Crackhead and return was by me) and since the excitement was to reach Denali National Park, we decided to keep some of the scenic stops for our way back.

We tugged along and finally reached DNP at around 12:30pm in afternoon. And, as expected the park is closed after 3 miles so unfortunately, we didn’t get an opportunity to drive up to 13 mile stone from where we can see Mt. Denali really up close.

But, the park was open for visitors to where brave enough to do hikes to enjoy some spectacular views from different vantage points.

Well, we being we. We decided to drive around the park (went some off road) and drove until the barricaded point and walked around a bit and spent some warm cozy time at the “Visitor Center” learning more about the park.

There was a dog sled tour that was open so we enjoyed that experience of petting the “Alaskan Huskies”. There were about 20+ Huskies bred for sledding, and I really enjoyed the experience of learning about this strongest dog in the world.

After spending a few hours, around 4pm we decided to head back into town and made quite a few stops enroute and finally reached town famished (there was nothing to eat enroute as Alaska is the pinnacle of wilderness) and stopped at a Thai Restaurant for a warm and delicious meal.

Driving towards Denali National Park.

https://youtu.be/ywUWhC48ud0

https://youtu.be/3tDpuZb4XVQ

Fairbanks-to-Denali National Park- 250 Miles Rountrip.



Post Breakfast- This picture was taken at 10:00am in the morning.



Showered and ready to head out.



Snow, Snow, everywhere.



20F. One of the warmest moments in Alaska.



One of the pit-stops.











Mt. Denali ranges could be seen constantly when approaching the National Park.



Entering the Denali National Park area.

https://youtu.be/M6hJZKFtvzM

Frozen Lakes. Plenty of them enroute.







Finally. Entering the beautiful and spectacular Denali National Park.



Snow quantity drastically increased when we entered the park.



Absolutely pretty surroundings.









Attachment 2530436





Inside the park- One of my favorite pictures.



Interesting & Information Signboards outside the Visitor Center inside the park.









Walking towards the dog kennel.

[mobike008]

Day 2 (Saturday, November 4th, 2023)......CONT'D

We spent a nice hour at the kennel situated inside the Denali National Park where there were at least 25+ Alaskan Huskies in their kennels.

Apparently, these dogs are the strongest in the world and each dog can carry a load of at least 3-times its body weight. And, each these dogs were pretty big and were in the 40-50 pounds range.

They love activity and want to be given tasks that is strenuous and can stay up in temperatures of -50C.

Imagine the sleds led by 6-8 dogs can carry over 1000 pounds of weight through harsh snowy trails.

Driving inside Denali National Park. Simply, Simply Breathtaking.

https://youtu.be/_dgQxfrro0Y

Yet another scenic drive video.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=d25k2uQU2lA?feature=share

Interesting information on Alaskan Huskies.



The "TEAM" that we met that day.



Beautiful Dogs.











Sample Dog Sled.



This is how they pull sleds in peak winters here in Denali.



Some pictures from a vantage point in Denali National Park.















Railway track running inside the park that caters to the scenic train that goes from Fairbanks to Denali National Park. 125 miles in 6-hours.



Where do we go? Fairbanks or Anchorage?



Breathtaking views everywhere. These pictures cannot do any justice.













Beautiful views from a vantage point from a resort located high up in elevation.







Rocky landscapes.

[mobike008]

Day 2 (Saturday, November 4th, 2023)......CONT'D

Some more pictures of this scenic route from Fairbanks to Denali National Park. This route is mandatory for visitors to drive as the scenery is breathtaking and we felt like stopping every few minutes as the landscapes just took our breath away. If you like snow, then it's recommended that you plan a visit to Denali National Park between September to November.

January to March would be quite dangerous as it's peak winter and temps can drop to an unbearable -50C or lower.

Few more pictures of our return route.







The snowy route that we took to go up the resort had some funny signboards through that hill climb. We both were in splits.



Spotted several US Army convoys on this stretch.

















One more funny signboard.



Resort which was closed due to upcoming winter.



They have blue eyes, apparently.



Back in town at 5:00pm and time to enjoy some warm Thai dinner.





My favorite- Thai Red Curry.



Spicy Schezwan and Chicken.







Another favorite- Tom Yum Soup. This really hit the spot in that cold weather.

[mobike008]

Day 2 (Saturday, November 4th, 2023)—Cont’d

Spotting the " Northern Lights in Fairbanks, Alaska"

After that excellent and warm Thai dinner, we were little snoozy so headed back to the hotel for a quick nap as we had a long night ahead of us.

Well, who can sleep when the excitement is “full on”.

Tonight was the night to chase the Aurora Borealis. Heck, that sounds exotic. Isn't it? But, what really is Aurora Borealis?

Aurora Borealis or also popularly known as The northern lights are an atmospheric phenomenon that's regarded as the Holy Grail of sky watching.

A small excerpt from the internet world explaining what is “Aurora Borealis”

“””” The northern lights is a beautiful phenomenon of dancing waves of light that have captivated people for years. But for all its beauty, this spectacular light show is a rather violent event. Energized particles from the sun slam into Earth's upper atmosphere at speeds of up to 45 million mph (72 million kph), but our planet's magnetic field protects us from the onslaught. As Earth's magnetic field redirects the particles toward the poles the dramatic process transforms into a cinematic atmospheric phenomenon that dazzles and fascinates scientists and sky watchers alike.”””

As the name suggest, logic is simple the higher you are from equator towards the north pole, the better are the chances of you spotting the “Northern Lights”.

Norway is the most popular place to enjoy some of the most spectacular visuals of this natural phenomena.

Fairbanks, Alaska comes into the 2nd spot for some of the best views of Aurora Borealis.

How to track the best times to visit?

Well, the best times are between September to March which is usually the winter months at these places, and you need a clear sky to spot this wonder.

Best way is to track something known as KPI index which is calculated from 1-10 (1 being the lightest to 10 being the strongest possibilities of great views of this “sky show”)

November 4th had a KPI index of 3 which unfortunately for us was not that great and we didn’t have much hope. But we still decided to drive about 50 miles outside of Fairbanks to an open elevated spot that Crackhead knew would help us spot the show (if it occurs).

We drove through slippery, icy roads at 30mph to reach our destination a little after midnight. We turned off the lights of the car (there were a few other cars waiting next to us), covered the odometer display which won’t go away by covering it with our jacket) and waited in “Pitch Dark” for the show to begin. Haha, it almost felt like waiting for an open-air theatrical show.

We decided to take turns sleeping in the car. But, we both slept at the same time. Eyes closed and waking up every 10 mins to check the surrounding if it came on. Except the clear beautiful half crescent moon, there was nothing.

1-hour passed, and I was getting bit disappointed and was sure that it won’t happen.

2-hours passed, and I woke up to see Crackhead sleeping. Then I peeked outside the window to see something green and vertical shaped the sky. I nudged Crackhead awake and he said, “That’s it, it’s happening.”

Yahooooooo! I was excited and we took out our phone cameras and started clicking sitting in the car. The outside temperatures dropped to 8 F ( -15 Celsius) and I didn’t have the courage to step out and take pictures. Well, I did briefly for maybe a couple of mins and clicked a picture or two.

We just sat in the car and were gaping at the wonderful visuals happening right in front of our eyes. No pictures can do justice to what we witnessed. This was a very light phenomena considering it was just 3 KPI Index. But I was happy that we ticked off the “Northern Lights” as it was particularly my first experience.

After spending an hour enjoying this phenomenon, around 3:00am we headed back to the hotel and enjoyed a satisfactory sleep.

Driving at Midnight for about 50 miles outside of Fairbanks to Murphy's Dome.

https://youtu.be/0zXLdzn-lRI

We were hungry again so had a quick bite to eat at McD's at around 11:00pm.



Entire drive to Murphy's Dome, the skies were red/brown. I began to wonder we are so up north over equator the skies here are dramatic even at night.





Waiting at Murphy Dome post midnight with 10F (-13 Celsius).





Breathtaking Northern Lights. It was a spectacle to behold and once in a lifetime experience.

[mobike008]

Day 3 (Sunday, November 5th, 2023)

Got up late around 9am and decided to go down for breakfast which was open until 10:00am. Well, I forgot to call out that sun rises at 10:00am and it was dark till then.

It’s indeed quite unreal and unusual even for us from Seattle where we are used to some crazy sunrise and sunset times during winter.

And winter has not even started and I’m told that in peak winter the sunrise even goes up to noon which is honestly quite unbelievable and weird as I have never experienced such weather ever in my life. We checked out of the hotel around 11:30am and decided to drive to one of the most popular locations in Alaska which is “Chena Hot Springs”

Chena Hot Springs was founded over 100 years ago by two gold mining brothers, Robert and Thomas Swan.

In 1905, Robert Swan was suffering from rheumatism and needed a place to calm his pain and be comfortable. The two brothers set out to find the hot springs. It took them a little over a month to reach the hot springs after searching for it in Interior Alaska’s harsh landscape.

In 1911, twelve small cabins were built to accommodate visitors. The twelve cabins developed, establishing it as a resort in the interior of Alaska. The United States Department of Agriculture sent chemists to analyze the water.

These hot springs are completely natural and despite being just 60 miles away from Fairbanks, is located quite interior Alaska and never reported any population in this area.

The maximum population is 10 people in peak summer who reside in this resort. I reckon it’s probably due to the harsh winter as the yearly average temperatures are -5C.

This ~60 miles drive from Fairbanks was almost like a fairytale and landscape was quite different than our previous day trip to Denali National Park. This route was even more snowy and there was literally any black top on the road surface as it was finely covered with ice majority of this route.We passed frozen lakes, snow covered trees and reached Chena Hot Springs around 1:00pm and after paying the fees ($20/person and $5/towel), we changed, showered and entered the hot spring.

From indoor to the outdoor hot spring was like 15 feet away but, the outside temperatures were around -12 C and when we stepped out to walk towards the spring, the cold blast was terrifying.

We quickly entered the hot spring and instantly enjoyed the warmth.

This was my first experience of entering a hot spring and it was simply an amazing experience. There were warnings that our body gets dehydrated when you spend lot of time in the water and there was recommendations to keep getting hydrated. So, we carried water bottles inside the spring and kept sipping on water every few minutes. We spent around 2-hours in the spring, and it was an experience to cherish as the head which was outside with hair, eyelashes and entire getting frozen and rest of the body is warm.

We got out of the pool and got dressed and spent some time walking around the resort. There is a huge transport plane (DC-6) hooked up on rails (God knows how they lugged a real plane so high-up) and we also noticed this resort is pretty self-sufficient as it had its own runway and fueling trucks to fuel planes that land on the strip which is located inside the resort.

After an enjoyable exploration in snowy conditions for an hour or so we decided to head back into town which after slowly making way through icy roads reached around 6:00pm.

We both were famished so headed straight to a popular place called “Brewster’s” in Fairbanks and enjoyed meal and drinks for a couple of hours.

Since our flight back to Seattle was at 1:00am (Monday Morning), we had a couple of hours to kill. So, what do 2 BHP’ians do?

We found “Gran Turismo” running in a Regal theater nearby and it was best thing to do is enjoy the warmth of the theatre till it’s time for the flight. I loved the movie so overall a good way to kill time and enjoy it too.

Reached airport at 11:30pm and returned the car in the parking lot which was an easy and uneventful affair. Despite the weather conditions, thankfully the flight was on-time and being a “Red Eye” flight, we slept through the flight to reach Seattle at 6:30am in morning local time and just in time to reach home and get into the regular mundane Monday morning meetings.

That’s how a 3-day exploration of the beautiful state of Alaska panned out and I really enjoyed this trip and just can’t wait to go back again and explore other beautiful parts of Alaska- Anchorage, Juneau and other national parks of Alaska.

Thanks for reading and all pictures and videos taken with iPhones (13 & 14 Promax) with no edits.

Hope you enjoyed the virtual tour and till our “next adventure.”

Cheers
Mobike008

Enjoying some pool time in Chena Hot Springs.

https://youtu.be/QPrFQtENibY

https://youtu.be/znaXGED7qpk

Fairbanks to Chena Hot Springs.



Sumptious Breakfast.





Bagel & Creamcheese. Love it !!



This route was quite treacherous. Entire 60 miles was like this with car sliding quite a few times. But, it was fun.



Amazing scenery on this route which was different than the Denali route







Entering Chena Hot Springs.



DC-60 strung up high in the air.



Enjoyable 2-hours spent in the hot springs.

















Head, Hair, Eye Lashes are frozen. Rest of the body is warm.













Drinking water is mandatory as body becomes dehydrated.







With DC-60 transport plane in the backdrop.

[mobike008]

Final set of pictures of this trip. Hope you enjoyed the tour. !!!

Alaskan Railways with snow in background is such a pretty sight.









During one of the break to enjoy the scenery.



Respect for this car on how it tackles bad roads with so much ease.





Chena Hot Spring Resort, AK









Looks awesome in real. I kept wondering how they put up such a large transport plane on the pedestal.





Steak Bites and Garlic Bread.



Coconut Shrimps.



Jalapeño Hamburger.



Apple & Strawberry Pie

[mobike008]

Brief Driving Impression of Subaru Forester 2020



In the 3 days we had the car with us, we drove this 2020 Subaru Forester for a total of about 650 Miles equally by me and Crackhead. Here is my quick observation of this extremely popular car in PNW region.

I noticed strangely that majority of Subarus sold are in cold regions where there is a lot of snow and predominant customers are woman drivers. It's rare to see Subarus in hotter regions like Texas, Arizona, Nevada, California etc. This is just an observation by me and might not be true.

This was my first ever Subaru driving experience and I was looking forward it. When I first got behind the wheel, for the first 50-odd miles, I was sorely disappointed with the car.

The engine felt underwhelmed, CVT gearbox was not the most rev happy. The engine struggled as power isn't one of its forte.

This impression changed rather quickly when we got on to snowy/icy roads as the car seems to have supreme confidence on such road conditions and makes you feel like driving on a rather dry/normal road surface. After this experience, I can understand why people buy Subarus and also almost convinced that the AWD system of Subaru is one of the best if not the best in automobile industry. The car's AWD and other driving aids like traction control, DSP etc make the car drive effortlessly even in some of the most dangerous and icy conditions which we what we drove on for majority of the miles that we clocked.

I experienced just a couple of slides during the entire drive and I was able to push the car to some unmentionable speeds (had to stand on the gas) even in snowy conditions tells a lot about its AWD system. I was able to push the car to go faster only because of the confidence that I got from the car despite such road conditions.

I messaged another friend in Seattle who drives a Forester that car doesn’t feel powerful so he advised me to slot it in Sports Mode. After searching for it a bit, drove it in Sports mode but, except for keeping the gear linger in higher gears for longer, the car didn’t feel any different.

In short, Subaru Forester is an excellent car for bad road conditions but, otherwise it's a decent and above average car from an overall driving experience perspective.

[graaja]

Moving thread from Assembly Line to Travelogues. Thank you so much for sharing this awesome travelogue.

[AKTransAM]

Originally Posted by mobike008

You see, a couple of Texas can easily fit into Alaska.

Yup! I figured most people knew that this is the largest state, but I guess not! I'm glad you enjoyed your visit. Fairbanks is not my favorite place in the state, but looks like you had a great time! You'll have to visit other parts of the state as well in the future .

[mobike008]

Originally Posted by AKTransAM

Yup! I figured most people knew that this is the largest state, but I guess not! I'm glad you enjoyed your visit. Fairbanks is not my favorite place in the state, but looks like you had a great time! You'll have to visit other parts of the state as well in the future.

Unfortunately, it's a shame that Alaska is never in the radar for anyone except when people want to travel to this beautiful state.

Iam sure 9/10 people (including me and Crackhead ) don't know that it's the biggest state in America.

I loved the visit and the state and enjoyed the pristine beauty and wilderness that Alaska has to offer. Being my first visit, I didn't know what to expect.

Hopefully, we may have an even better time when we visit the souther part (Anchorage, Juneau etc.).

[CrackedHead]

Not being much of a travelogue person myself, I've never found myself wanting to write up my trips. I've got to thank Mobike008 for the persistent reminders to come here to post. This was my third trip to AK and all of them have been during the winter.

Having explored Anchorage, Fairbanks and everything in between on the two previous trips, my focus was on driving north to the Dolton highway and possibly as far as the Artic Circle and the town of Coldfoot, AK. That plan was quickly put to rest once we saw our Turo host frown at the idea (I bet he expected to see his precious Subaru in bits on the back of a flatbed after we were done playing frontier explorers). So the plan was quickly downgraded to taking a picture at the Dolton Highway sign.

Originally Posted by AKTransAM

Yup! I figured most people knew that this is the largest state, but I guess not! I'm glad you enjoyed your visit. Fairbanks is not my favorite place in the state, but looks like you had a great time! You'll have to visit other parts of the state as well in the future

Yes, TX is just the largest in the contiguous U.S. - seems to have gotten lost over dinner . It was good to learn that we have a BHPian in AK and Mendenhall Ice Caves is next on our list so I'm sure this visit shall materialize soon.

[manaslu@2028]

Originally Posted by mobike008

Day 2 (Saturday, November 4th, 2023)

Like many things that I got to know for the first time, till this visit, I was not even aware that Mt. Denali (20,500 feet elevation) is the tallest mountain in North America. Infact, some blogs say it’s taller than Everest (28,000 feet elevation) from a different perspective. Some weird explanation given:

Mt. Everest Base camp is at ~ 8,000 feet while Mt. Denali base camp is at just 2,000 feet. By some strange calculations, Denali’s summit is higher than Mt. Everest.

Ridiculous & Funny, isn’t it?

There are many ways to measure a mountain's height. Everest is the highest when measured from sea level. But if you consider the base of a mountain i.e., the actual location on land from where you start climbing, then Denali is highest. By this calculation, Mount Everest's height from base to summit, or its vertical rise is ~11,500 feet. While Mount Denali's vertical rise is 18,000 feet

Fun fact: There is another mountain, Mauna Kea in Hawaii which is even taller than Denali with an elevation of 33,500 feet from base to peak. But most of it is under water. Technically, its the tallest mountain measured base to peak

Also, Small correction: Everest Base camp is at ~17,600 feet not at 8000 feet. Its peak is at ~29000 feet. Plan a trek to it. Its equal parts beautiful as Denali National park if not more.

Wonderful pictures. Enjoyed as if i was there. Thanks and Cheers!!