Summer Adventure 2018 Day 24

The morning began, that is so odd to say! The difference in time zones is wild. Ray wants to still operate on Eastern time while the rest of the world here is on Alaska time, 4 hours earlier. I'm caught somewhere in between.  Anyway, we had breakfast at The Cookie Jar. A small place, not too far from our RV park and the food is good.  We went out to see the Alaska Pipeline at Fox, Alaska on the Steese Highway. There have been couple of changes made to this site since we were here in 2010. A small building and the directions sign post are gone, the pig, used to clean the inside walls of the pipeline, was moved and there is also a new model on display alongside the old one. 

During the afternoon there was a tour of Gold Dredge #8. I asked at the ticket booth if there was a #9 dredge because we had been to dredge before where we ate a meal as the miners would have in  a mess hall, toured the dredge and panned for gold. I was told there are only 8 dredges and this one didn't appear to be the one I remembered. There is no mess hall there, I had no recollection of this entrance that passed directly under the pipeline and this place has a train ride.

When the time came we were permitted to board the train, we went straight to the front car, as the young man who took our tickets had told us the best seats would be there. The conductor,Earl Hughes, met us there and entertained us with his guitar and singing a few familiar songs and some of his original ones while we waited for the other passengers to board. He turned over microphone to George, who was our tour guide, as well as a high school social studies teacher. His presentation was very interesting from how the miners solved the problem of mining the frozen earth, to the dredges being brought in, to a gold panning demonstration and instructions and he finished with a short presentation on the pipeline.

Holding a $75,000 gold nugget.

When the train arrived at the dredge, Ray and I recognized the place. It was the same place I mentioned before. The mess hall is gone and no one used the parking area where we entered before on the tour. The gold panning area was as I remember... with a welcomed improvement, the water is warm.

I know you want to know if we panned for gold...and the answer is yes. Everyone was given a pouch of gravel and a gold pan, then sent to the trough to begin panning.  I remember how cold and miserable my hands were when we panned before, so I appreciated the warm water and ended up with $28.00 worth of gold.

While we were close to North Pole, we went there and to Santa Claus House.

Our dinner was at the restaurant adjacent to the RV park, The Chena Grill. The bacon-wrapped scallops and roasted vegetables were delicious!