The bed at the Extended Stay was less than great. We both woke up Monday with hurting backs. We slept in for a while, then went out and had some breakfast. At Taco Bell. Well, we did get up late, and Taco Bell is something Samara really misses in Dillingham. After that, we drove around a bit and found a tattoo shop and salon right next to each other. Samara wanted me to get a haircut, so we stopped in there first. Since it was going to be a fifteen minute wait, we went next door and spoke to the guys at the tattoo shop. One of the guys there really admired my sleeve--Scott should be proud. He said it was the best work he'd seen from outside his shop.
Pretty soon we went back over to the salon and I got my hair buzzed down for summer. Samara likes it short, and I like Samara, so it's a pretty good haircut, I guess.
Next activity for the day was a little canoeing down the Chena River. Chena River runs through downtown Fairbanks. We rented a canoe near Pioneer Park and paddled downstream to the Pump House restaurant, where the canoe rental folks picked us up. They said it would take at least two hours, but we were done in about an hour and a half. I guess we're fast paddlers.
Here's some pictures from our canoeing trip.
(Samara would probably want me to note that her swimsuit in this picture is covering her lower back--that's not her butt. She seemed to be displeased with this picture when I took it.)
Since Samara was in the front of the canoe, she got stuck in most of the pictures. But I was there too!
We saw a sternwheel boat on the river.
And a float plane took over from the river and flew right over us.
After we did the canoeing thing, we decided to take a trip to Chena Hot Springs. This is about 60 miles up the road, through the Chena State Recreation Area. There's a little resort there that has a hot springs. It costs $10 to swim all day. The drive was probably the nicest part.
In fact, as we were driving through the Recreation Area, I saw my first up-close moose! It was on the left side of the road, just grazing, and I saw some brown movement and slowed the car down. It took Samara a minute to get her camera out of her purse, so the best picture I got was of its rear end headed into the woods.
The Chena Hot Springs Resort is at the end of the road. The very end. It seems to cater to the tourist crowd. From the signs, I'd guess mostly Japanese tourists.
We saw some horses tied up when we arrived. I guess you could take a trailriding trip.
As we walked down towards the hot springs, we saw the ice skating pond, too. Guess it's more impressive in the winter.
The hot springs itself was nice. They had an indoor pool, two indoor hot tubs, one outdoor hot tub and a hot spring-fed rock pool. The hot spring pool itself was about 106 degrees. We couldn't stay in it for very long.
We hung out there in the Chena Hot Springs for maybe a hour, and then headed back towards Fairbanks for some dinner. On the way back, we saw some funny road signs.
We called our friend Ricky, who went to college in Fairbanks, and asked him where we should eat for dinner. He recommended Brewster's, but they turned out to be closed for Memorial Day. We went back to the hotel and got out the phone book. We decided we had to try the local barbeque place.
It is advertised as the world's northernmost southern barbeque. I suppose it is. It was pretty good food, as well. For the price, in fact, it couldn't be beat. We had a lot of leftovers to take home with us.
After dinner, we passed on the movie for a second time and did a little more shopping at Fred Meyer. We picked up a DVD to watch in our room. We made it about halfway through the movie before we both decided it was time to just zonk out.
Either the light or the bed was worse the second night. Samara and I both had trouble sleeping, and she was pretty sick during the night. In fact, she didn't feel well at all this morning. We had planned on taking Tuesday to drive down to Denali National Park, but the prospect of two or three hours in the car each way was just too much with Samara feeling bad.
Instead, we started off with a trip to the northernmost Denny's for breakfast. Every Denny's is the same, let me tell you. This one wasn't too great. After that, we checked out our new hotel, the Pike's Landing Lodge. They told us we could check in after three o'clock. So we decided to do a bit more shopping. We got some blackout curtains and dog treats for our friend Saramay. Then we decided that we'd go ahead and watch a movie today. We saw the new Star Trek movie, which was pretty good. Not the best movie ever, mind you, but fairly entertaining.
At that point, it was nearly three, so we went back to our new hotel. They really pissed Samara off, because she was sick, the room still wasn't ready, and they walked off when she tried to ask about switching to a different room. So we took off for another hour and drove around Fairbanks.
At 4, we got back to our new hotel, and Samara talked to the manager. She was really apologetic, which helped Samara's mood a bit. We got our room, which is actually a single-room cabin by the Chena River. It's nice, and the curtains do a much better job of keeping the light out than they did at the Extended Stay motel. I left Samara taking a nap and went out for a stroll.
There's a little pen with baby ducks in it, called the Duck Hotel. They have a pen with a little pond, a little house, and a coin-operated feeder. I had some quarters to feed the ducks, but the machine was empty. I guess someone will feed them.
I took a picture of the river near our hotel.
Tonight we'll probably try eating at Brewster's for dinner, since they should be open. Tomorrow and Thursday, Samara has training all day. I'll probably do some shopping around town and whatever else suits my fancy.
As far as vacations go, this one is so far, so good.
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