So its been two days ..... one day of not much to show for the rest of Vancouver and one day of flying up to Alaska.  So there are a couple of photos of the flight up and arriving in Fairbanks. Its a long way up, Vancouver to Anchorage is three and a half hours, then a quick turn around and back through security, (US again) which is a pain, and then on to the next flight up!

heading back out of Anchorage looking down over Alaska

Fairbanks airport for those of you who think we have fallen off the face of the earth!

and guess what ! McDonalds Fairbanks

 

 

 

So today we hired a car, Rus thought this was a great idea , so we could get around easily as we had a spare day here before we start the tour. I though it was a pain! Hopped in to a "taxi" if you could call it that, some American 4WD truck, with the driver that was straight out of the Alaskan woods, think grandpa from Dukes of Hazzard and there you are! Mind you its all trucks and 4WDs here, as the driver said "usually just 6 feet of snow in the winter, but sometimes its bad and its 9!" right, and " they gravel the road so that's why all the cars have cracked windscreens...... anyway a bit of spit and then we were off ....

 

So after picking up the rental, we headed to North Pole, and to Santa's house. Absolutely truly, its magnetic north on the compass as such. so here are the photos to prove to all you parents that Santa's house really does exist and they do get mail from children there and they do reply (really) and there are reindeer and elves and a workshop ........  

 

 

 

Apparently Santa now takes Visa....

 

 

and then we had a quick look around downtown Fairbanks, which took around 5 minutes (Rus says 5.5 minutes) and then went up to the University of Alaska, which is amazing and went around the museum.

 

looking out towards Denali where  we are headed

the museum

the bit of paper that the university is famous for ....