Friday, 22 June 2018 – Alaska Pipeline and Pioneer Park

The Alaskan Pipeline
Lunch at Banks Brewery. Really nice.
The small Pioneer Air Museum
The even smaller Pioneer Rail Museum
Maverick enjoying the Chena River at our RV Park

For the first time in a while we didn’t pack up and travel. Not that traveling is hard, we like it. That said, it is nice to take it easy for a change. After bumming around the coach this morning we headed out to explore. It is cooler and rainy today with a temperature of 59 deg F this morning and an expected high of 70. First we headed by an RV supply store to see if they had a replacement cabinet latch for one that recently broke. They did not.

Next we took the highway a short way out of town to the official viewpoint of the Alaska Pipeline. The summer before college in 1982 I had a job offer to work the pipeline and have always wondered how my life would have been different if I had accepted. After the pipeline we headed to lunch at Banks Brewery. Banks is a very nice and modern lunch place. The sandwich was excellent and we really enjoyed the meal. After lunch we dropped by Home Depot and bought a simple cabinet latch. We decided to go to the Pioneer Air Museum. It turns out the museum is part of the larger Pioneer Park in Fairbanks. Pioneer Park appears to be one of the major parks in Fairbanks. It contains playgrounds, the air museum, a railroad museum, and a train ride. We paid $4 each to view the air museum. It has some interesting history but is pretty small. While here we tried the railroad museum. Like the air museum it is pretty small with only one old steam engine, but its free.