Arctic Circle

I arrived in Fairbanks, but there really wasn't much to see in town. So, I decided to drive up north to the Arctic Circle, which was only 200 miles away. The first 85 miles from Fairbanks was on a very nicely paved road (Hwy 2) and connected me to the Dalton Highway.



The Arctic Circle lie 115 miles up on this "highway", the first 80 miles or so unpaved. When I say "unpaved" what I really mean is "hell". I took my Jeep through the most punishing road conditions yet on the trip. It was advised to take along 2 spare tires with you. The memory of being stuck with a flat in Telegraph Creek reminded me that my tires were not in the best of shape.



Above is a shot of the "war zone" that I had to pass. They were doing construction on a 12 mile stretch that required an escort vehicle in front to guide the cars through. I had to wait 30 minutes on the way back because I had just missed the previous line of cars going through.

Once cool thing along the entire length of the road was the Alaskan pipeline, pictured below:



It wound its way over hill and dale, and sometimes dissapeared through the hills. The oil enters the pipeline 300 miles north of here at the coast in a town called Barow. The oil is 180 degrees F as it enters the pipe and cools along the way. The pipeline is suspended over the ground so as not to thaw it and has radiators every few feet to dissapate the heat. The oil continues another 500 miles to the southern coast, to Valdez. Pretty impressive!

Anyway, after 60 miles of hellish road, I finally made it to the Arctic Circle. Not much there, except rolling tundra and this sign:



The Jeep took quite a beating, but luckily, no flat tires!