Ice Ice Baby

I apologize for the title. I couldn’t help it…

Day 10, 10:08AM Alaska Time (1 hour later than PST) – We completed our last TSD this morning in Fairfax, Alaska. The last two nights were absolute luxury for this trip. We stayed two nights at the Pike’s Waterfront Lodge, a resort with a massive lobby that resembles Cabela’s (a hunting and fishing superstore) in Georgia—there are large stuffed animals mounted to every free wall. But while Cabela’s has plenty of deer, Pike’s has a musk ox and a polar bear.

Two nights ago, Wednesday, we finished our second TSD at Tok Junction at 5:30PM with 250 miles left to drive that evening. Josh and I got about 18 miles down the road when we heard #21 on the radio asking Sweep to come help car #30, a Toyota Land Cruiser with two guys from CO and WA. The front CV boots had blown off, likely somewhere on Dempster. Josh’s immediate response was to turn the car around and head back to Tok Junction, to help out. I asked him how long this would take to fix and Josh said, “Oh, about an hour and a half.” I sighed, calculating our projected late arrival time, but this is one of the reasons I’m with this guy. He does the right thing and I’m proud of him.

Timeout: Car #37, a red Porsche, just passed us with its navigator sticking his head out with a clown (Pennywise) mask on. “That was awesome and terrifying,” someone else said on the radio. I wish we could keep traveling with these cut ups.

When we got there, Matt and Trevor slid out from underneath the Land Cruiser, and actually had their jackets on. (Being from Manitoba, they are frequently outside in the -20 degree air in sweatshirts and beanies. If they are wearing their parkas, it’s really cold out.) Josh brought out his toolbox and produced vice grip plyers, which the boys used to finagle bands around the CV boots—a temporary fix. It was done in less than 20 minutes and we all headed out together, arriving in town by 10PM. The Land Cruiser made it to Fairfax, but both bands popped off somewhere on the way.

Yesterday was the first day we have been able to sleep in and we slept ‘til a blissful 7:30AM. Our bodies are just too used to getting up by 6 to sleep much later. We had the option of going back up past the Arctic Circle (a 517-mile trip) or to the Chena hot springs (a 131-mile trip). Josh had driven 750 miles on Tuesday, from Inuvik to Whitehorse, and 610 miles Wednesday, Whitehorse to Fairfax. We opted for the hot springs. I don’t know yet if a single car went back to the Arctic Circle. This was the first and only rest day of our trip.

Josh and I saw another female moose on the way up the hill to the springs and in pulling into the parking lot, one of our friends (Shane from black Jeeper #35) came running through the parking lot in wet swim trunks and flip flops to grab his waterproof Go-Pro. Mind you, it’s -37 degrees Fahrenheit out! When I saw him inside, he told me that the plastic flip flops had frozen to his feet and he had to wait for them to thaw so he could take them off, which was very painful.

Entering the hot springs, is like instant relief and healing. For so many days, we have been in and out of shocking cold and dry indoor heat and sitting for hours and hours on end.  I don’t think we realized how exhausted we were until we sunk into the warm waters, nature’s version of a loving hug. The steam from the main pool was so thick, you can barely see five feet in front of you and I lost Josh more than once.

I couldn’t bring my phone into the hot springs, but Shane and several others snapped some of (what I’m hoping are) the funniest shots of our trip. There was a sprinkler spraying cool water overhead and when it hit my hair, the drops would instantly turn into snowflakes. Our hair, eyebrows and eyelashes soon had frosted tips. We are like those snow monkeys in Japan and probably just as content, if not more so.

Afterwards, we had lunch at the resort’s restaurant with Matt and Trevor and I recognized our waitress’s NY accent. She was from the Bronx and had relocated to Key West after a tough divorce. She came to Fairfax, AK soon after because, “Key West wasn’t far away enough rom he ex in New York.” I would have loved to hear more detail about that story.

We visited an ice museum next door, which was opened in and has some of the same sculptures from 2005. The room is warmer than outside. There is a castle with two knights on horseback jousting. An igloo with a xylophone you can play inside. There are gargoyles and animals carved in ice, and a mask that won the National Ice Sculpture Awards years ago, though we were told its headdress has since deteriorated. There’s an alter where the two ice sculptors who created the entire museum, married each other years ago. My favorite pieces had sunflowers and roses suspended inside, reminiscent of the rose in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast. The ice tour concludes with the guide pouring drinking into ice martini glasses at a bar carved of…you guessed it…ice. Each glass takes 7 seconds each to carve and you get to take them home. Makes sense they would give them away, as an ice glass would be difficult to run through a dishwasher.

You can rent out an ice hotel room in the back of the museum for $600 a night. The guide told us that it comes with a second room at the regular Chena Hot Springs Resort because there is no running water in the museum and guests usually get a little bored around 1am and want to go sleep in a real bed.

Josh and I went back to the room, where I did a load of bathtub laundry, hoping to send Josh off with enough clean clothes to last him 8 or 9 more days until he’s home. We had a quiet dinner and turned in early. This was the day we needed to end strong and enjoy our last travel day to Anchorage. Meanwhile, our buddies Matt and Trevor, both tracked down a tattoo parlor to have the Alcan5000 2020 emblem permanently impeded on each of their calves. Since they spent most of it with us, I take a small piece of that as a compliment.

This morning we barely made it to the TSD. The directions in our rally book were off, but thankfully Google Maps works in Fairfax so we were able to get to the start and set up the rally computer in time. My heart was already beating hard when we took off, but I think we finished our last TSD communicating well and, by my calculations, only 4 seconds early.

We are driving through crisp white mountains on Highway 3 towards Anchorage, with only 180 miles to go. This is the second time in my life that I wish we had farther to drive. The first time was when Josh and I drove my car across the country and we entered the state of Georgia. As happy as I was to get to my new home with him, I wanted more time on the road together. I feel similarly now. That has to be a strong testament.