Riverboat Discovery

 

What a pleasant day we had aboard the Riverboat Discovery in Fairbanks, Alaska. We took the 3 hour tour with about 400+ people on a perfect warm sunny day. The thermometer reached 91 degrees in the truck as we were leaving, the seats in the shade were in demand. There was a small concession on the boat that was amazing. A Bud Light, Diet Coke, and a bottle of water for $4.50. Unheard of in a tourist trap.

 We saw a demonstration of a float plane. He took off and landed right next to our boat 2 times, and we got a nice history lesson about flying in Alaska over the years from the pilot.

This is the home and kennels of the late four-time Iditarod winner Susan Butcher. The talk is given by Susan's daughter and is very interesting.
 We learned mostly about training puppies to become sled dogs. There was a nice demonstration involving the dogs pulling the 4 wheeler above, instead of a sled for obvious reasons. They also had another woman that had won the Iditarod with some of her dogs. If you don't think the dog breeding and training is a big business, you would be mistaken.

At one point they trotted out a small herd of reindeer. This boat ride was different in that we stayed mostly on the boat and things happened on the shore, as if the owners of the boat owned a bunch of property on the river.

 A fish wheel in the Chena Village, a stopping point on the boat ride. We all got off and listened to a couple of native high school kids talk about their culture. It was very informative and educational. The kids did an excellent job and you could tell they were very proud of their heritage. One of the girls working at the fish camp portion of the village, gutted and filleted a Chum Salmon in about 3 minutes, showing everyone how they prepared it to be dried, smoked and prepared to feed the dogs. The Indians saved the King and Silver Salmon for the people.

 Fortunately for us, they had a second boat they put all the cruise ship land tour people on. There had to be 8 buses full of tourists all filing along like a heard. Lots of confused, picture taking, people that had been confined to a bus for the last 7 days. UGH.

 

On the return they served smoked salmon dip on crackers. It was pretty yummy.

They were selling small cans of smoked salmon for $12.99 a can slightly larger than a can of tuna.

 Two huge moose. They held very still during the picture. LOL

We finished the day at the Silver Gulch Brewery, one of Triple D's stops in Fairbanks. Ran into a guy and his wife at the bar that writes several RV blogs. We swapped stories, had a few beers, some beer cheese soup, and called it a day.

 

91 degrees, crazy