Alaska’s second largest city, Hub of the Interior, Gateway to the Bush, the Golden Heart City – call it what you will, Fairbanks is as diverse and distinct as any place in Alaska. Officially the city of Fairbanks has 30,367 residents but the Fairbanks North Star Borough, which surrounds the city limits and includes bedroom communities like Ester and North Pole, has a population of almost 100,000, making this region the second largest population settlement in Alaska.
Fairbanks is one of Alaska’s best year-round destinations, and visitors will find plenty to do whether they come for the summer warmth and long days or in winter, when spectacular northern lights displays color the night sky. A wide range of activities are available, including shopping the many art galleries filled with pottery, painting, textiles and Alaska Native art and jewelry; rafting or kayaking the meandering Chena River as it winds through town; golfing; fishing; snowmobiling; enjoying tours and attractions like Pioneer Park that celebrate the town’s gold history and rough-and-tumble beginnings; cross-country and Alpine skiing; wildlife viewing; soaking in hot springs; or even enjoying a locally brewed beer.
Spread over 32-square miles with the Alaska Range and some of the best views of Mount McKinley visible to the south and the White Mountains to the north, Fairbanks sits at the confluence of the Richardson Highway, George Parks Highway, Steese Highway, and Elliott Highway, indeed the hub of a wheel connecting the Interior to Anchorage, Canada, and the lower 48 states. Downtown Fairbanks is centered around Golden Heart Plaza with the Chena River flowing through the city.
The city is known for its seasonal temperature extremes. Average January temperatures range from minus 19 to minus 2 degrees and average July temperatures range from 53 to 72 degrees, while temperatures have been recorded as low as 62 below zero in mid-winter and as high as 96 degrees in summer. These warm, pleasant summer days are also long – Fairbanks enjoys more than 22 hours of daylight when the solstice arrives on June 21. In Fairbanks they play semi-pro baseball games at midnight without the aid of artificial lights and golfers can hit the links even later.
Fairbanks is also home to the original campus of University of Alaska. Incorporated in 1917 as the Alaska Agricultural College and School of Mines and featuring six students its first year, University of Alaska Fairbanks now has more than 9,800 students. In the middle of the campus is the University of Alaska Museum of the North, which recently doubled its size with a $42 million expansion that further enhanced its reputation as the finest museum in the state.
For many, Fairbanks is a gateway for trips further into Interior and wilderness adventures in Arctic Alaska. The city is ideally located to serve as a hub for travel to the Brooks Range and Arctic Coastal Plain and to communities such as Fort Yukon, Coldfoot, Bettles, Anaktuvuk Pass and Nome. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is easily accessible by small plane, and any trip up the famous Dalton Highway, also known as the North Slope Haul Road, to Prudhoe Bay begins in Fairbanks. The best place to start any such side trip is at the city’s new Morris Thomson Cultural and Visitor Center. The $29 million center houses the Fairbanks Convention & Visitors Bureau and the Alaska Public Lands Information Center, a resource for state recreation areas, national parks and refuges. The center also features cultural exhibits, displays and a theater.
Fairbanks dates back to 1901 and was the result of E.T. Barnette cruising up the Tanana River on the SS Lavelle Young with 130 tons of supplies for the Tanacross goldfields. The next year an Italian prospector named Felix Pedro struck gold 12 miles to the north and Barnette’s trading post became a boomtown with hordes of miners stampeding into the area.
The construction of the Alaska Railroad, the Alaska Highway and the trans-Alaska oil pipeline all contributed greatly to the growth of Fairbanks, but this city still has a golden heart, as the nearby Fort Knox Gold Mine is Alaska’s largest. Visitors are also swept up by gold fever. The city’s most famous dredge, Gold Dredge No. 8, recovered more than 7 million ounces of the precious metal from 1928 to 1959, and today is the most viewed dredge in the state.
Nearby recreational opportunities include hiking, dog mushing and skiing in the White Mountains National Recreation Area, which has public-use cabins available for rent year-round. Chena River State Recreation Area, located along Chena Hot Springs Road, is a great place to see moose or launch a canoe, kayak or raft for a longer float down the Chena River into Fairbanks. The Angel Rocks Trailhead is located in the Chena River State Recreation Area, and an eight-mile hike leads to nearby Chena Hot Springs Resort, where tired hikers can soak their bones in the soothing hot springs pools.