DAY 58 JULY 14 RETURN TO FAIRBANKS

Day 58. We woke up early so we wouldn't miss our plane. Rev. Mardow Solomon picked us up and took us to the airport. Our flight, scheduled to leave at 8:50 a.m., actually left about 9:20 a.m. The flight itself was uneventful except for the fact that the skies of the Alaskan interior are full of smoke from all the forest fires. We did not see the ground until we were on our descent into Fairbanks. Rev. Anna Frank met us at the terminal and surprised us with an invitation to stay in the upstairs apartment over the Diocese office. We gladly accepted as our original plan was to tent camp. The balance of the day was spent getting the tires rotated, shopping for supplies for the return trip, and doing some souvenir shopping. This blog is being generated from the Fairbanks public library. I feel like I'm in a race car compared to the internet speed in Fort Yukon. We have modified our plans. Instead of spending two nights in Fairbanks and leaving on Thursday, we're going to spend only one night. We should be in Tok, Alaska, tomorrow night, and then drive on the Dawson City in the Yukon Territory on Thursday. We plan to pan for gold in Dawson City, which was the destination of so many prospectors back in 1898 when the Klondike gold rush was on. Blog updates may not be daily for the return trip since we will need to find public libraries along the way to do the updates. We'll do the best we can. We should be back in St. Louis in about three weeks.