Index
Day 1 - Northern Lights
Day 2 - Chena Hot Springs
Day 3 - Castner Glacier
Day 4 - Downtown Fairbanks
Day 5 - Return
Alaska
Boring day of work means indulging in the hotel breakfast (which actually had some hot food offerings), a quick break at lunch for a Costco run and a walking-distance restaurant, and then in the evening a bit of urban exploration around downtown.
Big Daddy's BBQ did some burnt ends that were deemed acceptable by the Texan, their collard greens were actually pretty good, but their pork ribs looked and tasted like improperly cooked, boiled mess. Gross.
The evening walk around downtown revealed a tiny bit of character with a random mural, a stop by the World War II memorial and the arch of antlers, and an ordinary but decent enough hot chocolate at McCafferty's. Dinner at the hotel restaurant, Lavelle's, resulted in fresh halibut but was otherwise unimpressive-- both in terms of COVID-19 safety as well as the menu. Wine list was advertised as the best in Fairbanks, but it looked like something you could compile from Total Wine and BevMo.
Made one more half-hearted effort to see the aurora borealis over at Chena Lake (near North Pole), but clouds around 11pm to midnight thwarted things, and stamina for yet late night wasn't in the cards. According to Ants, who checked, tourists who stayed til 4am reported the northern lights directly overhead that night, tho.