what to do in Fairbanks, any ideas?

11 days till our trip and our Delta flight got cancelled. we are now getting a day earlier than anticipated, so it all worked out in the end! Now, what do we do with a whole day in Fairbanks at the Princess Lodge? Is there a taxi or shuttle going into Fairbanks? once in Fairbanks, what is there to see, do, eat? We are kind of excited now with a day including Fairbanks.

Would you be open to renting a car for the day?

Would you be open to renting a car for the day?

At this point, no. just want to go into town, hang out, have a beer some food, see what is around and come back to try to get the Golden Heart wine experience rebooked for the evening....(Princess had to cancel it when our flight was getting in late, before we added the extra day.

Did you look thru the town Web site or visitor guide?

A link is in the attached thread:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2347988&highlight=resources

Just Curious.....why did the flight get cancelled?

Enjoy your extra day!

Just Curious.....why did the flight get cancelled?

 

Enjoy your extra day!

Delta did away with the flight from Dallas to Salt Lake, to Seattle. Seattle to Fairbanks they kept, but we could not get to Seattle to make that flight from Dallas.

Did you look thru the town Web site or visitor guide?

A link is in the attached thread:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2347988&highlight=resources

I have been looking but I did not see much? Maybe we should just relax and spend time at the Lodge? We have excursions booked the rest of the days, just not that day.

http://www.explorefairbanks.com

Frankly a car is "necessary" here in my opinion. It's a big spread out area, and no, nice "Main Street" like you may be thinking?

This could be an option to take advantage, if you choose to? Loads I could occupy my time with.

Sounds like you'll be just fine with you last comment. :) :) Maybe do a tripadvisor search for the better eateries?

At this point, no. just want to go into town, hang out, have a beer some food, see what is around and come back to try to get the Golden Heart wine experience rebooked for the evening....(Princess had to cancel it when our flight was getting in late, before we added the extra day.

You need to rent a car in Fairbanks. Everything worth seeing is spread out. There is not a good public transit system. Restaurants and bars are spread out. There is really no centralized downtown core and the places that are worth visiting are not in the core anyway. So what you are going to end up doing is spending you whole unexpected day in Fairbanks sitting in your hotel room watching TV.

How much is the cruise costing you? What would a 1 day car rental cost? What percentage of the total cruise cost would the car rental be?

Go onto TripAdvisor for Fairbanks - https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attractions-g60826-Activities-Fairbanks_Alaska.html - or get a guide book on AK out of your library and check on all the things there are to see in Fairbanks that you will not get to see because you are too frugal to rent a car. Do what you want but it makes no sense to me.

DON

You need to rent a car in Fairbanks. Everything worth seeing is spread out. There is not a good public transit system. Restaurants and bars are spread out. There is really no centralized downtown core and the places that are worth visiting are not in the core anyway. So what you are going to end up doing is spending you whole unexpected day in Fairbanks sitting in your hotel room watching TV.

 

How much is the cruise costing you? What would a 1 day car rental cost? What percentage of the total cruise cost would the car rental be?

 

Go onto TripAdvisor for Fairbanks - https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attractions-g60826-Activities-Fairbanks_Alaska.html - or get a guide book on AK out of your library and check on all the things there are to see in Fairbanks that you will not get to see because you are too frugal to rent a car. Do what you want but it makes no sense to me.

 

DON

I did check/Google, all the sites and trip advisors, and looks like all the things worth doing, we are doing, only the following 8 days. We are not the type of people that will sit and watch TV, LOL that was funny.

it is not the cost of renting a car, I just don't want to drive, do that enough in Dallas. We can always change our minds and do that though. Hike, drink, sit by a river and have a drink while looking at nature, is what I think we may do at the Lodge, (since we won't be missing much by going in town). We have 8 full days of excursions planned, followed by 7 cruise days filled with excursions and 2 days in Vancouver also filled with excursions, so a day of chilling is sounding pretty good. We do have a dinner planned that night.

You need to rent a car in Fairbanks. Everything worth seeing is spread out. There is not a good public transit system. Restaurants and bars are spread out. There is really no centralized downtown core and the places that are worth visiting are not in the core anyway. So what you are going to end up doing is spending you whole unexpected day in Fairbanks sitting in your hotel room watching TV.

 

How much is the cruise costing you? What would a 1 day car rental cost? What percentage of the total cruise cost would the car rental be?

 

Go onto TripAdvisor for Fairbanks - https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attractions-g60826-Activities-Fairbanks_Alaska.html - or get a guide book on AK out of your library and check on all the things there are to see in Fairbanks that you will not get to see because you are too frugal to rent a car. Do what you want but it makes no sense to me.

 

DON

Forgot to mention the Howling Dog Saloon - https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g780604-d4833230-Reviews-Howling_Dog_Saloon-Fox_Alaska.html - if you like good rock and roll and especially if you like great blues music. We love the place when we drove out there on one of our stays in Fairbanks.

DON

www.explorefairbanks.com

 

Frankly a car is "necessary" here in my opinion. It's a big spread out area, and no, nice "Main Street" like you may be thinking?

 

This could be an option to take advantage, if you choose to? Loads I could occupy my time with.

 

Sounds like you'll be just fine with you last comment. :) :) Maybe do a tripadvisor search for the better eateries?

have been reading all afternoon and looks like you are right, no main street like I was thinking. What about museums? Have you been to any of them? I will continue reading, thanks for the link.

Forgot to mention the Howling Dog Saloon - https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g780604-d4833230-Reviews-Howling_Dog_Saloon-Fox_Alaska.html - if you like good rock and roll and especially if you like great blues music. We love the place when we drove out there on one of our stays in Fairbanks.

 

DON

Husband does like the blues...........actually he likes a lot of different music and we like beer, thanks!

As someone who lives in Fairbanks I also think the decision to not rent a car for the day is a major mistake. While Fairbanks is the second largest community in the state it is very spread out. And our economy is not driven by the tourist industry as many of the SE Alaska communities, so you won't find any Diamonds International stores or zip-lining opportunities. The Fairbanks Princess is located on the outskirts of Fairbanks very close to the airport.

Since the OP has stated that they "did not see much" that seemed to be of interest I am hesitant to provide any recommendations. But if they do rent a car and are interested in seeing moose I would suggest driving the Chena Hot Springs road to the resort; while the first 20 miles are along subdivisions the road then enters the large state recreation area, and anyone who drives through the rec area and doesn't see a moose is just clueless as what to look for.

Also, if the OP has a vehicle another idea for a day would be to visit the Morris Thompson Cultural Center before proceeding to the Fountainhead Antique Auto Museum with a possible visit to the Museum of the North later in the day. If the OP is visiting on either a Wednesday or Saturday then it would be easy to stop at the Farmer's Market on College road after the Auto Museum.

If the OP persists in not renting a car for the day and also has any interest in learning about our state then they could consider taking a taxi to the Museum of the North (which is relatively close to the Fairbanks Princess).

have been reading all afternoon and looks like you are right, no main street like I was thinking. What about museums? Have you been to any of them? I will continue reading, thanks for the link.

Fairbanks is NOT a large town as you've noted. :D It's going to be tough to do a lot without a car. There's a bicycle share called Fairbikes that you might look into, but even then I'm unsure it'd do a lot.

Univ of Alaska, Fairbanks has the Museum of the North that's pretty nice. Not huge, it took me a couple hours to go through most of it, so figure a half day at most.

There's an Ice Museum "downtown" but I didn't visit.

Unsure if it interests you but it does supposedly have the largest Fred's in the nation. We drove by but didn't visit.

Chena Hot Springs Resort is interesting, but it's a pretty good drive out of town. Near there is the Angel Rocks hiking trail that is very pretty;be bear smart on that trail though.

Also consider a visit to The Santa Claus House at North Pole, Alaska a few miles east of Fairbanks to get a big dose of kitch. ;) They have forms you can fill out to have a letter sent to someone from Santa and postmarked from North Pole AK.

FWIW we enjoyed the Thai House restaurant for dinner one night, its on 5th ave.

About 5 miles from your hotel so an easy cab ride:

http://www.morristhompsoncenter.org

Lovely grounds, interesting exhibits and displays. The photo opportunity at the antler arch is worth the trip in itself. Pioneer Park is also closeby, maybe 3 miles.

Doing great you all.............Maybe we will be renting a car after all. Great suggestions, keep them coming.

I did check/Google, all the sites and trip advisors, and looks like all the things worth doing, we are doing, only the following 8 days. We are not the type of people that will sit and watch TV, LOL that was funny.

 

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Fairbanks is unique, there is no way you are doing the activities that are available there, elsewhere, since I'm assuming you are not 8 days in Fairbanks? Same with all of Alaska. Each area is very different from all the others. (unless you are taking about shopping??)

There are museums, The one at Fairbanks U, Museum of the North, is excellent. Pioneer Park is historic. The Public Lands has informative exhibits, not sure if the Ice Museum is still open?

Fairbanks is unique, there is no way you are doing the activities that are available there, elsewhere, since I'm assuming you are not 8 days in Fairbanks? Same with all of Alaska. Each area is very different from all the others. (unless you are taking about shopping??)

 

There are museums, The one at Fairbanks U, Museum of the North, is excellent. Pioneer Park is historic. The Public Lands has informative exhibits, not sure if the Ice Museum is still open?

Correct, not shopping and only 3 nights at the Lodge in Fairbanks, the other 2 days there are full. so, if we rented a car, where would you go? Museums, photo opts, wild life, hiking?

You may want to check with the lodge to see if they still have a shuttle. We stayed at the Bear Lodge last year on our cruise tour and some of group was dropped off at the Princess Lodge first. They announced that a shuttle was available at the hotel. There is a wonderful antique car museum out by the Bear Lodge and the Salmon Bake at the Pioneer Village is very good and there is a fun show in the evening.

If the hotel still has the shuttle, I think you can manage just fine with that.

You all are awesome on information. Got home from work and husband wants to rent a car. He agrees Fairbanks does not offer enough to not consider other options. So we will be renting.

Where what how do we rent? Where should we go? So excited.

Enterprise, National, and I think Alamo all serve the Fairbanks airport. We got our car from Enterprise using points I had from business travel rentals.

Princess may put you up at the Wedgewood Resort. It has a old car museum and nice grounds. There is a great pizza place nearby. Cannot remember the name. Check your detailed itinerary, if you don't go to the gold dredge, it's worth a visit. Same with the Riverboat. Fairbanks is a delightful small town, big for Alaska but still.

Someone just sent me this. Thought I would share

If you are at the Princess Lodge they have a "same day rental" deal with Avis who will bring the car to you. We went to the North Pole to see Santa & spend time with his reindeer (very cool!) and the rest of the day @ the Museum of the North (small but extremely well done) @ the U of AK Fairbanks. As a bonus we stopped at the grocery store to pick up fruit, breakfast food & snacks as we found the lodge meals to be quite pricey. Enjoy!

To share what we are doing in May. We're flying in the night before we are due for the cruise tour (two days before we start 'touring'), renting a car at the airport, shop for necessities, grab dinner somewhere (Pioneer Park?) and call it a night.

Next day, drive to Chena Hot Springs, then Museum of the North, return car to the airport, taking the shuttle back to the lodge.

I've done this tour a few years ago and regretted not being able to explore a bit.

Whatever you do, you'll have a blast!