Is it really worth going to Fairbanks ?

[Jacqueline]

I can see that there is much to see and do in Talketna, Denali, Steward, Skagway, ISP, etc, but am not quite sure if the stay in Fairbanks is just one of those hookey stops.

Any opinions ?

AS you might guess I would like to go back to AK next summer. It will be 4 years since our last trip...

[Yukon]

It depends on what your interests are and how much time you have. However, I think that Fairbanks would rank pretty low on most people's lists of must-see towns. Having said that, the Riverboat Discovery is one of the most professional (and to a large degree unique) tours in Alaska and the UAF Museum is one of the best small museums anywhere, but I consider those to be more things to do if you have to be in Fairbanks rather than reasons to go there. I say that because most people go to Alaska primarily to see wilderness and wildlife, not "town attractions".

 

Murray

[Budget Queen]

With TIME, Fairbanks is a favorite of mine and I always find plenty to do. Lots of hidden gems and the jumping off point for some great northern flights. BUT again- you need time as you do in all of Alaska- with a week, your list will about make it without Fairbanks- for clairfication it's Seward. Now my min. time is 2 weeks for Alaska trips. Allow plenty of time for activities and transit. I like a 2 week loop- Anchorage- Fairbanks-Valdez.

[Hellann]

Hi! Also, just down the highway is North Pole. It has Santa Claus house (giftshop) :) . If you are looking for good eats go to the Turtle Club.

[Genessa]

I especially enjoyed the museum at the University.

 

It combines the natural history of Alaska with the cultural and definitely added to my appreciation of our trip through the rest of Alaska.

 

The airplane museum was also fascinating and we enjoyed chatting with the young people working at Pioneerland/Alaskaland.

 

But, if time is limited, I would probably skip Fairbanks.

[ruvidu]

This was our first time to visit Alaska and Fairbanks was our first stop. We were really impressed with the locals who seemed genuinely glad to see us and treated us so.

We enjoyed the El Dorado Gold Mine tour that Princess provided for us. Sure, it was a bit hokey but so is all of Disney World, another favorite of ours. We learned a lot and even found some gold.

The riverboat, Discovery, was a fun afternoon trip as well. We saw things we would never see in SC and that was the gist of the entire trip. The free coffee and donuts were great too.

 

If you have to choose between Denali and Fairbanks for time constraints, definatly choose Demali but if you have time for both it is a good thing.

Russ

[stephenandrew]

We did a land tour prior to our cruise this past summer and had two nights in Fairbanks. We also took the Discovery Riverboat Cruise and the Gold Mining Expeditions. We had an option to give up one night in Fairbanks and spend an extra night at eiter Princess' Denali or McKinley Lodge. In retrospect, I would have rather done the later for the basic reason Yukon outlined in his repsonse above---we came to see wild life, and there was more of it outside of Fairbanks. There were also some pretty interesting looking excursions that I would have prefered to take at Denali and McKinley that we had to skip becasue of lack of time. If you only have four days, I would definitly recommend skipping Fairbanks; on the other hand, if you have a week, then I think Fairbanks might be worth 2 nites.

[bonsai1]

When we were in Healy for a couple of nights we had thought we would drive over to Fairbanks, but the smoke was so bad where we were and it was coming from the Fairbanks area that we decided to just to explore the park another day.

[Budget Queen]

Another point- there is a big difference in seeing Fairbanks with a cruisetour and on your own. Fairbanks requires a car and you see little without one. Most all the cruisetours include the boat and gold dredge tours. These are big tourist attractions that are excellent, but outside of those Fairbanks has plenty of other attractions in and around the area.

[General Max]

We spent one night in Fairbanks and that was enough. It just happened to be the first night of a cruisetour and we left at 7:30 the following morning.

 

General Max

[hooked-on-travel]

Fairbanks isn't worth a special trip, but one of the highlights, if you're there anyway, is the pipeline exhibit north of town. But I'm a self-admitted enginerd.

[StillLooking4Adventure]

One excellent reason to go to Fairbanks is if you want to do a one way drive from Fairbanks to Seward or Anchorage. We flew into Anchorage to begin our Alaskan adventure last summer. We rented a car one way from Hertz. We did the Discovery Riverboat and the El Dorado Gold Mine. We enjoyed both very much. We then drove our rental SUV from Fairbanks to Denali (2 nights) to Talkeetna (2 nights) to the Matsanuka Glacier to Achorage (2 nights) and dropped the car off in Seward after spending one night.