Riverboat Discovery

This afternoon we went by bus from the campground to the Riverboat Discovery on the Tanana River.


They had set it up for a sea plane to take off and land in front of us.


The trip down the river allowed us to see some beautiful riverfront homes such as this one.


This is a nice park


that adjoins a nice restaurant on the river.


These are the old dog musher boxes for the Flying Dutchman dog team.


The boat also went past Susan Butcher's Iditarod Kennels where her husband and workers showed off the dogs and the puppies.


I thought this was an interesting houseboat!


The boat trip took us to the Chena Indian Village. As we were approaching it, someone shooed the reindeer/caribou out where we could see them.



This is a view looking down river.


As we were headed back to the Indian village an eagle started circling the boat. This is the best picture I got.


Lance, of course got a much better picture.

There was another river boat out that day so we took pictures of them.

Upon arriving at the Chena Indian Village a woman was smoking salmon and explained to us how it was done.

There are several separate areas in the village so they divided us into groups going different directions. We started here at a cache house.

A young woman showed us the different types of fur that the Indians used and what they used them for. This was a beautiful fox pelt.

In another area we learned about their modes of transportation and shelters. This is a birch bark canoe.

This is a shelter using trees and pelts.

We went to the area where the reindeer were talked about. The reindeer is a domesticated caribou. The Indians raised them for food and trade.

They were very tame and several people were feeding them grasses.

This is another view of the birch bark canoe with some of the things that typically would be in it.

This is a picture of our pretty Indian guide. She is a senior in high school and works here in the summer

This area talked about the larger animals that they killed and the uses for them.

They also showed off a typical Indian parka made with different types of pelts. It was beautiful.

Here is a man's shirt make from pelts.

Here is a large grizzly bear pelt.

In front of the book store they had a statue of Susan Butcher's lead dog, Granite. She wrote a children's book about him.

On the trip back we saw another modern log cabin home on the river.

We also saw this non-typical Alaskan home. This area appears to appeal to people with money.

The home above was close to this private airstrip.

Here's a lot for sale if anyone is interested.

Most everyone was headed to Pioneer Park for dinner and to look around but Wayne is still feeling poorly so we stayed home.