FAIRBANKS · ALASKA
Auroras overhead. Dog teams in the snow. The Arctic up the road.
Aurora tours, dog sledding, Chena Hot Springs and Arctic Circle day trips. Plus the long midnight sun half of the year and the routes south into Denali.
Only in Fairbanks
Three things you can’t do anywhere else.
Cold-weather day trips exist in plenty of places. These three are latitude-locked. The auroral oval sits over the city, the only Arctic Circle road on earth runs north out of it, and the world’s toughest sled-dog race finishes in town. Plan the rest of the trip around them.
Under the auroral oval
Aurora From Almost Every Clear Night
Fairbanks sits directly under the band of sky where the northern lights are most active. Cold, dry, dark winters and a high-latitude vantage put it among the most reliable places on the planet to see the aurora — clear nights between late August and mid-April carry roughly 4-in-5 odds of a visible display.
- 1 Northern Lights & Chena Hot Springs Tour
- 2 Northern Lights & Arctic Circle Tour
- 3 SkyChase™ | Northern Lights Experience – Free Photography & More
Up the Dalton Highway
A Drive Across the Arctic Circle
The Dalton Highway out of Fairbanks is one of the only roads on earth that crosses the Arctic Circle. Most tours run it as a long day north and a flight back — you stand at 66°33′N, sign the certificate, eat lunch in the boreal forest and watch the tundra come up out the window on the way home.
- 1 Arctic Circle Day Tour
- 2 Original Arctic Circle Drive from Fairbanks
- 3 Northern Lights and Arctic Circle Trip from Fairbanks
Yukon Quest country
Run a Working Sled-Dog Team
Fairbanks is the historic finish line of the Yukon Quest, the toughest sled-dog race on earth. Many of the operators here run kennels descended from race teams, so the dogs you meet are working athletes. The standard half-day starts at the kennel and ends running birch trails behind a six-dog team.
- 1 Dog Sledding and Mushing Experience in North Pole
- 2 Free Pickup/Drop off: Alaskan Husky Dog Sledding with Free Photo
- 3 Dogsled Adventure in Fairbanks with Homestead tour
Start with this
If you only book one out of Fairbanks.
The single most-booked experience this far north. If you only have time for one, this is where to start.
The favourites
Fairbanks’s Most Popular Tours
Aurora chasing, dog sledding, Chena Hot Springs, the Arctic Circle. The reason most travellers head this far north.
By place
Pick a corner of the Interior.
Chena for the hot springs under the aurora. The Arctic Circle for the road to the top of the world. Denali for the bigger range south. Cleary Summit for clearer night skies above the valley.
By activity
Or pick what kind of day you want.
Aurora chasing if you came for the lights. Dog sledding for the classic frozen-trail day. Snowmobile if you want range. Hot springs if you want to stay outside in the cold without freezing.
If you came for the lights
Aurora chases with a camera in the bag.
Heated cabins, a photographer who knows the camera settings for moving green ribbons, and nights long enough to actually see what you came for. If we had to pick three for a first aurora trip, these are the ones we’d book.
The warm soak
Aurora above, mineral pool below.
Drive an hour and a half northeast out of Fairbanks, soak in 105°F water under a sky that, on a clear night, does the work for you. Our three favourites for the Chena Hot Springs day.
When you want range
The snowmobile days.
Frozen rivers, birch trails, lake crossings that would be a swim in July. The fastest way to see how big the Interior actually is. Three runs we’d put on any first-time winter itinerary.
By season
Fairbanks is two different places.
Late August the dark comes back and the aurora returns. Mid-May through July the sun never quite sets. Most operators run one half of the year and close the other. Pick the half you’re coming for.
Late Aug · Apr
Aurora season
Dark nights long enough to actually see the sky move. Cold enough that the hot springs feel earned. The classic Fairbanks reason to come, and the half of the year most operators are built around.
See aurora tours →May · Aug
Midnight sun
Twenty-plus hours of light at solstice. Salmon running, the Denali road open, trails dry, riverboat schedules in full swing, and softball games played at midnight. The opposite Fairbanks.
See summer tours →Just added