It is said that fireweed, seen above, is used by Alaskans to track the progress of summer. When the plant has bloomed all the way through the top, it means the warm season will soon be replaced by ice and snow until the bottom flowers bloom again next spring. For reference, this photograph was taken during the first week of August.

The city center of Fairbanks, Alaska's interior city.

Moose foraging near the entrance of Denali National Park.

Deep into the Denali National Park, a single road, seen right, cuts up, down, and around mountainsides while dry rivers stretch across valleys below. A school bus takes visitors past the first few miles of the park into this vast wilderness.

North America's highest mountain, Denali, as seen from the park road on a wet, overcast day. When you only have one chance, you do the best you can with it.

A grizzly bear crosses the park road. More than a dozen grizzlies were spotted on the day this bus tour was taken.

In the interior of Alaska, you can get married in a museum of ice if you'd like. Or, you can have a martini at the frozen bar behind this small chapel.

No matter your thoughts regarding fossil fuels, the feat of engineering displayed by the Alaska pipeline is impressive. A small park gives visitors an up close look to the steel snake here. While driving on highway roads, one can also spot the pipeline during sections in which it is above ground.

When caribou are domesticated and kept as livestock, they are called reindeer. The one here munches on leaves as tourists take a walk with the herd on a farm.

A group rows a boat on Chena Lakes. Some blue sky peeked through the seemingly ever present, low clouds of the Alaskan summer on this day.

Admittedly, this is not the finest photograph. I looked for this frog for 10 days, however, and finally spotted it on one of my final outings before having to head back home. It humored me just long enough to get a snapshot to remember it by. Alaska is not known for its amphibians and reptiles, due to the harsh climate. This wood frog survives by freezing solid in the winter. Its cells push water out before freezing, while maintaining sticky glucose within to preserve the cells until it thaws.