Of course, the El Dorado Gold Mine tour was geared to tourists, anyone who expects anything else is foolish. BUT, it is informative, interesting, fun for all ages. The folks there are informative and helpful, but of course the tour ends in the gift shop! We didn't expect anything else! We are glad we included the Gold Mine on our... More

This is definitely a tourist attraction, but a highlight of my trip! This was included as part of a tour, so I really didn't chose it. You start with a train ride in which they explain how gold is mined. As you get off the train you get a chance to observe how they really pan for gold in the... More

As an Alaskan and a geologist I found the El Dorado Mine an embarassing and appalling experience. Perhaps if they called it the Golden Fleecing Mine or something more touristy I could have handled it better. The whole process was to keep passeengers entertained until they could be delivered to the gift shop where you are held captive for an... More

The train ride was informative and I did learn a lot about the mining process but you had to sit on the end of a row on the train to get a view during the ride The engineer played the fiddle while we were boarding and he was really good. After we were back from the train we were given... More

This is a good place to learn about the process of "drift" and "placer" gold minning. Everyone gets to pan for gold at the end of the tour with the poke of gold bearing gravel that they give you. More

First we went on the Riverboat ride then lunch /shop then the El Dorado -it was hot I wish the gold mine was first -i am sure they seed the little bags you pan but hey i found $5.00 the REAL Gold mine is in the store where they weigh your gold and ask it you want to buy a... More

Our family including three teenage guys thought that this was going to be totally "cheesy", but humored the parents and went along. The little train ride is rather short, but you do learn a lot about panning for gold. An excellent demonstration is given showing how the gold mining process works today - and quite a bit of gold was... More

My wife did not want to go on this tour because she thought we were going to have to work a gold pan in a stream. When we went on the tour she was delighted to be able to sit at a trough and swirl her gold pan in the trough, feet dry. And she found $55 in flakes. More

We went to Fairbanks mostly just so we could ride the train (worth it, by the way), and we had a day to kill as a result. Frankly, there's not much to do in Fairbanks, so we reluctantly delivered ourselves into this appalling tourist trap. The whole tour takes about two hours. First you board a little train for a... More