FAIRBANKS — When most people consider the ukulele, they think of Hawaii — sandy beaches, pretty girls dancing the hula, sunshine and drinks with pineapple.

Not Russell Copelin.

Copelin thinks of ice and snow, below-zero temperatures and bars in the Yukon and Alaska.

Copelin, 26, a native of Benton, Maine, not Honolulu, plays the ukulele (and a few other instruments, too) and is lead vocalist with the Bacon Strips, performing tonight and Saturday at the Howling Dog, not in the islands.

He considers Alaska home. He and a girlfriend share a small cabin in a remote area more than 15 miles from downtown Fairbanks. He has more moose for neighbors than people.

Copelin graduated from Maine Central Institute in 2001 and from the University of Maine at Farmington in 2005 with a degree in history — “a degree I’ve yet to use,” he said in an interview at a Fairbanks coffee shop where he often checks his e-mail.

Shortly after finishing college, he and his father embarked on a cross-continent fishing trip in a pickup with a camper in the bed. The journey eventually took them through the Yukon and to Alaska.

His father flew back to Maine, leaving Copelin the pickup and camper to use while he explored Alaska. The more he saw of the state, the more he liked it.

At the end of summer, Josh Remy, a UMF classmate and a friend since high school, flew up to visit. They drove to Prudhoe Bay on the Arctic Ocean; then south to Whitehorse; then down to Vancouver, where “we gorged on sushi — it was extremely cheap.”

Then they visited Oregon before turning east toward Maine on a nonstop 72-hour marathon drive.

Even as he was driving to Maine, Copelin said, “I knew I needed to find a way to come back to Alaska and make it pay for itself. ... I started scheming to plan the next trip up here.”

Music seemed like a possibility.

While in college, Copelin had been involved in bands that performed throughout Maine. For one band, Gristlestick, he was the lead vocalist and drummer and played guitar, harmonica and — yes — the ukulele.

“One day I walked into Down Home Music in Fairfield and they had a uke on sale for $30.” He bought it.

“I thought, ‘This can’t be too hard to play.’ I was wrong. It’s hard,” he said, but added that “there’s a lot of cool stuff on the Internet,” and he found online instruction.

It worked. The ukulele — a professional instrument that cost a lot more than $30 — is now his primary instrument as he plays decidedly un-Hawaiian bluegrass, rock, Latin and funk.

Hoping to earn enough money for a return to Alaska, Copelin worked hard to find musical gigs in Maine.

“I had to be a badger on the telephone. I pestered people and only stopped when they told me never to call again.”

The pestering worked. Then Copelin started pestering places farther west — in Montana, the Yukon and Alaska.

In the summer of 2006, the four-piece band from Farmington piled into a 1989 Ford school bus and headed off toward an Alaska adventure. The bus — with built-in bunk beds — became home to the wandering troupe.

There were several musical stops in Montana, then more shows in the Yukon. They played on the streets in Whitehorse — and that’s where they got a break.

A representative from Yukon Brewing heard them and he liked the sound. He helped the band find jobs as they toured the territory.

At the end of the summer of 2006, they drove the bus back to Maine, where Copelin stayed more than a year.

Alaska remained on Copelin’s mind, however, so in the summer of 2008, the band got back on the bus.

They made it as far as Rancheria, a tiny settlement in the Yukon — it’s more than 100 miles from the next real town — when the bolt holding the alternator in place broke off.

“No charge equals bad,” he said. The bus coasted in.

“We pulled into this little garage where a guy knew what to do. He fixed it for free. Then we sat around the campfire with him playing music.”

A day or two later they arrived in Alaska, where they spent the rest of the summer performing. At the end of summer, they flew home, leaving the bus behind — waiting for Copelin’s return.

The next summer Copelin broke his usual pattern of heading to Maine at the end of the season. Turning to Craigslist, he found a remote cabin and — with some reluctance about the lack of indoor plumbing — his girlfriend agreed to live there.

So far he is enjoying the experience, though venturing out at night to the outhouse is not much fun, he said.

“The minus 35 (degree temperature) didn’t bother me at all,” he said. “There’s no wind and no heavy snow. You just take a broom” to clear the walk.

Because there are not enough wintertime gigs, Copelin has taken on other work, including nights buffing floors at a Safeway store. When possible, he is the percussionist and bass player with Sweating Honey.

Then he digs out the ukulele and joins two guys from the band to play his special kind of music. They call themselves Ukulele Russ and the Bacon Strips.

He has no plans to return to Maine anytime soon. “I love it here,” he said. “I want to stay here. ... I want to continue playing music. I love the people. They are like Mainers used to be. They invite you in.”

And they dig his music too.

David B. Offer is the retired executive editor of the Kennebec Journal and the Morning Sentinel. He is spending a year at the University of Alaska Fairbanks as the C.W. Snedden chair in journalism. E-mail davidboffer@hotmail.com

IF YOU GO

What: Ukulele Russ & The Bacon Strips

When: 10 p.m. tonight, Saturday

Where: Howling Dog Saloon, Fox

Information: 456-4695