Life in the Public Eye

As evening at the RV Park and Campground in Valdez, Alaska was closing in, I was sitting at the picnic table at our campsite while Barbara was switching the van from day mode to sleep mode (a process that takes 5-10 minutes). I looked up to find an older gentleman standing before me.

“I’m a dentist,” he said “and I want to tell you that I am impressed as hell!” I looked up at him with what I am sure was an expression of profound confusion. He pointed at my hand. I glanced over and saw a limp piece of dental floss that I had just used still wrapped around my right index finger. “Terrific oral hygiene!” he exclaimed before strolling back to his truck camper in the adjacent site.

On another occasion, while we were camped in a very crowded campground outside Denali National Park, a woman from the neighboring site wandered over to see what we were cooking for dinner. “That smells delicious!” she said peering into the skillet of onions, peppers, and mushrooms that I was sautéing for pasta sauce. She proceeded to explain that she was a nutritionist and expounded at some length on her and her husband’s dietary practices on the road providing somewhat more details of the digestive effects of said diet than I truly required. Then she invited herself to take have a tour of our matchbox-sized camper while her husband confided in me that the reason that they had had to rent the full-sized RV they were driving is that his wife was claustrophobic in the teardrop camper he had previously purchased. 

Welcome to life lived in full view. Life in the public eye is not just for politicians and the famous. When you are camping and living out of a vehicle virtually everything you do except perhaps using the toilet is open to public inspection.

Speaking of the toilet, the beginning of this week found us in a beautiful campground in the Canadian Rocky Mountain National Park. I have gotten quite used to sharing washroom facilities with my fellow campers. It is normal for showers to be in short supply, particularly at the most popular shower times (morning and early evening). Usually there are only 2-3 showers for each 5 or 6 toilets, because, to be honest, getting a shower can be important but it is rarely urgent.

For some reason, however, the men’s washroom (and women’s too, I was told) at this particular campground near Jasper, Alberta has just one toilet and 7 showers! The effect of this was that a queue formed every morning for the single commode. I saw this line get as long as five-deep in the morning with each of the waiting silently praying that the person currently taking his turn required just a “brief call.” Yes, the cubicle did provide a modicum of privacy, but those just outside the thin metal walls took a profound interest in the goings on inside notwithstanding. When it was finally my turn up at bat, I could not help but feel a little self-conscious when contemplating the discomfort of those still waiting on the bench. Performance anxiety at its worst!

I never had to wait for a shower though!

One of the things that many campers share most generously with each other is the gift of sound. If you do not camp, you may think of a campground as a place where the sounds of nature predominate and human voices are kept to a whisper. I am sorry to disabuse you of this idyllic notion. Loud music, yelling, boisterous (i.e. drunken) laughter, and snoring are among  the least offensive audibles our neighbors produce. Gasoline powered generators are among the most offensive.

Oddly, generators are often not permitted in private campgrounds but they usually are in government run ones. Imagine someone running a very loud lawn mower right next to your deck while you are trying to relax with family and friends. That will give you a sense of how disruptive they are.  Sometimes there are restricted hours when generators can be used but often not. One campground in British Columbia simply suggested that generator use be ‘limited.’ What limits our neighbors there were planning to adhere to, we never found out. At 10 pm, we packed up and move to another site in a different section of the campground where we couldn’t hear it. I am guessing they ran the thing all night.

Generally, we’ve figured out if a neighbor starts up a generator the best thing is just to grab your stuff and move to a new spot. They will run it as long as they are allowed or even beyond. Last week a dude was running his two hours after quiet hours began. Finally, a complaint to the authorities shut it down (only because we were in Canada where citizens respect authority).

For whatever reason, I have very bad campground karma. If there is but one camper in the campground playing loud music or running a generator, he will invariably be in the spot right next to mine.  Sometimes I am camped next to someone who runs their truck for several hours for no discernable reason! Maybe they just enjoy buying fuel.

In Hardin, Montana one night we camped next to a guy taking a motorcycle journey on his gleaming orange Harley-Davidson. Nothing wrong with that, I was a rider myself in a previous life. However, in addition to playing very loudly a radio station whose format would be best described as “Worst music of the 70s” (think Captain and Tennille and Firefall), every 10 minutes or so he would walk over to his bike and kick over the engine. Then he would rev the accelerator for 2-3 minutes and before shutting it off again. The pipes were among the loudest I have ever heard.  I wanted to ask him if he was afraid that the bike wouldn’t start up again if he let the engine cool down and suggest that he get a more reliable motorbike like a Honda, but I suspected he wouldn’t receive my counsel with the goodwill that was intended. He finally quit the engine revving at about 10:30 pm. When we left the next morning, he was still sleeping so unfortunately, I never got to see if a Harley is able to turnover with a cold engine.

As if the inquisitive eyes and intrusions to the ears from one’s fellow campers weren’t enough, many campgrounds have signs informing you that cameras are recording your every move. Others have bright lights that keep the premises lit up like day all night long making sleeping in a tent nearly impossible.

So why camp at all? Well, for one thing it costs perhaps a quarter of what a bottom end motel would run. We simply could not afford to travel for this length of time if we were not camping. But that aside, every once in a while, you end up at that perfect place that is quiet and dark on a night where the stars fill the heavens and the air is just cold enough to keep the mosquitos wherever it is mosquitos go when it is cold.

Such a place is the nearly perfect Two Jacks Campground near Banff, Alberta where we are ensconced for our last two nights in Canada. Midweek and at the tail end of the season we have this heavily wooded and spacious park largely to ourselves. Human noise has been at a minimum, just the occasionally car or truck going by on the service road.  

Sadly, it’s only nearly perfect. On the first night we still had to put up our blackout curtains before sleeping because the washroom which is about 100 meters away was lit up with bright lights that stay on all night long. On the second night a party arrived just as we were ready to turn in and spent 45 minutes trying to shimmy the backside of their large RV into the site next to ours. All the while the diesel engine of their truck protested with noisy groans and belches of burning oil. At least they didn’t have a generator.

On the plus side, with so few campers in this park there is rarely a wait for a toilet.

Neither is there ever a wait for a shower here.

There are none.  

Roads End

The Alaska Canada Highway (Alcan) is, along with Route 66 and the Pacific Coast Highway or Highway 1, one of the great North American road trips. Stretching from Dawson Creek in British Columbia and terminating in Fairbanks Alaska, the highway runs more than 2,200 kilometers through BC, Yukon and Alaska, traversing ice capped mountains, mighty rivers, and seemingly endless wilderness. Every year thousands of travelers make their way along this iconic road on their way to the 49th state.

We, however, did not. Road conditions and the particulars of our direction of travel, led us up the Cassiar Highway which runs north well west of the Alcan. The Cassiar is smaller and in general less well maintained than the Alcan but in June there was a massive bridge washout on the Alcan and though they had a bypass functioning within a few days, traffic was ‘single tracking’ through the affected area. We had already been planning to go up the Cassiar and this sealed the deal.

But knowing that every Alaska overland voyage requires driving every inch of the Alcan, as we began the long journey back from Fairbanks, we set out to reverse drive the highway from Mile 1422 to Mile 0.

Perhaps one reason that the road is so iconic is that it “feels” like Alaska most of the way. The most noticeable change in the topography when crossing the border into Canada is that the speed signs switch to kilometers per hour (ah, I feel so at home here!). Otherwise, there is little change. The road passes through mountains, meadows of wildflowers, and every few hundred kilometers a tiny village with a motel, a gas station, maybe a small grocery store, and if one is lucky, a campground. Miss an opportunity to get fuel and you may be taking an unplanned 200 km hike.

If you think it’s Alaska but it’s not, it may be the Alcan. Here a view of Muncho Lake in British Columbia.

The attentive will be rewarded with wildlife sightings. We saw a lone wolf, which appeared to be chasing down some prey. Many birds, waterfowl, and an elk or two were in evidence. Bear and moose made their appearances.

The Alcan was built in a rush. Started in March of 1942 in the midst of World War II, the first draft of the road was finished just 6 months later and as you might expect, it was a hot mess. The impetus for the road was driven by a U.S. fear of a Japanese invasion of Alaska. The road was needed to get troops and military equipment in place to defend what was, at the time, a U.S. territory. The road had been discussed previously but the Canadian government, fearing US domination, had put the kibosh on it. The threats posed by the war to Canada as well at the United States softened the Canadian opposition considerably.

Construction never ended. The ice and the shifting permafrost wreak havoc with the tarmac every winter and driving south we found a road surface that alternates between beautiful, smooth, freshly laid asphalt and roadway that is crumbling and full of potholes. In other places the thoroughfare is only gravel for many miles, or one is following ‘pilot vehicles’ through construction zones at speeds of around 40 km/hour. One must stay well back behind the car in front of you if one is to avoid a cracked and pockmarked windshield. I learned this the hard way with a nice dime-sized chip in the glass to show for it. Every summer the Canadian government rushes to repair and repave the road only to have winter weather wreck it again. I am trying to imagine Sisyphus happy but I am glad this task is not mine.

It took about a week to arrive at Mile 0 in Dawson Creek. The last miles are a rude return to civilization with lots of industry and even strip shopping centers and fast food restaurants. But the town of Dawson Creek itself has an incredible Pioneer Village with many relocated buildings and furnishings from the early 20th Century, giving one a feel for what life on the frontier might have been like.

After exploring the village, we stopped long enough to take the obligatory photos at the Mile Zero marker before turning toward the vast prairies of Alberta. All remaining vestiges of the North Country vanished instantly as the land became endless vistas of long brown grasses, rolling hills of summer-bleached yellow grains, and massive rolls of hay waiting in the fields. The temperature quickly rose to 30 C and the sky was hazy though cloudless. Soon we were in the city of Grand Prairie complete with a Costco, a McDonalds, and probably a Starbucks though I didn’t see one.

Though am sure Grand Prairie has much to offer those willing to plumb her depths, we didn’t linger. We stopped long enough to fill the tank ($1.49 CAN/ liter, the cheapest gas in Canada to date on this trip!), grab a bag of ice, and get back on the road. We hoped to escape the plains and be back in the Canadian Rocky Mountain National Park before the weekend.

With our completion of the Alcan, it feels that an important part of our trip has ended. After all, Alaska was the primary destination and now it is more than a thousand miles behind us. At the same time, we are still a long way from home and likely have 3-4 more weeks of adventures ahead. Up next - a deeper dive into the Rocky Mountains of Canada and then down into Montana and Wyoming to check out parts of those states we have not seen. Glacier National Park? Yellowstone? Maybe. We don’t plan that far ahead but no doubt there are wonders waiting around the next bend.

A friend of mine used to say after a satisfying meal, “The thing about an appetite is that there is always another one right behind it.” So too, at every road’s terminus, another track begins. At ‘Mile 0’ there is a roundabout with four exits headed in different directions. Even roads that lead to the sea always seem to terminate at a dock.  On a round earth, you never have to backtrack.

Roads end. Journeys never do.

Autumn Becomes Alaska

Maybe it’s because my birthday falls in September; Autumn has always been my favorite season. In the DC metro area, I have to wait until late September or even October to see and smell those fall colors and scents and feel that cold rain. Here, we started noticing the changes in early August.

We arrived at Denali National Park in a chilly downpour which hung around for 4 days. It was the second week of August but it felt like November at home. On the last stormy night there was even snow at the higher elevations. We awoke to fresh white mountain peaks crisply outlined against a sky of deep cloudless blue.

There was a new feeling in the air. Fall was setting in.

One of the primary indicators of the season is a plant that we have seen everywhere in Alaska – fireweed. Fireweed grows along the side of the roads and highways, in every meadow, and at every elevation, all the way up to the tree line. In mid-summer it is in full bloom with merry purple flowers that seem to dance in the lightest breeze.

But toward the end of July, they began to change. At the bottom most flowers started to fall off, leaving behind a glowing red stalk (hence the name of the plant). As the next weeks passed the flowers continued to fall from the lower part of the plant up until, at last, just a fringe of purple was left at the top of each.  Alaskans told us that when just the top flowers are left, winter is six weeks away, noting “It will be early this year.”

On our hikes too, we started to notice that the ground cover was changing as well -- deep greens giving way to oranges and reds and yellows. The leaves of the aspen trees are also starting to change to their iconic yellow that is so striking when the wind sets them to shimmering like gold.  The ground is lush with berries and we have been enjoying some of the best blueberries I’ve ever tasted – sweet and tart and there for the picking in the mountain meadows – as long as there isn’t a bear who wants them too.

Perhaps most striking, however, has been the return of night. Since we entered Canada back in mid-June, night has been unknown to us. Throughout June and July, there was at most a brief twilight between sunset at around 12:30 am and sunrise at 3:30 am. We still go to sleep usually before sunset (currently about 11 pm here in Fairbanks) but when I awaken in the middle of the night for my, um, stroll to the washroom it is actually dark. I even saw stars a few nights ago. It is remarkable to think that in just about four weeks, the day and night will be of equal length.

Aside from the pleasure of seeing a dark sky again for the first time in months, the return of darkness also means we may have a chance to see the Aurora Borealis before we get too far south. I have never seen it and it would be a thrill.

The tundra near the Arctic Circle

On Tuesday, we took a 16 hour round trip bus ride to the Arctic Circle (the imaginary line marking the southernmost point at which the sun doesn’t go below the horizon on the summer solstice) and back with a small group of like-minded travelers.  Several hundred miles further north, fall is well under way. Even at mid-day in full sun, the air was chilly, there was a strong wind and the colors of the tundra were muted.

A last sip of summer

As we begin to contemplate pointing the hood of the van southward, we should be able to follow the changing season all the way home, arriving home just as fall is beginning to get underway there. I expect it will be the longest Autumn of my life, other than, I hope, the metaphorical autumn of my life.

As insane as it sounds, I would love to return here in winter to experience what 40 below feels like and to see how never-ending night compares to never ending-day. Seeing Denali and the Arctic covered in snow must be as remarkable as seeing them in summer but it is also something far fewer people do.

I think of myself as fairly well-traveled, but pondering a map of the earth in the Yukon River Lodge, a rest stop on the way to the Arctic Circle, I realized just how little of the planet I have actually visited. There doesn’t seem to be enough time left for repeat visits when so much remains unseen. Yet, I now understand how Alaska gets under one’s skin (and no, I am not only thinking about the mosquitos). The vastness of the wilderness, so much of which feels pristine, the way humans manage to co-exist with bears, and moose, and caribou, and the color of the light is unlike anywhere I have been.

Alaska, it seems, is calling me back before I’ve even had a chance to say goodbye.

End of summer Fireweed devoid of blossoms