Scenic Route to Alaska

Burnt Paw cabin at Tok, Alaska.

Sweet cabin!

September 12th

Eureka Lodge to Tok: 316.9 km (Don’t get me started. I can’t imagine how they came up with that name.)

Cumulative distance: 2124 km

Maximum speed: 103 km/h

Average speed: 79 km/h

Editor’s note: OK, it was a tie with Omak.

Not that we are used to staying in fancy places but whoa, this place is really… humble. Aside from the aforementioned issues, the walls are tissue paper thin. There are two rooms of hunters checking in at 11:00 p.m. and Nan has already been asleep for an hour or more. A few minutes before, I was fighting to stay awake to finish the blog and a few minutes later, debating how long I give them to get it out of their system and go to bed. I’ve been there, so I want to cut them a little slack, but they are making a lot of noise and it’s back and forth across the hall.

Nan wakes with a start. She lays there for a minute or two and, recognizing the situation, jumps out of bed, goes to the door and opens it a foot and yells at these guys and starts laying into them about the noise and we’re trying to sleep and have some common courtesy and get some sleep because they will be handling guns tomorrow and on and on. She’s blowing a gasket! She is just tearing one strip off them one way and then the other. They are dead silent but she doesn’t stop. One of the men in the next room is sobbing quietly and his kid is whispering “dad, what do we do?” and he just goes “sssshhhhhh!”. After that, you could hear a pin drop anywhere in the lodge. They didn’t even flush a toilet. At least, that’s how Nan described it the next morning. What I remember is that she went to the door and called out, “guys, GUYS, there are people trying to sleep!” and within about 15 minutes they had all gone to bed. (And were up again at 5:30 a.m.)

It was cold in the morning and for the first time on the trip, there is ice on the bikes, but only a little. Nan and I were up early so we went out and wiped all the bikes off. For the most part, it was still just a heavy dew so only two of the bikes actually had water droplets that had frozen but it was still a little bit alarming.

We gassed up and were on the road at 9:16 a.m. and at 9:18 a.m., we saw a cow and calf moose cross the road just a short way in front of us. Only two minutes in and we are seeing wildlife!

Today, I am going to let the pictures tell the story.

The colours have been nothing short of phenomenal, but I’ve already told that tale. We got them in spades again today but every time we came around the corner, we got another face full. The only thing was that by the time we reached Tok, it was clear that they were a little farther along in their Autumn and many more of the trees were bare or had lost many more leaves. So often, we have seen pictures of Alaska depicting fall colours and now, we have a much better understanding why. It really is beautiful.

The other story that I am going to let the pictures tell, is the story of broken promises and failed dreams. All along the Glenn Highway, we have seen hotels, gas stations and restaurants either for sale or just plain abandoned. Shadows of their former selves, some are clearly only a few years old or out of service and others, clearly they are dreams that failed a long time ago.

Not sure why but I love ghost towns and old abandoned buildings and many of these places were abandoned a long time ago. In fact, I am sure that some are historical landmarks but of course, they were built in a different era. An era where travel was much slower, and it was a big undertaking to take a journey of a few hundred miles. In those days, travellers would not go so far as we do now and they would find a place to stay along the way. Now it is about the fastest way to get there and don’t stop or look at anything along the way. A restaurant every 20 or 30 miles and a hotel or cabins every 40 just is not as practical as it once was.

Oh, one more thing before we get to the stories. We had gone a long way and since Nan and I hadn’t eaten at the lodge in the morning, we were pretty hungry. After Stan had given us all ‘Janet’s home made “Eatmore” bars’ to keep from fainting, in five minutes we were at the Mantasta Lodge, a place, like so many others, out in the middle of nowhere. Just imagine driving for hours and not seeing a single business and then, out of nowhere and actually in the location of nowhere there is a property with a bar, lodge, restaurant, gas bar and usually liquor store or grocery or both.

The Mantasta is pretty interesting as they sell all kinds of things like groceries, car supplies, batteries, hunting knives (HUGE hunting knives), canned goods, like SPAM, baked goods made right there, and animal feed. This is not like the big box store at home, there is a limited selection of everything but it is clear that sometimes they buy in bulk to stock certain items. As we roll up, there are two guys out front putting up siding to make the place look like it is built from logs.

There is a guy minding the store when we come in and he acknowledges that he doesn’t know everything there but he is helpful. He is a big, Aboriginal man, friendly, helpful as much as he is able and tells us about his three kids and recommends the burgers because the 9 oz patties are hand made there. That wins John’s heart but we all order fish sandwiches, and Nan says “hold the bread” so she ends up with two pieces of battered halibut in a basket with a piece of lettuce and a tomato slice on the side. It is a good lunch and we are all pleasantly surprised. As we leave, the guy who took our order for lunch is outside working on the siding.