Mark - you make me SICK!!!!

Homesick!!! for the country that was my home for 30 years. Such memories!!

I felt I was there with you for every bump in the road, the rain, the
that air, the camaraderie of the project. I can almost smell the camp
fires and the food.

Great trip report!

John Rodgers
88 GL Driver

Mark Tuovinen wrote:
> Trip Report
>
>
>
> In early August my wife, her 16yr old daughter Julia (celebrated b-day in
> Eagle), our 6yr old son Colin, Maggie our Great Dane and I took a 7 day trip
> from Anchorage to Eagle, AK and back in our `87 Westy Syncro.  A late start
> out of Anchorage saw us departing about 5PM Saturday the 8th.  We stopped in
> Palmer to visit my wife�s parents whom were participating in Palmers version
> of Hot August Nights car show on the main street.  After viewing the cars,
> eating dinner and visiting with friends and family we headed North on the
> Glenn Highway to get as far up the road as we could for the day.  Eagle is
> approx. 510 road miles from Anchorage with several mountain passes (5-9%
> grades) and 100 miles of two lane dirt �highway� along the way.
>
>
>
>   The van ran well though is now a bit slower on the uphill grades due to
> the recent installation of 215/75R15 BFG�s on S A alloys.  The tires had
> been on the van for a week prior to the trip and it was only the day before
> we departed that the clamshell modifications were finished allowing a fully
> inflated spare to be carried.  So far we are very pleased with the tires and
> they are a lot quieter than I expected them to be.
>
>
>
> Saturday night we camped at a roadside pullout next to the Chistochina River
> after stopping for gas in Glennallen.  Shortly before we stopped for the
> night one of several moose we saw ran out into the highway turned away from
> us and zigzagged up the road while I did my best to stop the van without
> hitting it.  This reinforced my resolve to get the E-code headlights
> installed.  They are ready except for finding a decent quality pigtail to
> replace the stock 9004 bulb connectors.  A big brake kit may be in order.
>
>
>
> Sunday morning we awoke to cloudy skies and a light sprinkle that grew
> steadily harder as we drove toward Tok, our next refueling stop and where we
> ate breakfast.  Tok was uneventful except for the dog eating a package of
> hotdog buns when left alone in the van.  She is a new addition to the family
> and evidently has a couple of bad habits that our other Dane does not.  After
> a quick stop at the store to replace the buns we headed East toward Tetlin
> Junction where we would turn North onto the Taylor Highway.
>
>
>
>   The Taylor Highway climbs up and down the mountain sides offering
> panoramic views in every direction.  Large swaths of the countryside along
> it have experienced forest fires in the last 5-10 years and burnt trees, ok
> we call them trees but they are more like giant toothpicks, cover the hills
> and valleys as far as you can see.  About seventy to eighty miles in we came
> to the town using the term loosely, of Chicken.  The gold miners that first
> settled there wanted to call it Ptarmigan (silent �P�) but could not spell
> it so they chose Chicken.  Ptarmigan are prevalent throughout Alaska and are
> our official State bird.  Chicken consists of a combination fuel stop, gift
> shop, RV park and camping area.  There is also a caf�, gift shop, and of
> course bar.  There is also an airport and the main attraction, an old
> floating gold dredge now on dry land and open for tours.  We did not take
> the tour this time but might next time we are in the area.  Twenty or so
> miles out of Chicken we came to a fork in the road, straight would put us on
> The Top of The World Highway and in a few miles would cross the Border into
> Canada but we turned left staying on the Taylor Hwy and headed for Eagle.  Here
> the road winds along the ridges and drops into a few canyons where it
> narrows to one lane in places, and yes we call it a highway.  It had been
> raining since we broke camp that morning and as only the first 60 or so
> miles of the Taylor are paved both road and van were quite muddy by now.  As
> it was the day before caribou season was opening every possible place to
> pull off of the road and a few places on the road were filled with trucks,
> SUV�s, RV�s, trailers, four wheelers, and even a few horse trailers.  Makes
> you wonder how much that caribou costs per pound when you add in the $40,000
> truck, a trailer, four wheelers, rifles, and assorted other gear.  The rains
> let up as we covered the last few miles and dropped down the hillside into
> Eagle on the shore of the Yukon River.
>
>
>
> After a short drive around Eagle to familiarize ourselves with the area we
> headed out to the BLM campground north of town.  The campground has 16
> spaces of which only a couple would be suitable for larger RV�s, most are
> for car or tent camping.  There is good separation between the sites and all
> have fire rings and picnic tables.  The area is quiet with only the sounds
> of wind in the tree tops, a few birds, and a stream below the hill upon
> which the campground sits.  The closest neighbors to the campground are
> exceptionally quiet and well behaved as they reside in a small cemetery
> dating back to the early 1900�s when nearby Fort Egbert was active.
>
>
>
> Eagle, AK consists of two separate parts, the native village to the South
> and the �White� settlement to the North.  As is common with riverside
> communities the centers of both are/were located along the waterfront.  I
> say were because in early May of this year ice jams on the Yukon River
> caused extensive damage to both as ice and water spilled over the banks of
> the river.  The native area was wiped out completely and the white
> settlement suffered extensive damage.  Flooding here is extremely rare as
> Eagle is so far up the Yukon River it is almost at the Canadian border.  This
> year early thawing on the upper river created a lot of water and ice with no
> place to go but over the banks.
>
>
>
> Sunday evening we made camp and settled down for the night.  Monday morning
> after a late breakfast we went and found Rob the volunteer coordinator and
> signed up to help with the cleanup and reconstruction.  We spent the rest of
> the week working on cleanup, salvage, materials distribution, and
> construction.  Salvage mainly consisted of roof trusses, windows, and
> anything that was sturdy enough to stand up to being flooded and pushed
> around by the river ice.  Good building materials are hard to come by and
> expensive to ship into remote areas like Eagle so if it could be saved it
> was.  The work force consisted of two organized groups Samaritans Purse, and
> Mennonite Disaster Services, and a loose bunch of volunteers that like my
> family showed up to help.  Some were from Alaska others came from Oregon,
> Michigan, and the rest of the US.  One hard working young lady �Sina� was
> from Switzerland.  She is traveling the world and decided she would stop in
> and help out while in Alaska.  The days were long with breakfast served from
> 6:30 � 8:00AM then off to work until lunch at noon, back to work at 1:00PM
> and dinner at 6:00PM.  The crews building cabins would continue to work
> after dinner stopping a couple hours later as light ran out.  Long days but
> necessary when you consider the short construction season in Alaska.  The
> goal was to have all the new cabins built by mid September so their owners
> would have time to get settled in before the snows came and road closes for
> winter.  Tuesday August 11th was Julia�s 16th birthday and it was one she
> will never forget.  She helped pull sheets of salvaged plywood out of the
> woods and load a large pile of trash and flood debris into the scoop of a
> loader for removal to the dump.  The locals and volunteers working the mess
> hall found out about her birthday and surprised her with a cake complete
> with candles presented to her after dinner while everyone in the hall sang.
> I have never seen her blush as much as she did when the cake came out to the
> tune of Happy Birthday.
>
>
>
> All too quickly the week came to an end and Friday evening after one last
> dinner in the mess hall we said our good byes and hit the road headed for
> Chicken and fuel.  Had we been more on top of it we would have refueled in
> Eagle but as I was working all day we never thought about it until it was
> time to go and the gas station was closed for the night.   Had we done so we
> would not have made the stop in Chicken, nor met Juan and Sara on the way
> home so it all worked out for the better this way.  We drove out of Eagle
> into the setting sun across the ridge tops until dark fell and with it a
> light rain.  About 30 miles from Chicken a trail off the road took us to a
> clearing atop a small bluff where we camped for the night.  Up early
> Saturday morning we broke camp and drove into Chicken for fuel and breakfast
> at the Chicken Caf�.  To anyone traveling the Taylor Highway we highly
> recommend stopping at the Caf�.  On the counter there were at least eight
> fresh made pies, two huge sheets of brownies, another of cookies, and
> cinnamon rolls.  All made from scratch and very tasty.  We ate what we could
> of the generous servings of eggs and bacon putting the leftovers in our
> fridge for later.  While there we chatted with the owner who told us of her
> 18yr old son whom she had just gotten off the phone with.  He was calling to
> tell her of the apartment he had just rented in Paris where he will be
> attending a prestigious school on a full scholarship.  I would love to be
> there when his new friends and classmates hear of his life growing up in
> Chicken, AK.  The clientele of one Caf� in Paris during lunch would out
> number the population of Chicken, AK.
>
>
>
> The journey from Chicken to Anchorage was for the most part uneventful.  The
> weather improved from a light sprinkle to overcast though there were strong
> cross winds from Chistochina through Tolsona Lake.  Cruising south on the
> Glenn Highway near the Matanuska Glacier we came up behind a short line of
> slower moving traffic.  When we could see the front vehicle it was a Vanagon
> Syncro.  As we followed along behind it we scoped out the full length roof
> rack loaded with gear, two bikes were on a hitch mounted carrier.  It was
> sporting Nevada plates, LT style mirrors and was obviously lifted and
> running large tires(225/80R16).  Up front was a bumper with winch and the
> rear had a tube bumper.  After following them for a number of miles we
> passed them waving to each other as we went by.  Just outside of Palmer we
> pulled over and flagged them down.  Inside were Juan and Sara two wandering
> souls that departed Nevada in July on a journey that will take them to
> Alaska then down through Canada and the US heading for Florida in December.
> >From there they will cut across the southern States turning south into
> Mexico and make their way to Juan�s homeland of Argentina.
>
>
>
> We invited them to stay with us while in Anchorage and they spent the week
> at our house exploring the area and doing a little maintenance and repair
> work on the van. The following Saturday we loaded the kayaks on top of our
> van and caravanned with them to Seward for an overnight kayak camping trip
> to Caines Head at the mouth of Resurrection Bay.  Sunday evening after
> paddling back over calm water with dolphins swimming nearby to our launch
> site we ate dinner at Ray�s our favorite dining establishment in Seward and
> parted company with Juan and Sara.  They stayed to explore the Kenai
> Peninsula and do some fishing and we headed home to chores and work the next
> morning.  This was not the last we saw of them but that is for another
> story.  For more on the adventures of Juan and Sara go to their blogsite
> mixingamerica.com.ar.  I will post a link to photos of this and other trips
> on picasaweb soon.
>
>
>
> Mark in AK
>
>