Alaska 20. Road Warriors July 29

We slept well. Highway noise wasn’t too loud. Awoke to more rain. Not a surprise though, as we had seen the forecast. And, as you no doubt know by now, the forecast grim.

We spent the morning reading and drinking coffee in bed. I caught up on writing and Dave is trying to figure out the next week of FUN ACTIVITIES to entertain me. It will be raining a lot, that much we know. 

He landed on spending the bulk of the time around (but not in) Anchorage. Though — and I may not have mentioned this — we DO have another date with an Amazon locker! This time, to pick up the gas regulator for our bricked gas grill that has traveled over 5000 useless miles so far. Dave wanted to buy a new one, but I wouldn’t let him. Instead, using my new Amazon locker skillz, I ordered one almost two weeks ago to arrive in Anchorage this week. What do you know! 

So, we’ll troll around Talkeetna, Willow, Palmer, etc and try to entertain ourselves. A reader from out east suggested the Anchorage museum and we plan to do that when we swing through to pick up the regulator.

I was busy trying to get a blog posted since we had service, so I wasn’t doing my usual excellent job of reading to Dave about every mundane gravel turnout detailed in The Milepost. I had my head down much of the time. So it was with astonishment that when I DID lift my head, upon coming into the town of Talkeetna. I was stunned speechless. It looked like Dan Patch Boulevard at the Minnesota State Fair. Literally TEEMING with people walking both sides of a cute, kitschy/touristy village. 

Honestly. You come out of what feels like the back woods where you’ve seen few people, few cars and then BAM. Where did they come from? Where are they STAYING? It’s crazy.

(Spoiler Alert: a bit of the mystery was solved the next day when we saw a Princess Cruises bus leaving town packed with cruisers!)

We parked the rig on a back street and got out to walk around and check out the campgrounds I had read about.

The first was quite literally near the end (but not quite AT the end — which would have helped) of the busy street. It would be like parking the pod next to the giant slide on September 5th. I mean… definitely no naked potty run in the middle of the night.

So we walked up the street and became distracted by the good smells coming from the restaurants — which all looked pretty good. We stopped in to the Denali Brew Pub, sat outside all bundled up and under the awning where we stayed nice and dry — if a little chilled to the bone. We ordered some delicious beer and decided to eat a late lunch: fish ‘n chips for me and chowder and brisket for Dave. Yum. Stuffed.

We then waddled to the second campground, about a 15 minute walk away. It was dark and dank. Muddy and puddley… But there were a few spots with nice big rocks to park on instead of puddles, muddy pot holes under a dripping canopy of spruce. These were out in the open along the Talkeetna River. Not wanting to drive anymore and just wanting to be done, I sat at the site (so no one could take it) while Dave ran back to get the rig. 

The camper has developed an INSANE squeaking sound that we think is coming from the springs on the suspension. We talked to the techs at Escapod and they believed we needed to re-grease the ports so Dave drove about 15 miles to a hardware store, bought a grease gun and set to work. 

It did nothing. 

We aren’t super concerned but it’s annoying — and a little embarrassing — as we squeak our way through pot-holed campgrounds scoping out sites. It doesn’t make the sound when we are going fast — or at least we can’t hear it.

The camper next to us had the same generator as us and since his was running, we decided to run ours too. Generators have always driven us absolutely CRAZY, so we are SUPER self conscious about using them. Because, you know, it makes us supreme hypocrites… We ran ours for about 45 minutes and turned it off — while neighbor kept his going for another couple hours. In one of my random conversations with passers by, I motioned to the camper next to us and said, “I wish this guy would turn off his generator…”

And I only tell you this because the guy I said it to (and his family) went back into their rental camper (never to be seen again) and turned on their generator for the REST OF THE NIGHT. They turned it off sometime after we fell asleep and turned it back on again at 8am. They never even emerged in the morning. I was so annoyed. I am getting so intolerant of noise as I get older. A real curmudgeon. But in my defense, most campgrounds have rules about when and how long you can run your generator — and it isn’t for 5 hours straight or past 10 pm. So there.

Dave made a valiant effort at a fire with our horrible firewood. It took him forEVER to get it going. We did our usual rotating around the fire to try to avoid the smoke while we talked to almost everyone who went by: two different groups from Colorado. A group from Wisconsin. And one or two others I can’t remember. 

We were so flippin’ full from lunch that we just had cheese and crackers for dinner. 

Well, and some whiskey, too. 

And called it a night