Huge open space and a very loosely defined version of ‘road’ that went on and on, not a hint of human anywhere, including over the AM-radio as it raspberries and hisses with the rolling of the dial. Bring a can or two of spare fuel…
The State Fair was about a :30 minute drive from that tiny midwest town where I grew up. This trip to the Alaska State Fair clicked over about 2,200 miles, with 4 border crossings and 2 rounds of Marine Highway. She did get to taste Dairy Queen ice cream for the very first time, too. And there were about $100 worth of carnival ride tickets, which roughly equals all-day-long. I’m ready to do it all again just to see her smile and wave, a blur of kid-screams and laughter and color, up in the air like a floating dream.
photo: Robert Earl Keen sang about ‘the road goes on forever and the party never ends’, but I do believe he ain’t -ever- seen a road like this here road: Blowing down that hump-tulip-highway like a breeze, somewhere out there in the Wrangell-St. Elias toward Tok, a second or two too late with the camera to snap the scraggly gnarly looking brown bear in the right-hand lane sitting on his butt with his legs splayed, casually munching on parts of something very freshly dead, smacking his lips and looking skyward, oblivious to the presence of anything else as the slowing truck rolled past. Going back for pictures seemed like a bad idea.