Date:         Fri, 25 Sep 2009 12:27:23 -0800
Reply-To:     Mark Tuovinen <aksyncronaut@GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Mark Tuovinen <aksyncronaut@GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Trip Report ( Long!) Eagle, AK
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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 café, 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 Café.  To anyone traveling the Taylor Highway we highly
recommend stopping at the Café.  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 Café 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