Saturday, March 6, 2010

If You Dream Of Going To Alaska This Summer

Alaska is renowned the world over as the "Last Frontier," the Land Of the Midnight Sun. It is a great place to visit in the summer. Just be sure to take a sleep mask with you. Let me explain why I say that.

On the first of May 1997, after many years of dreaming of going to Alaska, my wife
and I left New Jersey in our self-contained 30' motor home determined to drive all
the way from Freehold, New Jersey to Alaska.

As a young man, (back in 1948) I was recently discharged from the U.S. Navy. That
is when I made plans to go to Alaska as soon as possible and spend the rest of my
life there. But first, since I wanted to be an Alaskan bush pilot, I decided to use part
of my GI Bill benefits to learn how to fly a Piper Cub airplane. So, I signed up for
flying lessons at the flight school operated at our local Red Bank, NJ airport.
Learning to fly was a great experience and I enjoyed every lesson to the utmost.

Then, soon after my first very exciting solo flight, when I got my "wings." I met the
girl of my dreams. We met at the Baptist church in Freehold, NJ where we both lived.
Naturally, I told my new girl friend all about my plans to first learn to fly, then move
to Alaska and become a bush pilot.

Of course, because of my enthusiasm, this beautiful young lady soon became as
excited as I was about moving to Alaska and we talked for many hours about the
great adventures I expected to have while living in Alaska, the Last Frontier.

Well, as you might have suspected from what I've just told you, we fell in love.
Several months later we were married and about a year after that we were pregnant
and soon our first son was born. I went to college at night and worked in my
father's business during the day.

The move to Alaska was not to be - yet.

The years passed, I started my own business; we had more children, a house
mortgage, payments on two cars and later, our elderly parents to take care of. The
children's needs kept both of us working hard to make ends meet. Of course, we
had lots of fun. Life was good. Even so, our dream of going to Alaska was always
there, buried in the back of our minds.

We vowed to do our best to get to Alaska - someday.

The children grew, went to collage, got married and made us grandparents many
times over. During all of those years we still talked about somehow, someday, going
to Alaska.

Then, in the fall of 1996, the one hundred year old converted farmhouse where I
rented space for my direct mail advertising and printing business caught fire. The
fire (an accident caused by the torch of a careless roofer) caused so much damage; I
was put out of business. Fortunately, we had enough insurance to cover our losses.
Then, instead of going back in business, we decided to use the insurance money to
buy the motor home and - drive to Alaska!

"Someday" had arrived! Alaska was no longer a dream, we were on our way.

We left New Jersey in May and drove about two hundred miles each day; found a
campsite each night, then followed the same routine for the next thirty days.

It was the first of June when we drove into Tok, Alaska. We were so excited! We
were in Alaska at last! We stayed in Tok (wonderful people there) a couple of days
and then headed for Fairbanks, Anchorage, Denali, and later, Homer. Our general
plan was to spend the whole summer in Alaska and see as much as we could of that
spectacular Great Land.

During those wonderful months of leisurely traveling and camping all over Alaska,
from June to September, we met lots of friendly Alaskans wherever we went. The
snowcapped mountains, the moose, the bears, Mt. Denali, panning for gold, all were
absolutely spectacular to see and experience first hand. We had a great time every
day.

The only real problem I had, and it was a problem that bothered me the whole time
we were in Alaska, was this: I discovered that in Alaska, in the summertime, there is
constant daylight. It never got dark! Even at midnight there was daylight and bright
sunshine. One "night" at one AM in the morning, I remember looking out of the
RV's windshield and I saw a double rainbow in the sky right there in front of us!

Constant daylight in the summer in Alaska was something I had not expected. I
suffered because I just could not get to sleep with all of that light around me. There
was constant (23 or 24 hours) bright daylight, all day every day for each of those
three months. Eventually, here is how I solved the problem. I made myself a sleep
mask to put over my eyes and then, and only then, could I go to sleep and get some
much-needed rest.

In short, our long awaited visit to Alaska has left us with many wonderful memories
and we have the satisfaction of knowing that dreams really do come true.

No comments:

Post a Comment