Day 47 - Friday, May 17 - Milepost 5125 - Birdcount 223 - Glenallen, Alaska

(SF's Journal).  I do not understand how the sun can get from the west in the setting position to the east in the rising position so fast. Last night I went to bed at 11 PM and it was still light enough to read.  I woke up several times during the night, it was always light out and when I finally dragged myself out of the warm covers at 6:30 AM, the sun looked like a 9 AM sun. How did it get from here to there so fast?  Bumpity Bump. Bumpity bump. Bumpity bump on the Alaska Highway. We continue our journey with an anticipated stop at Tok to retrieve our mail.   It is waiting for us, along with a Mother’s Day present from Missy. She sent a picnic basket, table cloth, napkins and cookbook for picnics. Oh what a sweetheart!   We intend to start using it tomorrow as we depart R TENT and take the car on a day trip to the wilderness to view mountains and rivers as far as one can see.

Alaska1.JPG (44027 bytes)BF's Journal).  We cross the border within a few miles after we get started this morning. We now have visited our 49th state, which also happens to be the 49th state to enter the union. We take lots of pictures to prove we actually made it. In this part of the country, Alaska roads are as bad as Yukon’s; both are under construction. Again we follow the "Follow Me" truck through the construction site. At one stop a bulldozer tries to crawl by us while we wait for the truck and the flag lady asks me to back up. After I tell her I only go forward, the bulldozer somehow manages to get by. She tells me they are trying to recover a car from the wooded ravine next to the road. Apparently a towed car unhitched from its motor home and ran 150 ft into the brush. The way we roller coaster over the frost heaves on the Alaska Highway, I can see how the car can unhitch. We check ours every time we stop and we stop often. The first big town in Alaska is Tok. Here we get tourist brochures at the information center, buy an Alaska State Park season pass for camping and pick up our mail from the post office. We also refuel at what seems like a bargain price of $1.53/gal.   It takes most of the afternoon to reach tonight’s destination on another roller coaster road driven at 35-45 mph.  Like the past few days, we encounter other travelers infrequently.  In the early morning hours we see one vehicle per hour; later in the day it is still only three or four per hour.  At our campsite we use a coin operated car wash to remove thick layers of dust from our two vehicles. It takes 20 quarters before we decide its passably clean.

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