We spent two days in Palmer, Alaska before moving south to Anchorage. In Palmer we met up again with our friends Dave & Mary Anne, and met their friends Norm and Susan, who live in Palmer during the summer and live at Palm Creek (Casa Grande, Arizona) the other half of the year. What a great couple.
Norm has a penchant for stretching the truth that has long been an Alaskan tradition. Story telling is a long established tradition here in Alaska (long winters???) and since everything in this state is so big, whenever early settlers embellished the truth their stories end up sounding possible but mighty implausible.
Alaskans refer to these stories as "windies"' or the "Alaskan breeze". In any case, Norm is an accomplished story teller, weaving true stories on the history of the area with 'windies' so carefully we had to look to his wife Sue for the truth. Whenever Norm launched into one of his 'windies' Sue would just roll her eyes, something she had obviously perfected over years of listening to Norm entertain friends and family.
We had a great time with them. Norm took us up to Hatcher's pass and the Independence Gold Mine, which is now an Alaskan State Park. The mountains at this time of year have a spectacular beauty, covered in so many deep shades of green you could mistake it for Ireland if not for the height and steepness of the mountains. The night before it had rained in the lower valleys however here at Hatcher Pass that translated to a light dusting (1 inch or so) of snow at the tops of the mountains.
The top of the pass commanded at sweeping view of the mountains all the way down to Cook Anchorage and Cook Inlet, a distance of at least 30 miles.
Independence Gold Mine was yet another monument to what 'gold fever' does to men. In this case, mining for gold was accomplished in the traditional underground process of digging shafts and tunnel through the mountain chasing quartz seams that contained gold. In fact there are over ten miles of tunnels throughout the mountain.
These tunnels yielded millions of dollars worth of gold over the years until the mine was shut down in 1942 due to WWII. Remember, gold's value was fixed at $32/ounce during all the time that mine was in operation. Recently gold was selling for $975/once, so in today's dollars that $1 million would be worth ~$30.5 million.
There were several attempts to restart the mine after the war however, due to a number of factors including environmental impact, none of the reopening attempts ever panned out. In the late 1980's the mine and the property were donated to the State of Alaska to be developed as a state park. Today it's a fascinating glimpse of life at a gold mine.
This particular mine was considered one of the best mines to work for. Salary, housing, working conditions and quality of the food were the best available at any mine and miners considered themselves very fortunate to sign on with the Independence Mine.
Guided tours are available and well worth the $5 per person. The tour guides are all volunteers (mostly unpaid so be sure to tip them) and they take you into a number of the buildings not normally accessible on self-guided tours. Plus our guide, Derrick, had lots of great information and stories that he shared with us. Like many of the summer help in Alaska, Derrick is from the lower 48 and the call of Alaska proved irresistible to him. He just graduated from University of Minnesota Duluth and accepted this unpaid volunteer guide position both for the experience and with the hope it will lead to a job with the state of Alaska.
Mary Lynn and I have found these tours typically are a good value and Derrick's tour didn't disappoint. He gave us a much better look at what life was really like for the men and women working at the mine. Not a bad way to live, except for that part about descending into the dark, dank, dusty and dangerous depths of hell in search of gold...
All in all a great day in an area with great scenic beauty.
We had planned to extend our stay in Palmer however the campground owner's proved impossible to deal with; both were certifiable nut cases. The owner's wife screeched about how "you people from the lower 48 need to learn..." and her "that's your problem" lack of empathy combined with the anal retentive behaviour of the owner proved to be too much. He actually measures how long people park their car in some locations... walking around the campground with a little clipboard writing down infractions... I tell you, you can't make up stuff this hilarious.
In any case we left for saner pastures and are now in Anchorage for the next week or so... Lots to see and do here so I'll keep updated.
Last night the campground had Mitch Seavey, the 2004 Iditarod Winner come in and talk with us. He brought along one of his sled dogs, Rocko, and one of the puppies from his breeding program. Didn't think we'd be able to pry that little puppy from MLA's arms.
Mitch's talk was extremely interesting; MLA has developed a keen interest in the Iditarod. Coming to watch the race may be the only way I get her to come to Alaska during the winter.
Today we went to the Earthquake Visitor Center that has a 10 minute film shown in a theater that allows them to re-create the earthquake during part of the film. Did a pretty good job of shaking us around.
Later we watched a film (in a different, non shaking theater) about Alaska. The movie was made in the 80's on film; it desperately needs to be re-shot in digital HD. Despite the graininess and the poor color it was still quite interesting. Some of the shots were filmed from a helicopter and the lady introducing the movie said certain scenes would rarely cause someone to get motion sickness.
That said, every row had a plastic bucket sitting at each end just in case someone got sick. They seemed awfully well prepared for something that rarely happened however everyone in our showing managed to get through the movie without any ill effects. I did notice a few people who closed their eyes during the flying scenes however.
The rest of the museum had pictures of what Anchorage & Valdez looked like after the Good Friday earthquake of 1964. Just amazing more people were not killed by such a tremendous earthquake. It was 100 time larger than the 1906 San Francisco earthquake that nearly destroyed that city.
All in all a good couple of days here in Alaska.
See Ya!
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