Offtrack Beauties: Notes from the Last Frontier

To spend an extra day at Chicken was to give up on my dream of seeing the Yukon, a river whose name rings of adventure. The road to Eagle on its banks was too rough to risk my rental car and my suspect mechanic skills on.  Feeding my disappointment breakfast at the only restaurant worth its name in Chicken was where I saw them come in. A few dozen cars, vintage and classic machines driving there from New York on the far away East Coast. Most excited to see them was the restaurant dog wearing his “I am diabetic. Don’t feed me.” T-shirt and I came a close second. The entire idea of Chicken being an isolated location was challenged by such an arrival of dust and engine rumbles. But to see such a crowd – a 1916 Lancia, a 1920s Bentley, Jaguar E-Types, classic Porsches amongst others – show up out of the blue in the middle of nowhere had its surrealist value. Also a deeper happiness about how these vehicles had committed to a life on the road and were not lost to a life of shininess and garages (and ultimate sadness).

[http://bit.ly/7-alaska]

[Part of the Series: Notes from the Last Frontier]

 

The Seekers: Notes from the Last Frontier

A rusting hulk of a machine angled over Chicken Creek, calendars from 1967 still hanging on the walls and an assortment of abandoned trailers & cabins to choose from – this was what remained of the original reasons that brought the outside world to Alaska. In a manner of speaking, I was there too because of the same. A remote, inaccessible and hostile world was explored first for the most basic of reasons – greed a.k.a. gold. All the stories and all the adventure came out of this need to get rich quick. Most failed but the world would never be the same again. A portal had been opened into the edge of the known from where poured tales and characters and promise. Alaska drew all, from the greedy to the dreamy, some there for the glory, some for the story. After a long leading conversation, when Bill and Will, two struggling gold miners tried to sell me 1 gm of Chicken mined gold for ‘only’ $60, I wasn’t hurt by their attempts to swindle me. I was happy that the mischievous spirit of opportunity had still some space to play.

[http://bit.ly/6-alaska]

[Part of the Series: Notes from the Last Frontier]

From Siberia with Love: Notes from the Last Frontier

 

Lonely little buildings left behind at the edge of the sea, the Russian Eastern Orthodox churches in the Kenai Peninsula point to a little discussed aspect of Alaska’s history. That of it being a Russian colony. Eventually sold to the USA for a pittance ($7.2 million) back in the day (1867) when oil wasn’t worth anything. I had coached myself on Alaska’s history before going so I cannot claim to be unbiased but there was something distinctly Siberian Suburbia about those areas. Villages like Ninelchek and Kenai matched up to what I imagined Russian villages to be. The colours of the church domes contrasted against the blue sky and the colorful choice of vestments for the priest there compounded the effect of little Siberian villages on the sea. A priest at one of these churches aked questions laced with a hint of “India… who lives in such faraway exotic places?” The irony of a man who lives in the edge of nowhere himself to grade India for faraway-ness was not lost on me. Nor was the sneaky feeling that the Cold War never really resolved itself out there where Russia and America come closest to shaking hands.

[http://bit.ly/5-alaska]

[Part of the Series: Notes from the Last Frontier]

 

Eagles and Volcanoes: Notes from the Last Frontier

The majesty of the bald eagle seemed lost to me. Out on a fishing boat in Ninelchek, they squabbled like crows over bits and pieces from the catch. Alaska deadened my sense of wonder in ways I hadn’t thought possible. Here I was, comparing bald eagles with crows. Driving down the Kenai Peninsula in Alaskan seclusion, drinking in the blues of the ocean, Captain Cook was a name that came up quite often. Once a spotless hero, the realities of his ‘exploration’ had long dawned on me but only for today, he was given a free pass. Volcanoes covered with snow met the eyes, steaming in unpredictable rage, across channels with the deepest tides known in the world. Viewpoints that would need words to be invented and ensure instant empathy with anyone who chose to give up everything just so they could settle in Alaska. I sat there gazing out into the Pacific, watching a lone baldie regain some respect for its kind, soaring alone against the backdrop of mountains wild. This experience which may not be a true representation of everything Alaska was still enough to keep me pinching punching myself. Yes, it was true. Yes, I was here.

[http://bit.ly/4-alaska]

[Part of the Series: Notes from the Last Frontier]

 

The Train and the Sea: Notes from the Last Frontier

To know trains is to love them. Cross-India sojourns thundering along its central artery west to east and back find favoured status in memory’s locker, accessible and instantly gratifying. To put it mildly, the Seward Express from Anchorage to Kenai was hardly Howrah-Ahmedabad Express. Catering to tourists alone, it wasn’t a ‘working train’ and its embellishments indicated likewise. Carriages with glass roofs and dining cars with picture windows to the landscape rolling by submerged the guilt of travelling in such high style in sheer luxury. Outside the windows though, the raw ruled. A day before, passengers had seen stages of a wolf hunt of a moose and sighting orcas (killer whales) from the train wasn’t unheard of. Backyards of urban Alaska were no ordinary backyards either with little planes hangered in kitchen gardens while cars did duty at front doors. Grand View Pass, snow submerged even at the end of May, as the train rumbled through; a cannon being fired in advance of it to let any loose snow fall in to be cleared. The sea a constant companion, soothing and surging simultaneously, alongside a mode of travel so familiar, a terrain so distinct.

 [http://bit.ly/3-alaska]

[Part of the Series: Notes from the Last Frontier]

 

Master. Postmaster.: Notes from the Last Frontier

 

I wandered to Chicken’s cute little Post Office No. 99732 of the US Postal Service, half expecting to burst out into laughter at its token activities. My joviality drained in an instant under the steely gaze of Robin, judging this wanderer in front of her workspace. Postmaster and de-facto town in charge, a couple of sharp questions from her led me to inadvertently stammer out my biodata. She broke into a smile. “India?”, she asked and proceeded to verify in-depth information she had heard on Public Radio. She told me of how her India plans back in the 1970s had gone along with her gold miner love story. Her bring-it-on attitude now that she had raised two daughters, one of them delivered by a doctor brought in on a dog sled in the depths of winter; her nature photographer husband who was always out on field; how wolves were welcome but moose were more her worry; the triweekly mail plane that brought letters in and her responsibility in ensuring that it reached far out homesteads dozens of kilometres apart – word by word, picture by picture I could see my cliched adventurer image disintegrate. Person-in-charge couldn’t have had a better personification.

[http://bit.ly/2-alaska]

[Part of the Series: Notes from the Last Frontier]

 

Arrival: Notes from the Last Frontier

 

It's pretty close to midnight but the mountains are cold and clear as I look down upon them. The plane circles around the Chugach mountains aiming towards Anchorage airport. Here is this place I have read and dreamt of enough and within a few minutes I will be setting foot on its hallowed soil. All the stories of adventures – bears, sled dogs and the great outdoors are going to be within reach. National Geographic magazines and articles; all those Discovery Channel documentaries - this was the base of them all. It was easy to imagine myself as an explorer here, pretend that I wasn’t this urban mollycoddled inept Indian. That there was so much natural light around at that time of night was a reminder of the strangeness of the land I was in. Even though everything looked similar once I set foot on the ground, it was hard to fight the feeling that nothing ever would be the same.

[http://bit.ly/1-alaska]

 [Part of the Series: Notes from the Last Frontier]