I had the best time in Denali, giving away our extra firewood. After the exhausting 9 hour day on and off the school bus, and the promise of “ 70% chance of rain” for Sunday, we decided to forfeit our 3rd night in Denali and decided to ready the camper for an early morning departure to base-Riley-camp showers and resupply. SO, Sat.pm, I started around the camping loop with a bundle of wood we could not use: first stop— right next door—I came upon 3 girls, maybe 8, 10 and 12yo? And asked if their parents were around. (I didn’t want to fuel [sic] the hopes of a campfire if their parents weren’t into it.) While one sister went into find a parent, I discovered from the youngest they were from Switzerland and spoke Swiss-German. Ouch—that takes me out of my comfort zone. I took 4 years of High School French ( despite living in San Diego where you’d have thunk I’d have become fluent in Spanish.) I’m actually probably most fluent in Swahili, having lived in East Africa, and bargained for my potatoes at market, for two years as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Kenya. If I start a phrase in Spanish which I can’t finish, it comes out French or Swahili ( my bigger vocabularies.) But in 4-5th grade, I lived on an Army base in Illisheim, Germany—an hour from Nuremberg ( notable because THaTs on a map and had a big P. X (PX=Army talk for Post Exchange ie where Americans buy stuff when they live abroad.)
Anyway, the father came out, of course seamlessly bilingual like anyone not American, and asked if we had too much wood. I said yes—too much wood. So they accepted my meager bundle and I humbly accepted their thanks. After dinner, later, I was again out on the road to deliver my trash to the bear-proof bin before visiting the outhouse, the youngest daughter ran out from her campsite to meet me. I dredged up my 4th grade-Herr Schmidt-lessons. “Guten abend! Wie geht es?” She gets me! She is shocked! So, after that ‘good evening; how are you?’ she says Gut ( =good) I say , “ ich niche spreche kein Deutsch”(I don’t speak German) yet she disagrees with me, as she has clearly understood my massacre of her language. We stammer together on the dirt road, her 3rd grade English embarrassingly better than my 4th grade German—yet, with some pantomime, come to the understandings that, no, she has not seen a bear, but her mother has and yes, she has seen a thing with antlers ? Moose? Caribou? She has 3 sisters and a brother and I have 1 daughter and 2 sons. The youngest sister looks expectantly for the eldest sister to come rescue our conversation—and her 8th grade English ‘Bernie’s’ my 4th grade German . (As possibly previously blogged, Judd and I don’t use the word, lower class, or do I mean lower case, trump for games any more. We play games ( hearts, whist) where Bernies win over evil.)
Anyway. Now I learn they have flown from Zurich to Reykjavik to Anchorage and have 4 weeks “ in zee camper.” They are in a bigger-than-ours Adventurer. But come on, they are six, and a continent away from European civilization —they deserve it. We part with our grade school civilities—me: “Danke! Auf Wiedersehein “ and they with “Thank you. sleep well.” I run home to tell Judd. He is happy I’m so excited.
And then today, I almost go to prison. We did ditch Denali a day early, forfeiting our right to drive on that long gravel road in the tundra wilderness with a view of the invisible mountain in the mist. We sighted one moose and one hare upon our egress and made it to Fairbanks by 11:00. It rained on and off (mostly on) all day, so we staked out a campground at the State park early but went about touring the town by car. The North Pole was only 20 min away so we fell into the touristy trap for a bit—mostly for post cards I could have post marked North Pole. We believed Google and went to Internet cafes that had no internet yet we felt obliged to have soup or a bagel anyway. The rain persisted. We debated a movie but decided we could do that any ol’ Rainy day in Maine. We cruised 20 min north to the viewpoint for the Alaska pipeline and I took pics of Judd taking pics of engineering marvels. But we discovered Fairbanks is home to a large military fort: Fort Wainwright, named after the same WW II hero that is the namesake brother of Walla Walla VA (Veterans Administration) Medical Center where I just retired. We drove up to the entrance to have Judd take my pic out front for my Walla Walla colleagues, before I get my flip-flopped wet feet out of the rainy grass, two 20ish yo looking men, armed and in uniform come walking up briskly to say “no pictures allowed on Federal property.” I explain that I just retired from Wainwright VAMC and wanted to send a pic back but they stand and watch me delete all two pics that Judd took off my cell phone. By the time we drove away. I found the retirement plaque work had given me— And I was dying to go back and show the guards, but by then, Judd and I were well on our way to Silver Gulch-/ not much silver, but the Alaskan hush puppies and beer flight were amnesiacs. I forgot how annoyed I was at Ft. Wainwright—we didn’t get this doo-doo in Pasadena—-NASA and JPL let us take our pic with Sheldon by their signs!
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