As I have stated in previous posts, I have been preparing to move states from Alaska to Washington. This is a move made necessary by my health, living circumstances, and changing support systems. 

As much as I love Alaska and will likely always claim it as home, it is not known for great healthcare. Nor is it known for being a particularly cheap place to live. To put this in perspective, a shopping trip in Rochester, MN with my mother cost us $200. The same cart of the same stuff in the same store would have been closer to $400 in Alaska. It just was not feasible for myself and dear loved one whom I shall refer to as Squishy in this post, to stay there any longer. So with a heavy heart on my part and many “I told you so’s” and “should have just moved to Washington in the first place” on Squishy’s part we planned our move. 

Squishy wanted to fly. He was very opposed to driving from the start of our planning but flying would have cost us much more money in the long run owing to the need to sell or transport cars, get new ones, as well as transporting two animals and all of our stuff. In the end, we settled on making the drive through Canada, much to Squishy’s dismay and anxiety. 

Before we left, we had to take care of our things. I was wanting to save us money by selling the furniture and stuff we had but Squishy very wisely said no. So we had to find a different means to transport our stuff from one state to the next. I then suggested renting a uhaul which was an idea shot down very quicky by Squishy owing to his desire to not drive it through Canada and for the fact that it wouldn’t fit the animals which was the whole reason we weren’t flying in the first place. Finally it was settled that we would use the same company that Squishy had used to move to Alaska with, Upack. For anyone looking to move states- I did really enjoy working with this company and their pricing was not bad at all. 

The trailer was dropped off on Monday the 28th of July. We were determined to get out of town as quickly as possible and so we worked through a majority of the night and the next day to get it completely packed with all of our stuff. Squishy, knowing I have MS and struggle with fatigue, did most of the heavy lifting and maneuvering himself. That is not to say I didn’t pull my weight. I handed things up, helped move the things he couldn’t get on his own, kept him company, got us water, and cooked food. Finally the truck was loaded and we could schedule pickup. 

I was hoping that the truck would get picked up early in the day. That hope was not met. It was not picked up until well into the evening, about 8 at night. But once it was picked up, Squishy and I were determined to get on the road. Squishy wanted to avoid traffic he feared would be an issue despite my reassurances that it was not. I wanted to avoid (not) sleeping on the floor again as we had done the night before and was anxious to get to Washington as soon as possible. 

So, we hit the road- after a quick stop at Walmart and McDonalds that is. 

We finally made the Glenn Highway out of Palmer, AK around 10:00 pm Wednesday July 30. 

I had no way of knowing, as we left that night, what a wonderful and eventful trip it was going to end up being. 

As I had stated earlier in this post, Squishy was concerned about traffic and would not listen to me telling him that it would not be an issue. It soon became apparent to him how right I was about that and that I had kept out some key details. The Glenn Highway is two lanes and much of it is in wilderness over mountain passes. A winding road that is not always in the best of conditions and with little to no major cities or towns en route to cause traffic to begin with. 

Squishy has a fear of heights and I had neglected to tell him how much of the road was on the mountains with cliffs and drop offs. Breathtaking views but Squishy was not impressed. His exact words were “I am seeing the tops of trees. I should not be seeing the tops of trees. I am NOT a Brachiosaurus!” He was very sure to let me know how much I had not told him it would be in the mountains by pointing out how close to the tops of mountains we were. At one point the phrasing was something along the lines of “We are so high in the mountain they had to split that one in twain to get through it! Note the split and the cliff on the road side with the sloping greenery on the other! Why are we in the mountains, Dare!?” 

For anyone taking the Glenn Highway toward the Canadian Border, please know, it is in the mountains!

 I had also neglected to tell him that this two lane highway toward the border that changes from the Glen Highway to the Tok Cutoff, to Tok Junction, also is not in the best of repair at times. Large, car swallowing potholes become an issue the closer to the border you get, and in some patches for no apparent reason other than to make you question life, the pavement ceases to exist to be replaced by loose gravel for short stretches. I was also not made aware by my parents who had done a similar trip earlier on, that the construction we saw bits of on their journey actually was construction over a course of 16 consecutive miles for no apparent reason. So that was fun. Squishy had a lot to say on these patches but mostly it came down to one simple question- ‘WHY?! I am so confused!” 

One thing I had warned Squishy of though was wildlife. Moose and bears are a thing in Alaksa and I know on this particular stretch of highway my father had encountered bears in the past. I had warned Squishy of this but wasn’t too worried as bears weren’t common sightings and though moose are more frequent I hadn’t seen one in a long while. That was, of course, until Squishy’s father, out of concern for our safety, mentioned how the fog we experienced leaving Palmer was not great for spotting moose. 

Within an hour and thirty minutes of that comment, while in the mountains Squishy was already cursing, after the sun had set but the fog had gone away, we encountered our first moose. It ran across the road and was on the other side before we had to break. Within an hour and a half after that we encountered 9 more moose for a total of 10! One set was a mother and her calf that actually did make us hit the breaks while they took their time getting across the road. 

Moose are a thing in Alaska and so that wasn’t a total surprise. We had seen our fair share of moose prior to this trip. Other animals were less expected. 

Late at night, on a road punctuated by strips of gravel, after we’d passed GlenAllen and were on the Tok Cuttoff, Squishy spotted something on the road too late to avoid it. He described it being about the size of a large raccoon, but it was dark and so that and the waddle is all he can make sense of before clipping it. We found a pull-off because Squishy wanted to check the car for damages and that is when we found out what had been clipped. 

Porcupine quills were found embedded in his wheel and the front bumper of the car. Squishy had never seen a porcupine before! It was both sad and exciting. Sad we hit the poor thing, exciting because it was a first time encounter. 

We traded drivers after that and Squishy slept as the sun began to rise. While he slept, I saw 5 more porcupines eating vegetation and chilling out on the side of the highway. 

All in all, it had been an eventful first day on the road. 

Dare.