Newspaper Page Text
WEDNESDAY, JULY 30, 2008
THE BANKS COUNTY NEWS
PAGE 7B
North to Alaska
We left Caleb behind and continued on
our journey. He’d be missed because he
was lots of fun! We were in a rest area in
Idaho when a man approached us talking
about our giant banner “North to Alaska”
in our RV window. He and his wife were
going there also so we chatted a while.
They were Lowell and Joyce Walker
from Utah, and are key players in our
Alaska adventure. We exchanged phone
numbers and traveled miles up the road
together. We all stopped to make sand
wiches. Joyce is originally from Holland
and she has a proper accent. She yelled
out the door of the RV, “Y’all, the food
is ready.” Then turned to us and said
“I’m trying to talk like y’all and they
won’t pay me any attention.” We all
broke into an uncontrollable laugh. Her
proper accent trying to sound southern
like us. We knew right away we liked
these people!
Our next stop was Great Falls,
Montana! We stopped to visit some
friends of mine, Elam and Lydia Fisher
from Pennsylvania. They were up there
helping their son and asked us to stop
by. Our new friends stopped with us and
we all stayed in the same RV park. The
Fishers’ took us on some adventures the
next day. We visited some dams and
stopped at a museum to hear a lecture
about Lewis and Clark. This was embar
rassing because the man was so boring.
I looked around and everybody in our
party was sound asleep. I have to admit
I really had to try hard to keep my eyes
open and I did not learn one thing about
Lewis and Clark. We had paid five dol
lars to watch a film but we all decided
we couldn’t stand anymore so we called
it our five-dollar laugh, but we held it
until we got into the car. We then went
to Ryan’s Island where we had to cross
a long swinging bridge. As we stepped
from it onto the Island, we were met with
a sign that said, “When you hear eight
short blasts, evacuate the Island.” What
a welcome!
Elam asked if we’d ever heard of the
Hutterites. These are people that are com
pletely self-sufficient and they all live in
houses exactly alike. The women dress in
long dark skirts and long sleeves and they
wear polka-dotted scarves on their head.
They farm 8,000 acres of land. We drove
miles and miles on Montana back roads
to find them. I felt we were approaching
a compound. I was nervous but Elam
was driving and we forged ahead. They
have the best and most updated farm
equipment. They have their own laundry
mat, tool shop, cement mixer green
house, egg processing place and they
make their own shoes and bind their own
books. Some man came out and asked
what our business was. Elam told him
we were looking to buy some homemade
bread and he directed us to a building in
the middle of the place. We went into
this huge commercial type kitchen. I had
something to talk to them about since I
work in the school kitchen. I recognized
a lot of their huge mixers and ovens. This
place was absolutely spotless! A young
girl kinda took up with me since I was
interested in their equipment.
She began to show us around and
before long we had 10 girls following us
around and giggling at my questions. I
asked if I could join their colony and they
said “Yes” but I would have to ask for
permission to ever leave. She told us 200
Hutterites lived there. Most colonies are
crop producers and raise large amounts
of livestock. Every person is assigned
a job. They have no TV and visit other
colonies to meet other young people.
When a young couple gets married, they
are provided a completely furnished
house. We got to look at a house they
were getting ready for a soon-to-be mar
ried couple. It had no kitchen, a finished
basement and several bedrooms. Their
shelving and cabinets were made in the
woodwork shop. All the houses looked
like a row of apartments, exactly alike,
everyone eats in the main kitchen. The
men sit on one side of the room accord
ing to age, the women on the other side
and young people in the middle. The
very young eat at home attended by the
teens. They do not talk and they have 15
minutes to eat. They invited us to eat with
them but we declined. We didn’t want
to wear out our welcome. You can learn
more about them from the Internet. What
an awesome adventure!
We really hated to leave the Fishers
behind but we headed for the border the
next morning. We spent three hours held
up there because we had a gun. Margaret
had gotten all the necessary papers from
the Internet but had forgotten some small
detail that had to be straightened out.
This was spooky to us. Some girl was
crying her heart out. They asked us all
kinds of questions. We were in another
country and felt like aliens. The Canada
road signs were all different. We had to
figure out what speed we were going
and the gas was advertised as titers not
gallons and of course their money was
different. We soon forgot the border
ordeal when we drove up the beautiful
Icefield Parkway with the crystal clear
Lake Louise, stunning views and snow
capped mountains. We saw huge elk,
a black wolf and two black bears. We
ran into a small hail storm, some snow
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0k COMMERCE
WAMERICAN LEGION
Commerce Rec. Dept. Post 93
Carson Street - 1st Mon. night
Each Month, 7:30 p.m.
335-6400
Citizens Organized for
Pipeline Safety
investigating the health risks to citizens from
underground pipelines and booster stations in
Madison Co. Meetings 6:30 p.m. at the Colbert
Grove Baptist Church the 2nd Thurs. of each
month. 706-783-4702. Pd.04/09
JEFFERSON
IIP AMERICAN LEGION
Albert Gordon Post 56
Each 3rd Tuesday, 7:30 p.m.
Harvie Lance, Commander
Phone (706) 654-1274 310
White Plains Baptist Church Pd02/09
Faith Bible Class meets every Sunday morning
at 10:00 a.m. It is a place where strangers
become friends and friends become family.
706-367-5650
White Plains Baptist Church
3650 Hwy. 124 West, Jefferson, GA 30549
The Jackson Co. Republican Party
Would like you to meet us for
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month, 8:00 at The Jefferson
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706-652-2967 or email
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BANKS COUNTY
AMERICAN LEGION
Post 215
Meets each 3rd Thursday, 7 p.m.
In Homer, GA at the
American Legion Building on
Historic Highway 441 pd.06/09
rpfe VETERANS OF
FOREIGN WARS
Post 4872, Hurricane Shoals Convention Ctr.
Each 4th Monday, 7:00 p.m.
Mike Buffington, Commander
Phone 706-335-6532 263
JEFFERSON LIONS CLUB
Meets 2nd & 4th Monday
Jefferson City Clubhouse
6:30 p.m. *(706) 387-1156
Mack Cates, President
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No. 36, Jefferson, GA
1st Tuesday of each month, 7:30 p.m.
Dwight Wier • 706-367-5882
Borders St. behind Tabo’s 260
JEFFERSON ROTARY CLUB
Meets Tuesdays
Jefferson City Clubhouse
12:30 p.m. • (706) 367-7696
Gina Mitsdarffer, President
547
... continued from page 6B
TRAVELING BUDDIES
David and Margaret Ledford and Phyllis and Ralph McConnell
are shown with their Utah friends, Lowell and Joyce Walker,
and Texas friends, Judy and J.C. Chansley.
and it reached 29 degrees. We went into
Brittish Columbia and the temperature
climbed 60 degrees. We saw three more
black bears.
We lost the Walkers at the border.
They’d taken a wrong turn and called
to tell us they would meet us in Prince
George. They are 77 and 74 years old
and will celebrate their 50th wedding
anniversary in October. They’d been in
every state except Alaska and he wanted
to bring her to the last state. Fifty years,
fifty states. He told us this would most
likely be their last long trip.
Hooray, the next day we all headed
to Dawson Creek, the beginning of the
Alaska Highway. We had our pictures
made at the 0 mile marker. My heart was
beating so hard, I was so excited. Over
1,400 miles before we reach Alaska.
Canada was very expensive. Bread was
over three dollars a loaf, four Nutty
Buddies were seven dollars (we left
them) and even the cheap cookies were
over four dollars. The Walkers told us to
go ahead because they could not travel as
far as we could.
We reluctantly left them behind plan
ning on keeping in touch and meeting
up later. We reached Watson Lake Sign
Forest where we placed our signs we’d
had made with our names on them. Over
70,000 signs hang there from people all
over the world. I had a sign made with
the names of the people I work with. I felt
tike I was taking them along on my great
adventure. Their names now hang along
side the Alaskan Highway. Watson Lake
Sign Forest can be found on the Internet.
While there, we saw some names from
Camesville. I came home, looked them
up in the phone book and gave them a
call. We talked over an hour and plan to
have them visit soon.
Pictures can not capture the beauty we
saw along the way. More snow capped
mountains that were closer now, lakes
for miles and miles that ran right along
the roadside. There were also a lot of
construction and animals that would run
right out in front of you. We stayed
in White Horse a couple of days and
restocked our food supply. One store
charged a dollar to use their grocery cart
and you had to bag your own groceries.
We went to a play in town. It was very
funny and gave us a break from the road.
We got acquainted with another couple
from Texas, Judy and J.C. Chansley. We
all left the park together and traveled
toward Alaska keeping in touch with
walkie talkies. Diesel was expensive even
more than at home. We had to pay $6.90
a gallon at one place. We just could not
risk hunting a cheaper place and running
out. They were far and few between.
The milepost is a must for this trip tell
ing us what to expect around every bend.
From Haines Junction to Alaska, the
roads got rougher. There were lots more
road construction and dip after dip. It was
tike riding a roller coaster. If you hit a dip
fast and hard, you would be out of your
seat. These were due to all the freezes in
the winter. We saw lots of buffalo and
sheep on this part of the trip. We finally
reached the border to enter Alaska. It
went smoother this time for us but they
were tearing somebody’s truck apart. It
was hallelujah great to see, “Welcome to
Alaska,” and to see our United States flag
flying high filled our hearts with pride.
We found a very nice RV park in Tok,
very wooded and pretty. We looked to
see what damage we incurred on the road
thus far. Let’s see! A cracked windshield
on the RV, a small bing on the jeep wind
shield, and the hood of David’s new jeep
was beat up and lots of achy bones. We
were concerned about our friends we’d
left at Watson Lake. We had planned to
keep in touch but we had no phone ser
vice for five days! We knew we had lost
them forever! We went to a nice resau-
rant to eat with our Texas friends and we
were still whining about losing our Utah
friends, Lowell and Joyce, when behold
guess who walked in? Lowell!! What a
reunion! We had been so worried about
them and they reached Alaska before
us and had been in the RV park one day
before us. He told us he’d thought we
ditched them and they had driven 10
hours a day to catch up.
We finally got TV service and found
out Tim Russert had died. Ralph and
I loved to watch “Meet the Press” and
will miss him. It was Margaret’s birthday
and we tried to make it special. Our new
Texas friends started the day by bringing
over some juice and cinnamon rolls. I
cooked bacon and eggs for everyone
and we all put our steaks and potatoes
together and cooked for her birthday. We
gave her an Alaska album from us all. We
had so much fun. People walked by and
ask “are you the ones having so much
fun over here.” We invited everyone to
come on in and chat a while. I get up
very early so I’d walk and have to wear
sunglasses before seven o’clock, the sun
was so bright. It never got dark! It felt
strange going to bed when it was so tight
outside. After two days in Tok, we head
ed to North Pole, Alaska. I mailed lots
of cards there so they’d have the North
Pole stamp on them for those that don’t
believe in Santa Claus. The street posts
were candy canes. We ate at Wendy’s
and they had Christmas trees and all the
trimmings up. Sounds tike a place I need
to live. We traveled on to Fairbanks with
our caravan of new friends. We stayed by
the river three days here and met a couple
from Germany and one Georgia couple
that took the wrong road and ended up in
the RV park and on the way out he saw
our Georgia tags and stopped to chat and
ended up staying two hours. It was here
Joyce began to tell us about her child
hood in Germany and how their house
would be searched for Jewish people.
They hid three but were never caught.
She told us stories about the concentra
tion camps and lots of things she saw and
had to endure. We formed such a strong
bond with her. We left our Texas and
Utah friends behind and headed toward
Denali. We’d meet up with them later!
My doctor in Gainesville suggested a
movie to watch before I left for Alaska.
“Into the Wild” was a sad but true story
about a young man who starved to death
in an old abandoned bus he found in the
wild of Alaska. While I was at the RV
park near Denali, I happened to pick up
a paper and read about this very story
and found out it took place only 10 miles
from where we were at. I just had to go. It
was a little town called Healy. We found
and went down Stampede Road where
the tragedy had taken place. We met a
local photographer down there who was
taking pictures of a group of people on
horseback. He told us the bus had been
there his whole life and the saddest part
of the story was the guy didn’t know
he was very close to a ranger camp the
whole time. He said his uncle was the
one that found him.
He directed us on down to an eight
mile lake where the boy had hiked from
to the bus. The road was very rough
from there and he said a lot of tourists
were trying to find it and would get lost.
It was a strenuous 22-mile hike and he
advised anyone not to go. Such a sad
ending for such a young life to be lost.
We took a bus tour into Denali Park. It
was awesome! We saw two grizzly bears
and a moose. The truth was we saw more
animals on the Alaskan Highway.
When we left Denali, I asked David if I
could drive the RV just enough to say I’d
driven in Alaska. I drove a good 40 miles
when we ran upon a road construction
sign. David asked if I wanted to switch
back and I told him it probably wasn’t
much of anything. The traffic started
moving and as we rounded the bend it
was too late to switch back now. Straight
ahead was a bridge that was barricaded
off in the middle with cement walls. Now
this was a 38-foot long motor home pull
ing a jeep. It looked to me tike we were
going through the eye of a needle. (Just
because I was inexperienced).
David said, “Phyllis you’re getting
pretty close over here.” I said “you ought
to see my side over here.” I was next
to the water. I had a sense of calmness
I couldn’t understand, probably because
I didn’t have time to be scared. I can
promise you one thing David, Margaret
and Ralph were wide awake and putting
on their brakes. Ha! How much more
continued on page 8B
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