…. now let me see your oranges!
Real time post – A week ago today I crossed the border from the Yukon Territory into the United States near Beaver Creek, YT. It was around 6pm PDT, which then became 5pm AKDT when I crossed the line. As big as Alaska is, most of it is in one time zone – except the extreme southern Aleutian Islands which are on Hawaii Time. And Alaska only has one Area Code – 907.
Actually, I was already in the US – I had crossed the line about 30 miles earlier but the Customs Inspection Station wasn’t until later. I guess they really want to nab you before you can slink back into Canada.
When it got to be my turn it was pretty straightforward until we got to the subject of fruit. The agent was only interested in my 1 1/3 bags of mandarin oranges which I had purchased at a Walmart in Prince George, BC. He didn’t seem to care about the one banana I had left, or the two partial bags of apples I was packing.
He confiscated them. (He took two large potted plants from the woman in the car ahead of me. Lord knows what was in the U-Haul her traveling companion was driving).
Maybe he was hungry and was outfitting his apartment.
Anyway – I was cleared to go shortly thereafter and on my way to Tok (pronounced toke), AK.
And I just talked about road conditions in my last post. The first 10 miles or so of the highway in the US were pristine. Newly paved and without blemishes. (Take THAT, Canada… we know how to do roads over here!)
Then things started to go south. Same issues as in Canada except little or no warning at offending spots, and POTHOLES! Lots of POTHOLES! I honestly don’t think I saw a single pothole on the Alaska Highway in the Yukon. I swear they must go out every morning and patch them before they get worse. Not so on the US side.
Guess AKDOT needs to tuck it’s tail between it’s legs….
In their defense, I will give AKDOT kudos for repairing the road near Anchorage after a major earthquake many years ago. I remember seeing news stories about how they removed and replaced entire sections of the badly damaged roadway in record time. They apparently had all the materials ready to go, and moved in as soon as it was safe to do the rebuild.
That IS impressive.
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