fulltimeusa

Boondocked

We pulled off Richardson Highway at a large gravel, flat pulloff last night. No other boondockers at this site but we saw quite a few at various pull offs along the way. We’re located very near a river but we were too tired to check it out and just fell into bed. Woke to lovely views of greenery this morning and looked to see if there was wildlife lurking among the trees. No wildlife seen this morning, at least not from our boondock site.
Yesterday, we wrote about learning to boondock. We’ve been told boondocking is “not allowed in this area or that area” (doesn’t matter what area they’re talking about). Usually, we’re told that by people that really don’t have the facts correct. We’ve had no trouble boondocking most anywhere including those areas folks who really didn’t know, said it was not allowed.

Also, some folks will tell you it is too dangerous to boondock.  We have never had any trouble nor do we know anyone directly that has had trouble.  People say they “heard” about someone but they cannot give you any specifics.
We’re respectful of private property but otherwise we boondock unless there’s no other option such as inside a national park that has boondocking restrictions. Some places such as Walmart allow dry camping overnight even though they have signs that state otherwise, you just have to ask management, to be sure.
It’s raining today. This is the usual weather for coastal areas in Alaska in the summer. Valdez has a rare day of sunshine, very occationally. Coastal rain is thier hallmark. Maybe we will be lucky enough to see the sun there. Ha! Here is where the saying “If wishes where horses, beggers could ride.” may well apply.

Internet connection–
Have learned to be very careful of information given out with absolute certainty. When we were at the Wrangell-St. Elias Visitor Center, we were told by two folks behind the desk that our “Verizon MiFi connection would not work anywhere from the visitor center down to Valdez”. This morning, Jerry wanted to check the stock market and the Verizon MiFi hooked him up just fine. This is the second time we have been told incorrect information about internet connectivity. I’m sure these folks did not mean to mislead, they just were certain about something they were wrong about. It pays to check for yourself.

Richardson Highway to Valdez–

We left our boondock site in the rain this morning after Jerry made some stock option trades. Started driving down the Richardson Highway toward Valdez in the rain. All thoughts that a day of steady rain would turn out to be a bust disapated as soon as we had driven about ten miles. Suddenly, ahead in the fog loomed some huge beautiful, mountains that looked, for all the world, like a giant sleeping on his side (The Chugach Mountain Range). We stopped so many times along the way to take pictures that the trip, which normally would have only taken a few hours, ended up taking us most of the day!  Will let the pictures do the talking about some of the beauty we saw today.

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