Travelers' Tales Alaska by Bill Sherwonit

but we haven’t met,” Tom laughs.
    An hour and three rain squalls later we’re still chatting on the pavement outside Dick’s rig. Dick’s smile disappears into his tanned, seamed face when he laughs. Today is his last free day before a two-month job at Fort Richardson in Anchorage’s east side. Keith’s thick gray curls escape from under a blue corduroy Alaska cap. When I mention my mother, he asks, “Does she dance? I’m looking for a dancing partner while I’m here.”
    Most of Tom’s forty years have been bound by what he calls a Midwestern mentality. “Same job, same people, same house. People expect you to be you. Change is not what’s expected.” But when his son said, “Dad, I don’t think you are ever going to go up there,” Tom quit his job and drove to Alaska. A month ago, he stalked bull caribou north of the Brooks Range and killed one with his bow. He kept the backstrap and rack, donating the rest of the meat to the Fairbanks food bank. He shows me a picture of himself with a fish hook through his chin and blood matting his new beard, grinning an impossibly wide grin, the happiest of men. “I kept right on fishing,” he laughs. Then moans, “I gotta get out of this parking lot. It’s driving me crazy!”
    Other rig owners have “For Sale” signs posted. One battered truck and one classic black sedan look abandoned to the side of the RV parking area. “Is there zoning here?” I ask.
    â€œNah,” the men say, “but if you got a bucket outside…”
    I do, of course. Is that why my Iowa neighbors, who can see the gray water draining into the bucket from my sink, are so aloof? To each his own, I think. My camper drips, but their rig generator woke me up this morning.
    I trek back to WalMart for some research in the “Books” aisle. A new question has emerged. I pull out a copy of Catch and Release: The Guide to Finding an Alaska Man. Sure enough, it omits all mention of hanging out in WalMart parking lots. I make a note to send an addition to the editors.
    As the rainy day passes noon, I wrap up my expedition with one last stroll around my village. Ed and Ruth are gone for the day, their trailer locked. Bill and Terri plan to camp here all week, until their daughter flies in to meet them. Woody and Rose take off for Talkeetna, “unless the weather stays this bad. If it does, we’ll camp at the WalMart in Wasilla.” The Chugach have disappeared under low clouds flowing like thick cream.
    Dick and Keith invite me for a last cup of coffee, this time out of the rain, at the McDonald’s inside WalMart. Tom ambles by, observing that I’m in danger of becoming a “lot rat.”
    â€œBetter than being a house rat,” I respond.
    After coffee, I take up my sink-drain bucket and lock the camper door. My restless spirit is primed after this weekend among road wayfarers. Now that the Alaska Highway is paved, I could just keep going, on to the next WalMart and the next.… I jump into the truck cab, slide Dire Straits into the cassette player, sing “Sometimes you’re the windshield, sometimes you’re the bug” and head off down the road.
    Ellen Bielawski is a co-editor of this book. She never camps at WalMart unless looking for a story.

TOM DUNKEL

Taking on the Kenai
    Alaska-in-miniature is just a quick drive south of Anchorage.
    A BOUT THE ONLY THING THAT ISN’T OVERPRICED IN Alaska is advice. Folks still dispense it free just like in the Lower 48, and right now I’m getting a friendly earful.
    â€œDon’t hesitate when you’re here, ’cause you may not ever be here again,” says Eddy, who is urging me to push the tourist envelope during my stay in Alaska. “This is wilderness fantasyland. There’s nothin’ left like it, unless it’s Siberia, and it’s pretty hard to travel there.”
    We’ve never