LeAnne Hardy, author and editor
  • Home
  • BIO
  • My Books
    • Children's and Young Adult
    • Historical Fiction
    • Non-fiction
  • Blog
  • Editorial Services

My ​Times and Places
​


​​

North to Alaska!

6/25/2015

1 Comment

 
Picture
Early morning hike in Haines Junction, YT
Long ago—back around 1960—I was a child in school when we studied the building of the Alaska-Canada Highway—“Alcan” for short. The idea of driving all the way to Alaska caught my childish imagination, but the road was gravel. You had to carry gas cans and know how to fix your own car if it broke down because there were no services. I am not the least bit mechanically minded, so as an adult I regretfully set aside that dream as unrealistic for me.
PictureGates can close the road to travel in foul weather.

Fast-forward fifty years. The road is asphalted. There are gas stations every hundred miles or so and finding a mechanic in a time of need is theoretically not impossible. It turns out that driving to Alaska was also a long-time dream of my soon-to-be-ninety-year-old mother-in-law. My husband (no more mechanical than I am) is now officially retired. We could do it, we told ourselves. Why not? 


We began talking seriously about it eight months ago. The Alaska Tourism Board was more than happy to send us information. My husband plotted our route and contacted hotels in February. May 20 we left home with a cooler, a camera, and a box of supplies. Twenty-five days and 9,280 miles later, we arrived home, awed and eager to do it again.

PictureIn 1942 a recuperating soldier added his hometown of Danville, IL, to the sign post on Watson Lake in Yukon Territory. Since then others have followed suit until it has grown into this "signpost forest".
The Alaska Highway had been talked about since the gold miners headed north in the 1890s. Serious route possibilities were discussed in the 1930s. But it was the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that pushed the US and Canadian governments to come to an agreement to make the road a reality. Work began in the spring of 1942. In June the Japanese attacked an American base in the Aleutian Islands and demonstrated the importance of an overland supply route for military bases there. More than 16,000 soldiers and civilian engineers bulldozed trees, leveled the ground, and built bridges, ditches and culverts over 1,422 miles of wilderness. At first commanders believed that Americans of African descent would not be able to handle the harsh conditions of the far north (more than 90 degrees in summer and fifty or more below zero in winter). When they finally did send African Americans, they excelled. This miracle of engineering, sometimes compared to the Panama Canal for its scope and coordination, was completed in November of 1942, only eight months after it was begun.

PictureWildlife like bear and this moose can be seen along the road.
Now, I am a novelist. As we journeyed, I kept imagining the men who built the road, the sweethearts they left behind, the friends and brothers fighting in the Pacific. Most of these men had never been out of the lower 48 before. Most of the locals were used to traveling by dog-sled. What a range of characters! What a range of emotions in those close quarters and harsh conditions! What a setting for Christian fiction! World War 2 is big right now. I'm hoping one of my Canadian writer friends will choose the building of the Alcan as a setting. I would love to read it!

Our 2015 journey found a two-lane asphalted road, much of it with no shoulder. Some days we met another vehicle about once every ten minutes. "Facilities" were mostly long drops at roadside pullovers. We saw moose and bear, waterfalls, tundra and snow-capped mountains. Although Mom likes to take an arm to steady her these days when she walks, her spirit of adventure is strong. She’s not up to hiking, but she is more than up to riding in a car and oggling out the windows. Every day of the journey was a worship experience, praising our incredible Creator God, a shared adventure none of us will ever forget.

[Reposted from International Christian Fiction Writers. For more pictures and details of this trip, see my new travel blog, Wide-eyed Wanderer.]

Picture
1 Comment
Peggy Smith
6/26/2015 04:02:46 am

Wonderful! It was a great experience for us, taken vicariously....

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    LeAnne Hardy has lived in six countries on four continents. Her books come out of her cross-cultural experiences and her passion to use story to convey spiritual truths in a form that will permeate lives.

    RSS Feed

    Add http://www.leannehardy.net/1/feed to your RSS feed.
    To receive an e-mail when I post a new blog, please subscribe.
    Subscribe to Blog

    Categories

    All
    Africa
    Author Interviews
    Current Events
    Devotional Thoughts
    Guest Blog
    Holidays Christmas
    Holidays Easter
    Holidays-Easter
    Holidays Other
    Holidays-Thanksgiving
    Missions And Missionaries
    Music
    My Books
    My Life And Family
    My Travels
    Non Fiction
    Orphans And Vulnerable Children
    Photos
    Publishers And Publishing
    Reading And Sharing Books
    Reviews
    Skating
    Theological Education
    Tributes
    Writing

    Archives

    November 2022
    June 2022
    March 2022
    December 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    August 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    September 2017
    April 2017
    February 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    October 2010
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    June 2010
    May 2010
    April 2010
    March 2010
    February 2010
    January 2010
    December 2009
    November 2009
    October 2009
    September 2009
    August 2009
    March 2000

Proudly powered by Weebly
  • Home
  • BIO
  • My Books
    • Children's and Young Adult
    • Historical Fiction
    • Non-fiction
  • Blog
  • Editorial Services