May 12 already??

Wow - we're moving right along here and at the moment at least - everything is going in the right direction.   It's looking like we're a go for closing next Wednesday - will actually sign the papers on Tuesday and take possession of the house on Wednesday.  That will give us a couple of evenings to look at things and determine where we are going to put everything -- so keep your fingers crossed that we are still speaking to each other at the end of that ordeal.

Last Saturday we decided to take a drive up north.  JW was wise enough to decide that we needed to stop by Subway and pick up a sandwich for our drive - we know enough by now to realize that we just can't count on anything being open out there.  It was almost 10:45 when we headed out of town.

The first thing we noticed was that the birch trees are starting to leaf out so the hills are turning green.  8 miles out of town at Fox, the Steese Highway takes off to the right (that is the old Steese highway (of course - the new one just kind of ends at Fox).  We kept going straight on the Elliott Highway (new one - all that's left of the old Elliott highway are numerous pullouts). 15 miles out of town we got to Hilltop and a sign that said "Next fuel 115 miles"  - since we'd already topped off we knew fuel wouldn't be a problem.

When I was out shopping earlier in the week, I had picked up the latest issue of the Milepost http://www.milepost.com/
- a must have guide for anyone driving in Alaska - if we had it when we drove to Circle, we would not have made the 16 mile side trip to Circle Hot Springs to find out it was closed.  So, I kind of kept an eye on the guide so we would know what to see. 

Of course, there was lots of this type of view: (and yes alexshuman, i need to photoshop the pictures but since I'm on call tonight i'm on my work computer and it doesn't have any photo software.)

Trees so thick that you can't see beyond them.  There were a few view points along the way but trees blocking the views.  Lots of boggy areas.  The road meandered up, down and around through the White Mountains National Recreation Area.  Having the milepost (which gives you the mile marker and what to see) helped us to identify a few things to look at such as:

GRAPEFRUIT ROCKS: (Milepost 39)

DOG SLED ROCKS: (Mile post 30)

Nope there aren't a lot of big rocks around that's why they can name them.  We drove to mile post 44 and pulled off on the east end of the Tatalina River Bridge to eat our lunch.  JW wanted to do a dukes of hazzard over the hill onto this bridge but fortunately for all, he restrained himself.  (this bridge of course is the old bridge on old Elliott Road).

We continued on our journey north to where the Elliott Highway turns south-west and we hit the Dalton Highway - from here it is 415 miles to Deadhorse / Prudhoe Bay.  Definitely somewhere we plan to drive to but will need to have reservations a few places cause not a trip we want to make in 2 days.

Here's where the pavement ended so after stopping long enough to get a picture of the sign and to attract a million skeeters to the truck, we jumped back in and headed back south so we could get home in time for JW to watch the Nascar race. 

Mother's day we got up and went to a local nursery to see what kind of things we can grow up here.  Then we went to Pioneer Park for the Salmon Bake.  They open on Mother's day for lunch and then for the rest of the summer, every evening they will be open.  Choice of salmon, halibut or prime rib with baked beans and serve yourself salad bar.  The fish was delicious - good enough that JW was thinking we should go back for dinner that night.  I had mentioned thai food but that didn't sound too good to him.  He still has bad memories of food from his almost 9 month visit to Nam in the early 70's.  So we settled on Ivory Jacks and had pizza - oh well, no complaints since I didn't have to cook.