Wednesday August 4

More rain. Locals are saying it’s the rainiest summer in a long time. It can be a drag.

Woke in my usual Talkeeta parking spot, saw the rain, and decided on a few more hours sleep.

When I finally woke up I called the bakery and put in my order for 60 more ginger cookies….those suckers were good and they’d last me another 3 weeks.

Listened to a ranger talk on climbing Denali (Mt. McKinley). It was pretty good. Tons of people attempt unprepared and end up dead, 4 now this year.

Picked up the cookies and hit another local river supposedly teaming with salmon. I caught a few more pinks and chums and even hooked another monster king. It went nutty after I hooked it, jumping and blasting down stream. I was way into my backing when it finally broke off. Funny how you can be out there in the middle of nowhere and bump into people. Spoke to this guy from Maine for a while in the rain before he drove is rental off through the mud.

The Fairview Inn in Talkeetna is a famous place that climbers stay either before or after their attempt of Denali. The rooms upstairs are sold as is, meaning that the music will be blaring in the bar below through most of the night and you might never fall asleep. They have live music every single night. You can be in the bar below and find yourself sitting next to a world class, world famous climber. The place attracts an interesting variety of other folks as well, including the seasonal foreign workers, the Princess Cruise patrons, and the local odd balls of Talkeetna. Tonight there was this guy playing his guitar while his girlfriend wiggled around like a worm singing these song they’d written. I think I worked out the lyrics of one song. It went something like, “If you’re going to wear T bone cologne, the dogs will follow you around.” The place is such a dive that all the doors can be found wide open and at any time (including tonight) up to 4 or more local neighborhood dogs can be found jetting around the place, even blasting right thru the singers legs as she sings. The place is just fun.

A final observation on Talkeetna’s weirdness is that everyone in town stays up way too late. The Fairview Inn and downtown street are alive with people ‘til well beyond 2:00 a.m. every single night. In the morning the town is empty, no traffic at all until around 10:00 a.m. When I imagine the rat race at home at 6:00 a.m. every day I wonder who the weird ones really are.