It's about FREEDOM

Dave Stancliff and his teenage musicians entertain us with stories about Alaska at the Tok RV Resort.

Dave Stancliff was our entertainer of the evening. He is a guitar-playing-songwriter and story-teller about all things Alaskan. We were in Tok RV Park and his concert was part of the services offered. Tok is 90 miles from the Canadian Border and is a key crossroads since this is where you have to decide whether to head for Anchorage or up to Fairbanks. He was accompanied by three high schoolers - Jenny on the fiddle, and brother-sister team Huff and Holly.
Jenny told us the schools never close because of weather in Tok. But, when the temperature drops below minus 30F, the kids are allowed to skip school without it counting against them. But she said she'd gone to school earlier this year when the temperature was minus 73F. This may explain why she was school valedictorian at graduation this year.
They entertained well enough but Dave's stories were what enthralled. He explained why he has spent the better part of his 60 years in Tok. “No taxes, no law enforcement, no laws so you can't break any. We're free.”
Jo fretted about this after the concert. She couldn't figure out how anyone could live without paying taxes. But it was clear there were no services in Tok. But she persisted. “Who is paying the teachers, building the schools and fixing the roads?” So we decided to stop by the office on our way out on Tuesday morning. The woman behind the counter was quite happy to answer Jo's questions. “We decided not to vote ourselves into a borough,” she said. “So we have no town officials, no building inspector, no police, nobody who wants to 'help' us.”
In answer to the next question about schools, she said the state pays. “But who pays the state?” I asked. She looked at me as if I were an idiot. “The oil pays, of course,” she said. Same goes for the repair of the highways. Because Tok is unincorporated, the state has to maintain the roads. What about the state police? Same answer. State pays.
So if you, by now, are getting aboard your SUV and heading north to live free, I'd recommend against that. While the country is spectacular and the wildlife is unmatched, we're not over-enthused about the run of the mill Alaskans we have met. Obviously there are exceptions, but we have found them to be self-centered and very much looking to pick a fight with anyone who believes the federal government can actually do anything worthwhile. The Alaskans we've met – many of them – remind me of branch office workers I've worked with over the years. When you're cut off from the mother ship an inevitable sense of second-class citizenship seems to built and you are quick to look for slights and the sense that the main office doesn't really care much what happens to you. Everything bad happens in the lower 48 states, from many of their points of view. Finally, they drive with such foolishness, ignoring double yellow lines on the two-lane roads, that it is a miracle there are not more deaths from rollovers. And there's hardly a road sign that hasn't been shot out with bullets.
But life is pretty free. It really does live up to its license plate logo: “The Last Frontier.”

On our way to the border on Tuesday, I was fiddling with our computer navigation program when Jo, who was driving, slammed on the brakes and said, Oh my God! Oh my God. Oh my God.” By the time I looked up, a female moose and her calf were ambling onto the highway 15 yards ahead of us. Jo swerved and brought the rig to a halt. I grabbed my camera. But mom and her calf decided they had enough of this and quickly scooted back down the hill and into the trees.

We decided to revisit Kluane Lake, one of our favorite spots in the Yukon Territory. Amazingly, our first campsite was vacant and we moved in. A Swiss couple and their grown son arrived by van and set up their tent beside us. There are warnings about doing this between mid-July and September because this is bear country and the soapberries are out right now - a favorite of the grizzlies. They had flown into Yukon (Whitehorse, actually) from Zurich and rented the van.

The campground view was just as - if not more - spectacular. much of the snow is off the high peaks. But the wreathing clouds on the mountains made the place mysterious and cozy.

We arrived at Haines on Thursday afternoon. Haines is our departure point on the ferry system. Our car and rig are coated in dirt from the gravel road we traveled for 100 miles from the U.S. Border into Canada. I call this the 100-miles-of-hell highway. It is bone-jarring and hard on the vehicle. The only solution is to drive at 25 miles an hour. And that doesn't keep the dirt down. But it doesn't ruin the rig.
We parked on the waterfront in Haines and licked our wounds. The car didn't start when we unhooked it from the rig: our first real casualty. We jump-started it and then ran it for a few hours to charge the battery.
We head out aboard the ferry on Saturday morning and will make stops at Juneau, Sitka, Wrangell, Ketchikan and leave the ferry when we reach Prince Rupert, British Columbia, on Aug. 1.