Finding Hope

It was fitting that I sat down to catch up on the blog and realized I was at this point.  I typed in the title, "Finding Hope," early this morning, started uploading the photos, and then went off to tackle the rest of my day.  I stumbled across a poster that said "Ask yourself if what you are doing today is getting you closer to where you want to be tomorrow."  I had to truthfully say, no.  That was the easy part, answering why is always just a bit more difficult.  I have been working late, staying in, and being a hermit, not because anyone is making me, but because I chose to.  It reminded me of what always used to say in Bermuda..."what are you running away from?"  The running joke was that everyone was there because they were running away from something else, and more often than not, it was true, whether we realized it or not at the time.  I wondered if sometimes once we start running, if it just feels too good to stop.

I took myself on a long walk to think it out.  Walking or running always cleanses my mind and soul a bit.  I realized I haven't been doing enough of any of that.  I have been letting the too energy vampires win.  I haven't given enough time to thinking, feeling, and processing.  Life is cyclical, there are gains, and there are losses.  Above all there must be balance.  And I realized I have lost mine.

Balance is a skill, and like all others, it takes training for it to be effortless.  I did a little of that training today.  I took that walk, I hooked up that BBQ (finally) and cooked a great meal, framed some pictures, and sat down with the blog again.  It's time to get back to the story, and more importantly, to living the story.  And where the story starts again, is finding Hope.

So where does one find Hope in Alaska?  Well, from Anchorage you take the Old Glenn Highway towards Seward.  Past Turnagain Arm, past the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center, you find a turnoff.  If you are someone who reads the blog regularly, you might remember a winter blog where I mentioned that across the ocean, at the base of a mountain, you could see a couple of white rooftops on an otherwise uninhabited landscape.  They are the remainder of Hope, a once thriving town near a very hot gold mine in the earliest days of the goldrush in Alaska.

Shibby and I set out to find Hope.  It was past a river, past a bridge, on a windy little highway in the middle of a wilderness wonderland.  When we finally made it there, the first building to greet us was the renowned "Discovery Cafe."  Also the first permanent structure we had seen in about an hour.  We pulled in for a tasty lunch on the patio.  The food was good, but I think it's the setting that made it taste so much better.

Hope turned out to be a very very small town, full of hidden treasures!  A block or so past the Cafe is a little museum.  For such a rugged land, Alaska has such delicate little wildflowers.  When they take over metal and steel, it is done with a gracefulness that has a beauty of its own.

Yesterday is clearly gone.  What remains is surprisingly unobtrusive.  Today we leave concrete, steel, and pavement in our wake as we race through time.  The items left behind in Hope seem to have been left by a species with a gentler touch than our own, which seems so improbable given that the life was so much harder in comparison.  Hand crafted wheels, workbenches, and cabins hold an almost tangible sense of the people that once stood with them.

The museum is a collection of three or four buildings, and a bit of an unexpected surprise for the day.

The second surprise was an old fellow in a lawnchair as we drove up, sitting patiently, waiting to see if anyone might drive in that day and want to try their hand at panning for Alaska Gold.  Patient he must be, because in the hour or so we were there, no one else drove by.  I thought it would be hokey, but Shibby wanted to try panning for gold.  So "Goldrush Peck," sold her a $20 bucket of dirt and showed her the ropes.

Now if you notice the watch on Peck's hand in the photo above, you will see that it's pretty unique.  Definitely an original, it seems he does know how to pan for real gold.  The story of Peck is that his grandfather put him to work in a gold mine at the age of ten in Oregon.  Here he shows Shibby how to shake, rake, pick, and slosh your way through dirt.



But low and behold, Peck still knows how to find the gold, because Shibby left with what I am quite sure is more than $20 in gold in today's values!

The next gem we found was this -- the Seaview Cafe, which I have seen in pictures and been looking forward to photographing myself.

There is something about this rusty tin roof on this painstakingly clean white building, with what looks like a hand welded "Cafe" sign that just calls to me.  The photos I have seen did not have so much traffic about -- it seems that a lot of people were in town to do some camping, fishing, or beer drinking at the Seaview Bar.

Since we had just had lunch at the Discovery Cafe, we did not go to the Seaview Cafe.  Shibby got a picture there though, and then we headed along the little walk to the next doorway.

The Seaforth Bar.  The museum told us that this was actually the oldest pub still in operation in Alaska.  The twenty-something year old bartender didn't know if that was true or not.  I prefer to believe the museum staff and say we did stop in for a pint at the oldest pub in Alaska.

We ordered a beer from the Alaska Brewing Company, but they were out.  So we had a King Street, which made me smile, since that is one of the few street names downtown in good old Bermuda.

Hope is a popular destination for bikes it seems.  There were a lot of fancy bikes out front, and a busy, slightly rowdy patio crowd.

I definitely asked for permission before photographing their bikes, and to my surprise they were quite happy to let me admire the bikes.  I was a little afraid of reliving that scene in Smoky and the Bandit, but all went well.

Last look over the shoulder at another favorite little spot in Alaska.  I would definitely book a nearby cabin and spend a summer weekend here with some guests in the future.  Hope.  It's a good place to get to!