“I honestly don't think we're going to find the Grand Canyon on this road.”-Ellen Griswold, Vacation

Pretty early on in the trip I saw this truck. My immediate concern was that we were driving into some post-apocalyptic Mad-Max scenario, and I had left my midget and steel-spiked shoulder pads at home.

We made it to the Haul Road. The first I ever heard of the Haul Road was during my first visit to Fairbanks. Over the Hertz® counter there’s a sign that says your rental car will immediately burst into flame if you go on the Haul Road. Beyond that, Hertz™ then lays claim to your soul and any EverQuest stuff you have. The warnings were strong.

If you noted from my earlier post, I said I took four spare tires for the trip. Actually, that’s wrong. I took five spare tires, because the one that comes with the car was packed between the tires under the axle. An aside: you’re just got a flat. You’re irritated. Some goofball in Detroit then puts the spare so you have to crawl under the car to access it. Does that make sense to anyone? You’re in trouble, so we’ll torture you by design for a while? It’s like credit card companies designed that part of the car.

I digress. The speed limit sign is one of the first things you see on the Haul Road. It indicates that the speed limit is 50 MPH (342km/s) for the next 416 miles. I thought about that, and it made sense. If you have a road that has exactly one way in, and exactly one way out, why would you need more than one speed limit sign? It’s not like you could seriously make an argument that you didn’t know the speed limit because you just got on the road.

Missing was the sign that said, “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here,” or, “Here be dragons,” or “Hertz® now owns your soul, keep it clean.”

The next nineteen miles were rough road. By rough, whenever we went up an incline, the stereo would vibrate out of the cavity that holds it, as if it were attempting to break out of its cocoon and become an I-Pod®. The Mrs. and I took turns holding it in place. Inexplicably, nineteen miles up the haul road, the rough, washboard dirt road turns into (fairly) smooth asphalt.

Immediately I began wondering. Was the whole “rough Haul Road” thing a ruse? Do we just tell stories to scare people away?



Here’s the road at mile 19. Look, Ma, no dirt.

No. The paved section (complete with road signs) disappeared a few miles after it started. It was, essentially, a tease. I was like the AKDOT said, “Hey, guys, we could pave this if we really wanted, but, no, we really don’t. Well, now you know what the road could be like.”

It was about this point that I saved The Boy’s life. I had mentioned the day before that we were going up the Dalton Highway. I did this because The Boy must know the name of any road we find ourselves on. Immediately, the little meat microprocessor (his term, really) interpreted “Dalton Highway” as “Dolphin Highway.” I guess he doesn’t like Timothy Dalton, either.

I saved his life by having him stop saying “Dolphin Highway” after he’d done it about 332 times. That’s about the limit The Mrs. has. Fortunately, he never said, “Are we there yet?”