Chat with Deb—Alaska Through the Mist
Many tourists never see Mount Denali. And then some have trouble making out the trees a couple hundred yards away.
Previously, on Deb & Jack’s Alaska Adventure:
Since we’re on vacation, we stayed in bed until hours after sunrise… which, that far north, was about 3AM (the hotel room curtains were VERY good at keeping the light out—although I would be shocked if ANY curtains in Alaska were not outstanding at keeping light out). We opened the curtains to find…
ME: I think it snowed last night!
DEB: I think it’s still snowing now!
ME: And there’s snow on the mountains.
DEB: There was snow on the mountains yesterday.
ME: There was snow on the big mountains we can’t see anymore. There’s snow on the cute little mountains that were pretty and green yesterday.
DEB: Good thing our park tour isn’t until after lunch!
When we got to THE available restaurant, we discovered an unfortunate confluence of events¹:
- The pretty snow with some minor icing at the resort was a winter white-out at higher elevations — the morning excursions were canceled.
- By the time we got down to breakfast, maybe a bit after 8:30AM, the late-risers and the disappointed excursion members had all converged.
- Seven restaurant staff members had called in sick. That was more than all the front staff we’d seen the night before. There was A chef in the kitchen, possibly some folks helping back there, and service was… slooooowwwwww…
We stood in line for about a quarter hour. Just to get our names in. Linda, at the front desk, was the gatekeeper who had to manage the in-person reservations, the online reservations (not all of which showed up on her system, but she accepted someone showing her an email with an acknowledgment), and the people who “just needed something quickly, can I do the buffet but not take a table?” Linda had two women who took people to tables, handled explanations (such as no longer taking walk-ins after 9AM), helped make sense of the hybrid electronic/paper system, and went searching for parties when their turn came (“Bill? Bill? Is Bill here?” and then stepping outside to try again).
There was also our personal heroine, who did not have a name tag, so we called her “Tiff” after a friend of ours — because of looks (very butch) and actions: Tiff stepped in and got stuff done. Buffet table out of plates? Tiff got plates. Out of spoons next to the cereal? Tiff got spoons (they were ice tea spoons , but I could guess Tiff’s thought process— are they clean? can you eat cereal with them? fine, done, next problem). Somebody supposed to meet someone? Tiff helped search. (The dining area was crowded and VERY chaotic with no good lines of sight.) Problems with a check? Tiff talked casually and comfortably with the customer to sort it out and let the (very frazzled) server take care of other customers.
WOMAN IN LINE AHEAD OF US: (with a sneer and voice that dripped entitlement) See? This is what happens when you pay people not to work!
ME: Exactly! If these ingrates aren’t happy with five bucks an hour, they don’t really deserve to feed their families! They—
Deb took me in hand at this point.
DEB: Honey, you cannot argue with these people. They won’t listen.
ME: That the unemployment benefits she talked about stopped eight months ago? That we’re in the literal middle of freakin’ nowhere so there is no place to hire from? And you have to find people who are willing to move to the middle of freakin’ nowhere but just for the summer? And we’ve met employees from Bulgaria and Eastern Europe and Utah² and HAP still can’t find enough warm bodies? That— (seeing Deb’s expression) Yes, dear. Quiet now.
We finally got called and seated. Eva, our poor frazzled server, who looked to still be in high school, apologized for the chaos, got us coffee and water, and told us to help ourselves to the buffet. The food was good, but some items (such as reindeer sausage, a local specialty) had already run out. Eva stopped by, apologized for the chaos, and checked that everything was okay. (It was.) Deb got seconds, and reported that the buffet was shutting down at 11:00 (we had been there over two hours at this point), so I hightailed it to grab more grub as well. (We had agreed that lunch was NOT going to happen so we had better chow down.) We asked Eva for the bill, she apologized for the chaos, and got it for us. We paid our $30 bill with two $25 vouchers, after checking with Eva that that was allowed — yes, but she couldn’t do change, she announced with fear in her eyes, apologizing for the chaos — and if the excess could go to a tip for her and her colleagues (she said yes, with tears in her eyes — then thanked us and blessed us).
ME: Have we ever been blessed by a server before?
DEB: At church dinners? Maybe?
On the way out, Deb thanked Linda for hanging in there (Linda got teary-eyed). I thanked “Tiff,” who, bless her heart, listened long enough to determine I was not a problem, said “Thank you, sir,” and rushed off to take care of something that was actually a concern.³ Both women got Gifts of Shared Kindness envelopes.⁴
DEB: I think the portrait shop is open now! Want to check it out?
The lady who ran the portrait shop was a delight. She asked what we had in mind, showed us some sample portraits, got us set up with costumes and props, and had us in and out inside of half an hour.
We checked at the front desk about afternoon excursions. Was our park trip still on?
No. Wait, yes. Well, it might be slightly abbreviated, they aren’t sure which roads are passable. Also, the visibility was not great, so there was a chance we might not see Mount Denali. Did we still want to go?
Well, sure!
Our tour started on time. Our bus driver/guide, Lisa, was a hoot. She knew all about everything, kept the talks interesting, answered simple questions with simple answers and technical questions with technical answers, all while driving a school bus over somewhat icy roads and snowy conditions.
And sometimes she had to act like a school bus driver.
LISA: Hi! Please keep your head and hands inside the bus; we do not want to wildlife to become acclimated to people, we want them scared of us.
Visibility was hampered by fog, airborne snow (BIG honkin’ flakes; we had to brush ourselves off when we came back on the bus after a stop), and snow piles.
LISA: This was a hundred-year snow that we had over the winter. Usually most would be melted by now. It’s bad for the wildlife, because they normally are seeing new growth around this time. And we have to be extra careful on the roads, because wildlife are using them to get around. I’m sorry you can’t see Mount Denali today!
DEB: (talking to me) We got to see what, four moose? And a ptarmigan. And the landscape was beautiful, in a wintery way. We knew that Mount Denali would be an iffy thing, so I don’t feel cheated at all.
Dinner was (SURPRISE!) a chaotic clusterfrak. Our 8:30PM reservations got us seated after 9:00PM, and we had to share a table (a lovely couple from London, about our age). We did not get served until almost 10:00PM. Meanwhile, someone decided that what was needed to chill out all these unhappy customers was a mediocre musician playing 70s cover songs badly and VERY VERY LOUDLY. So Deb (who does most of the talking anyway, and all of it when we’re in a loud environment, because with my poor hearing I can’t distinguish words well in those situations⁵) had to have her mask off, even before we finally were served, because otherwise conversation was impossible. We finally got out of there at 10:30PM, and we did NOT get any of their delicious carrot cake⁶. <sniff>
DEB: Well, I’m sorry the trip is almost over, but it will be fun to see Anchorage tomorrow. And maybe the weather won’t be totally awful tomorrow?
¹I hate the term “perfect storm.” Unless there’s a storm involved. Which, okay, yes, there was in this case. (Still hate the term.)
²And you’re thinking, Utah, wow, so, Mormons in Alaska? Really? Based on the number of tats and face piercings, I thinks the odds are low, in this case.
³I’m the same way when things are in chaos and I’m trying to accomplish something. Thanks, yup, glad to be useful, now can you PLEASE GO AWAY! (Usually I just say that inside my head.)
⁴ Gail Boenning came up with these delightful little envelopes for use as a way to say thank you to folks who did a little extra to help us; not just money (though they hold that) but an open acknowledgement that the recipient went above and beyond for us. We (okay, Deb) had a bunch of envelopes ready and handy for the cruise; we passed them out on board the ship, on excursions, and at hotels. Thanks, Gail!
⁵Yes, I’m thinking about hearing aids. Preferably modern ones, that can charge in their carrying case, connect to an app on my phone, and use the phone mic as auxiliary input.
⁶Maybe they had already run out of carrot cake, you say? Thank you, that’s a very nice thought, you’re a wonderful person!
Next: Hey, look, it’s Mount Denali! (later) Hey, it’s Mount Denali. (still later) Huh, is that… yep, it’s Mount Denali. Good heavens, will be ever be able to get away from that thing?
