Valdez: A Very Strange Beginning

We left Seward on July 6th ready for the next adventure. They seem to follow us wherever we go, and figured the next stop would be no exception. Valdez (Val-DEEZ), AK is yet another town at the end of the road, on Prince William Sound, with more boats in the harbor than houses on the streets.

Our first morning in Valdez started off rather well. After our first showers since Homer, we set off for the docks to meet up with Brad, the son of a family friend currently living in Alaska, working for a fishing company. The day we met up was one day before they were to se off for a multi-month salmon fishing trip. Which is cool, because it means that we got to check out the boat before we left—the first of its kind I’ve ever encountered outside of a book or film. And the Pequod it was not. It did not evoke angry seas or bawdy fisherman—in fact, the Ruth M was downright cozy. We toured the tiny kitchen, the bunks, and the head down below, followed by the comparatively spacious skipper’s quarters above deck. The boat had a sink and freezer, a shower even. From what I could see, it sure beats living out of a car. It got me thinking that fishing wouldn’t be a bad life, escaping the real world for months at a time. Sophia quickly killed that newfound dream by informing me that deckhands (Brad’s job on the boat) have to be strong enough to, you know, pick up things. Like buckets of salmon. And I can barely do real push-ups. Bummer.

While I greatly enjoyed touring the boat and even felt an instant fondness for ol’ Ruth, I will say this: the boat, she was filthy. Clothes and food strewn everywhere, dishes piled high, the decks were bogged down with fishnets waiting to be mended, and the top of the skipper’s bunkbed was buried in a lifetime’s accumulation of junk. I guess he sleeps in the bottom bunk. What this boat needs is a woman, I thought. A cliché, I know, but Suzanne Germain would have this vessel spotless (in shipshape!) before departure the next day. But apparently that’s bad luck twofold: a woman on a boat is no good, and Brad even thinks bathing is bad juju, too. God, what I would’ve given to see the boat (and its crew) when it docks in Valdez in 2 month’s time.

After seeing the boat and enjoying a picnic near the harbor, we decided to rent mountain bikes and go for a ride in the surrounding wilderness. This idea started off phenomenally: it felt good to get on a bike, the scenery was beautiful, we were practically alone (always a plus), and the terrain was actually pretty exciting. We took a mostly abandoned road out of town that made Vermont’s dirt roads look tame. The road wound alongside Mineral Creek, and as long as we kept peddling, the mosquitoes kept their distance.

Eventually we came to a broken down bridge, and could go no further, so we turned around and arrived back in town with 2 hours left of our rental. At this point, Sophia and I switched bikes so that she could get a turn on my much better bike (Isabelle and I had the same ok mountain bike, Sophia’s was just awful). Within minutes of kicking off on the pavement, the peddle peddled itself right off the bike. I was shocked, but kept my cool, glad that it hadn’t happened on the earlier more rugged terrain. We all went inside the rental shop to tell them about the broken bike, and asked if we could exchange it for another, or at least a partial refund.

The woman behind the counter (the owner, we later found out) had been scary even when we had first rented the bikes. Wizened and witch-like, she had said nothing friendly. I was not excited to talk to her again, particularly not about the broken bicycle. My fears were instantly realized. When we asked for an exchange, she snapped, “absolutely not.” We argued that it was unfair, that we had paid for four hours and only gotten two. “Such is life,” she said. By the end of the extremely tense conversation (Isabelle and Sophia did most of the talking, it was badass), she had essentially implied that I had broken it on purpose to get my money back: “I’ve had this bike for 1 year and this has never happened before.” (The “mountain” bike had no shocks and was not a day under fifteen years old). Well, great. It’s happened now. We left the shop pissed and hormonal and HATING Valdez (unfairly, yes—and our opinion and memories of the town are now fond, but at his moment…it was ugly).

It only got weirder from here. We went to a very small town green alongside the road (two picnic tables) to make dinner. We have become so sick of halibut that dinner is now just a way to wash it down as easily as possible. Using mostly supplies on hand, we created what eventually amounted to halibut slop: rice, peas, tasteless Colby jack cheese, and fish all mixed together. It was fine. Kind of. Not delicious, but nothing would make halibut exciting at this point. What made dinner exciting was not the cuisine, but the entertainment that accompanied it.

Not long after setting up our cookstoves, a truck pulled up nearby and idled for a moment. We worried that we were breaking a rule of some kind, until the engine died and the man inside walked over to us. “Do you mind if I use this other picnic table?” he asked, indicating the only other table in the miniscule park. “I don’t want to interrupt your dinner.” We said it was fine, wondering why he even felt the need to ask. He went back to the truck, and returned holding a cardboard box with some kind of animal inside. “This is my red wing hawk,” he said. “she’s just a baby.” He carried the box over to the picnic table. “I have more stuff, too.” He walked back to the truck and next emerged holding a fully grown hawk on a fake perch, attached at the foot. “She’s injured,” he explained, “so I bring her here every day to get some fresh air.” Then he returned again to the truck. We waited eagerly for the next arrival, which turned out to be just a normal-looking dog. By now we were a little wary of Valdezians in general, and this man was not helping. “Maybe it’s part of his job,” Sophia whispered, and we all sat down to eat our halibut slop and pretended to ignore the man, whose hawks were also enjoying dinner: the corpses of many smaller birds.

Now, what happened next actually happened. The hawk man took a boom box out of his truck, and a staff, unbuttoned his shirt halfway, and began performing rather intense tae kwon do/bo staff moves, while the hawks all looked on and (get this) the Eagles sang “Take it Easy” in the background. Several cars passed by during this time, and I wondered if they thought we were all together—three homeless girls in bright sweatshirts, and a man performing martial arts with a bo staff surrounded by hunting hawks.

[Insert by Isabelle: Rachel left to do dishes and Sophia and I began to pack the car. Although the man with the hawks was certainly bizarre, I felt a sort of fondness for him and felt compelled to talk to him. We’d been discussing ways to get rid of some of the Halibut for a few days and I thought, why not give some to this man? It would be the perfect in to have a conversation with him. We also had some left over peas that were rapidly thawing that we needed to get rid of.

A little terrified of the hawks that stood in my way, I headed over to the man. I explained that we were on a trip and had a lack of freezer space and would he like any of our excess halibut. His face red from dancing and shirt still unbuttoned, he began to explain that he was the tae kwon do instructor at the local college. “Everyone knows me, why don’t you just head over to my house and stick your halibut in the freezer? It’s the house with the big open garage, you’ll see some hawks in there.” Did he really expect us to go to his house? Too scary. We told him that we were heading out the next day and that we just wanted to get rid of a few pounds. He agreed and we were able to get rid of the peas and the halibut. He did not seem nearly grateful enough and acted as if we were the strange ones. He told us all about hawk hunting though, so in the end, totally worth it.]

Eventually we packed up, bought ice cream sandwiches at Safeway for dessert, and headed back up the abandoned road we had cycled to scope out a free campsite. Before long, I was snoozing peacefully, on the whole content with the bizarre (yet memorable) day in Valdez. Hours—or perhaps only moments—later, Isabelle shook me awake.
“I need to pee,” she whispered.
“So?” I asked, tired and grumpy.
“Come with me.”
“No! Just go right outside. I’m sleeping!”
“But I’m scared,” she replied, “I just saw someone run by on the road.”
At this point, it was practically broad daylight, and I thought nothing of this morning jogger using the old road. “So?” I asked again.
“So, it’s 1 o’clock in the morning.”
Oh. The image of the jogger disappeared, replaced instantly by a homicidal psycho preying on naïve young girls camping illegally, dragging the bodies off into the Alaskan wilderness. We’d never be found. Like a good big sister, I accompanied Isabelle outside, and she soon fell asleep. Meanwhile, I laid awake in terror long after, straining to hear the murderer’s footsteps over the roar of the nearby river.