• Negotiating Alaska •
[1½ MIN READ]
A recent run from the native village of Kluti-Kaah north and west to the local “big town” of Glennallen, Alaska had me traversing a construction zone unlike any around these here parts. Around a lot of the state, there are no alternative routes. That was the case over the Tazlina River.
We had been traversing the bridge to get to Kluti-Kaah daily as we reported to the Wrangell Mountain Bible Conference where we had been ministering to the teens for the 8-day duration. The siding and road repair effort reduced travel to one lane with a sign crew and a lead car controlling traffic flow. As we drove the bridge daily before my planned run, I looked for a pedestrian lane and saw nothing. While it’s a stretch to say there are no pedestrians in that part of Alaska, there are few, so the shoulder of the roadway is the standard option.
The evening of my run, I reached the bridge at 10:00 with nightfall still 3 hours away. The flagger greeted me pleasantly: “You’ll have to jump into the lead car when it gets here.” As a regular passenger in our vehicle, just doing my thing, I had barely registered that there even was one. It approached from the opposite direction and pulled into the turnaround. “Just turn back from here and go back,” the driver volunteered. “Glennallen is my destination.” “Oh.”
I hopped in and rode as the driver led the northbound assemblage of cars across the span. That is the process 24 hours a day for the multi-week duration of the construction project. Reaching the turnaround on the far side, she wished me a good run and let me out. Then as I continued the rest of my 12 miler, she turned around to lead the southbound assemblage back.
-CtCloser (Calvinthe) “Negative Split or Positive Splat” #dothedue
FINE PRINT ¶Text by Calvin Wang (Wäng), CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. ¶Cross-published: Facebook Shawmont Running Club (ZY Weekly Newsletter 7/26/25), Shawmont Running Club website, Ruminations by CtCloser. ¶This website posting: Rumination with added caption
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