Tuesday, June 28, 2022 we were on a mission; a mission for eggs.
Sunday we ran out of eggs. We walked down to the campground mercantile store, but they were out as well.
Monday, after the Dog Sled Demonstration we stopped back by the campground store, but they still had none in stock. We drove down to the “town” and tried both of the food stores, which were really liquor stores with an array of convenience store foods, but both of them were out of eggs as well.
We even drove back north 10 miles to the nearest real grocery store in the town of Healy, but they only had a couple of dozen organic eggs that were $11 a dozen, or racks of 5 dozen white eggs for $15. There is no way we could keep 60 eggs in our little travel trailer refrigerator. Plus we’re both watching our cholesterol, lol!
So Tuesday we were hopeful that deliveries had been made and we could find some eggs. We hit the same places in the same order as we did on Monday afternoon, but to no avail. In fact, the real grocery store in Healy was now out of the organic eggs, but still had the racks of 5 dozen. We asked the woman stocking the refrigerated section and she said the eggs weren’t due in until Thursday, but she would break down some of the 5 dozen racks into dozens in about an hour and a half. We did not want to wait that long, so we bought a container of EggBeaters and wondered why they hadn’t ALREADY broken down some of the larger containers into smaller ones.
The cashier asked if we found everything we needed and we laughed and said we hadn’t. He asked what we were looking for and we said, “Eggs” and he nodded and said he thought so and he was sorry and that a delivery truck was supposed to be in that afternoon. We told him the lady stocking told us Thursday and was nice enough to offer to break up the larger containers but that we could not wait 90 minutes for them. He apologized again and a woman nearby said, “Welcome to Alaska in the Summer.”
I wasn’t sure if that was a swipe at tourists like us or that they always have these supply-side issues during the summer months. I know they haven’t had much tourism the past two years due to COVID-19, but WE knew that there would be a $h17load of RVs heading to Alaska this year so I can’t help but think that suppliers and retail outlets had to know that too and should have been prepared.
We went back to the campground, had some lunch and then did some leisurely walking around the Visitor Center complex to visit the various areas that the cashier at the Visitor Center told us we could get our National Park Passports stamped. One was closed, the Bus Stop and Rail Depot Station both said they don’t stamp passports and Cindy said she was happy with the one we had so we skipped the Bus Depot.
That evening we went to a Ranger Talk at the Campground Amphitheater titled “Midnight Sun and Midnight Snacks with Ranger Rick.” As with al the Ranger Talks it begins with several minutes talking about animal safety; how far to stay away from bears, moose and caribou and what actions to take or not take if you encounter them personally. The Midnight Sun talk was an interesting presentation about how the axis and rotation of the earth account for the long days of summer and long nights of winter in this part of the world. It was all stuff we learned in school, but refreshers are always nice, especially when you’re there in person experiencing it.
I took some photos on the way back from the talk of the sun through the trees and if we had been in Florida it would have looked like 2 or 3 in the afternoon instead of the 8:30pm it actually was here. After we got back to Nomad Cindy suddenly said, “Hey, we didn’t get any Midnight Snacks!”
It was a good night, until Cindy looked at her email and exclaimed, “No! That can’t be! NO!”
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