Ghost Town Talkeetna.

Yesterday I drove down from The Hills to go to the post office. It was May the 18th, High Season. The village streets should have been bustling with people; people shopping, people going down to the river, people jumping on a boat to go upriver, people eating at the Roadhouse or West Rib… But there were no people. What I saw was a ghost town.

After a couple of weeks of sunny weather, the clouds hung heavily in the distance, obscuring the sky in some dreary sense of foreboding.

Talkeetna has seasons. And I have been documenting the intricacies of the seasons in South Central Alaska for eight years. I can tell you with good accuracy when the various migratory birds will return, when the fireweed will bloom, when the dragonfly nymphs appear, when the wood frogs leave the creek to seek a place to hibernate. The boreal forest lives by its seasons, but so does our town. Mid May, the visitors come. And they bring money and joy to many people of the village; they are the bread and butter of our town. They allow many people here to work their tails off all summer, so they can have enough coin to survive the Winter. There are no visitors this year. Talkeetna is a ghost town.

A “For Rent” sign hung ominously on Main Street; it was the building that once house The Salted Pickle (Corvus’ favorite seasonal sandwich shop, later a Thai restaurant). The gift stores; Closed. The Roadhouse; Closed. It was eerie to see the village like that. This time of year, when my children run about barefoot and barely dressed, the village should be abustle! It should be full of happy people coming to see The Mountain to cross it off their bucket list. Even Village Park was devoid of souls, save for the two drunks hanging out in the pavilion. It seems the drunks come anyway, pandemic be damned, just like the cranes, swans, and swallows.

I saw a group of strangers in my dear friend’s truck. My first thought was not “they must have stolen it!”, but rather “She has been out of work since mid March; she probably sold her truck to pay the bills”.

There were hardly any cars on the paved roads. No motorcycles or RVs. There was a long-haired maid riding her horse bareback along the Parks Highway near the grocer though.

My heart hurt looking around the forsaken town. These businesses that are closed belong to my friends. I loathe the people rejoicing over the “quiet” in the village, especially the ones who do so whilst petitioning the legislature for exceptions for their tourist-based business. Shame on you! You know who you are!

Governor Dunleavy has set to reopen Alaska completely this Friday, but that does not mean things will change here. The cruise ships aren’t coming this year and we still have a fourteen day quarantine restriction for travelers coming in from outside of Alaska. How long can our village survive? How long before my friends have to pack up and leave if there is no coin to be had to survive the Winter?

On my way home to my stronghold in The Hills, I came across a dead coyote alongside the dirt road, bloated with rot and maggots spilling out of its mouth.

It felt foreboding, like the dark sky that loomed.

The rain fell later that day. I love the rain. I don’t know if I could have lived in Ketchikan (the second rainiest place in the US with over 12.5 feet of rain each year) if I did not love rain. Water binds the dust of the dirt roads around Talkeetna. It washes everything clean. I was happy it rained yesterday. I will be fine. I fear for the village though. I really do.