My childhood visions of Alaska were more intimate. My father would go on fishing trips there deep into the wilderness. He came home with tales of floatplanes, fishing camps, and river adventures. Within a week or two of his return a cooler of salmon showed up on our doorstep, a testament the stories were not exaggerations or of "the ones that got away." I believe to this day Alaska is my father's favorite place on earth.
I watched the late evening sun touch the horizon and reflected on those memories during my reluctant drive back to Anchorage. This visit to the last frontier state was brief and made possible only through a work commitment. I was so fortunate to have my stepmother, a companion on many of my father's trips, put me in touch with bush pilot Bill Quirk. Bill had joined in on one of their back country romps, and he regaled me with fond recollections during our flight over the Knik. His stories were a bridge to my father's narratives allowing me to feel I was following his footsteps.
I rounded a bend and my rear view mirror became obscured by a multicolor reflection. At first I thought it was a refraction of the rain on my windows, but one look over my shoulder revealed the most majestic panorama I ever beheld.
A double rainbow rose in blinding technicolor off the dark ripples of the Turnagain Arm only a half mile distant. At its base water boiled in an orange blaze. Red, yellow, and blue-tinted mist blew off its towering arches. I heard a voice whisper faintly on the wind, "Look what I can show you. You've only just arrived.” I cast a long, wistful stare. With my heart in my throat I turned northward once more.
My father once remarked, "Once you've been to Alaska, you never come all the way home."
He was right.
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