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South From Ft St John (The Alaskan)
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Riff Raff
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Joined: October 25, 2004
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Location: Alberta
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PostPosted: Mon Nov 14, 2005 9:19 pm    Post subject: South From Ft St John (The Alaskan) Reply with quote

It was the summer of 1986.
I had completed my first year of University and had got a job with Unocal at an oil production battery just north of Ft St John in northern British Columbia. I was a summer student, so I spent most of my time doing menial jobs like painting piping and pigging gathering system lines. I would also relief operate for operators who were on holidays. As the job was a camp job, we would work eight days at ten hours a day and then get six days off. On my days off, I would travel back to Calgary, or to Vancouver or the Interior. I was 26 and single and I would just take off wherever on my days off. In 1986, I had a 73 Sunroof Super Beetle. I had the obligatory eight spoke aluminum wheels, offset decklid and sway bars. It was not a speed demon, but it was a good little car that got me where I needed to go. I had bought the car off a buddy of mine. When he bought it, it had the hideous MacTac fake wood dashboard. When he pulled off the MacTac, it revealed the word Tedy written in grease pencil. Whether it needed it or not, the car already had a name, so, Ted it was.
On one particular set of days off, I decided to go down to Vancouver instead of going home to Calgary. My shift ended at 6:00PM, so I had all my stuff packed up and ready to go. I set out on the road at about 7:00. The camp was about an hour and a half outside of Ft St John. I bounced along down the lease road until I got to the pavement in town. I fueled up in town and pointed the Beetle south. Vancouver is about 16 hours south of Ft St John in an A/C Beetle. I had nothing better to do with my life right then, so I decided I would try to drive straight through.
I do not like driving at night because of the reduced visibility and my night vision is not the greatest. I do like driving at night because there are no tourists on the road. I don’t mind sharing the road with trucks as I know that they are not going to pull any stupid moves in front of me.
Anyhow, I drove through the night without any incident. By sunrise, I was starting to get pretty sleepy and began to think of ways to keep myself awake. I tried hanging my head out the window, and that worked for awhile, but I could still feel myself nodding. I had passed a couple of hitch hikers and thought that I should pick one up to keep me awake. I nodded off again and decided that come Hell or high water, I was going to pick up the next hitch hiker that I saw.
I did not have long to wait.
Only a couple miles down the road, I saw a figure by the side of the road.
Ok, here’s my hitch hiker.
As I slowed down to pull over, the figure began to take shape. The closer I got, the more the gravity of the situation revealed itself to me. This was one scary looking dude!
I don’t know any axe murderers personally, so I cannot be entirely sure what one looks like, but this guy looked like what I would like to think an axe murderer should look like.
He was wearing a lumberjack jacket and dirty jeans. He had long wild hair that was parted at the side. It looked like a Buddy Holly style that that had been left to it's own devices for a couple of years. He had a full longish beard. He looked a lot like John McEuen of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band did back in the day. He had no backpack or luggage of any kind.
As I pulled over, my spider senses weren't just tingling, they were screaming at me to keep driving, but I had decided that I was going to pick up the next hitch hiker that came along and, by Neddy Jingoes, I was going to pick him up. It is lucky for him that I had decided to pick up the next hitch hiker I saw, or he might still be there!
When he got in the car, he immediately began thanking me for picking him up. Now that I could get a closer look at him, it appeared that all of my assumptions about him were true. He was a scary looking dude!
I was awake now anyhow.
As we got up to speed, he began to tell me his story. His name was Michael Morton, if I remember correctly. He was from Kentucky. He had moved up to Alaska several years earlier to get in on the oil boom of the late seventies and had stayed on. He had married a local girl and bought a house. Things had been pretty good until the oil price crash of the early eighties. Times were a little tougher, but they had managed to get by. Then, that summer, all hell broke loose. He said that within a month, his wife had left him, he lost his job and the bank had foreclosed on the mortgage. He had decided he had had enough and it was time to pack it in and head back home to Kentucky.
He seemed friendly enough, so I commented that he looked like he had slept in a culvert. He allowed as to how he HAD slept in a culvert because it was raining intermittently the night before. Boy, can I pick them or what?
I asked him if he lived anywhere near Muhlenberg County and he was astonished that I had even heard of it. I asked him if he knew anyone who worked for the Peabody Coal Company and his jaw dropped. “How do you know about the Peabody Coal Company” he asked in amazement. It’s not that I’m a great world traveler, it’s just that I like the song Paradise Lost by John Prine. Now we had some common ground anyhow
Anyhow, he sold off all of his worldly possessions, packed some clothes in a backpack and stuck out his thumb on the outskirts of Fairbanks. The first guy to pick him up held a gun to his head, took all his money and tossed him out by side of the road and drove off with his money and backpack. It had taken him four days to get to Grande Cache, where I picked him up. He said that rides were hard to come by for him, looking the way he did and having no backpack and all.
Imagine my surprise.
As we continued south, he pulled out a small piece of hash. He said it was the only thing he had left out of all the stuff he left Fairbanks with, but had no way of smoking it because his pipe was in his backpack. He asked if I wanted to partake, but the last thing I needed was a hit of hash. I was having a tough enough time trying to stay awake as it was. I rolled him a smoke so he could have a hoot or two.
As we proceeded south, it occurred to me that he may not have any idea where he was going. I asked him if he knew what route to take to get to Kentucky and he allowed as to how he had lost his map with the rest of his stuff.
We were coming up on Hope, and that was where our paths were going to part. I had to go west to get to Vancouver, and he had to go east to get to Kentucky. When I stopped in Hope, I considered my options. I decided I couldn’t just boot him out of the car, penniless and destitute as he was. I had forty four dollars cash and a couple of pouches of Drum tobacco with me for the trip. I decided to split it with him. I gave him twenty two dollars, a pouch of tobacco, a pack of Zig Zag blue rolling papers and my map.
My thinking was that even if the whole story that he told me was a ruse, it had kept me entertained and awake for last hundred miles or so and that alone was worth the price of admission!
He was truly grateful. He wanted my address so that he could send me back the cash when he got home. I declined and suggested that he could repay me by helping out some other unfortunate soul he may come across. He agreed that he would do that, but also insisted that if I was ever down in Kentucky to ask around about him because he had a lot of friends and I would be well taken care of.
I have never made it to Kentucky, but I have no doubt that his offer is as good today as it was 19 years ago.
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iWesty
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Joined: April 18, 2005
Posts: 54
Location: Fort St. John, BC
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PostPosted: Tue Nov 15, 2005 8:46 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

what a great story! Particularly interesting because I've lived in Fort St. John for my whole 17 year life. I was in Grande Cache just last august as well.
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TeamSpatula
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 16, 2005 6:09 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Awesome story indeed! One of the more memorable hitchhiker stories I have-
Driving the crew cab on I-40 west one evening, as it was just starting to rain...by the side of the road, I saw a cowboy in full gear - hat, boots, etc, and a couple big duffle bags...I was a little worried also - big cowboys don't always like funny-looking old VWs...
Anyway, he had a similar tale of woe - he had been with his wife at a rodeo, and after his events of the evening, came back to their hotel room to find everything gone except for his suitcase, and a note from her saying she had taken his truck and run off with his friend - the makings of a country song if ever there were...
Smile
Anyway, I gave him a ride to the next truck stop before I took my exit...come to think of it, he was also going to Kentucky...said he had an old Beetle back on his dad's farm too...I gave him my email, but he never wrote about the beetle...
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Turin39789
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Joined: January 28, 2004
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PostPosted: Fri Nov 18, 2005 1:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Life's tough when you come from Kentucky
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budgetbug68
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Joined: November 13, 2005
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PostPosted: Sun Nov 20, 2005 4:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Great Story Man , I know i would have done the same.
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logansuttle1963vw
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 02, 2014 4:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I live in Muhlenberg and have a 1963 vw beetle
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