Sudsing Up!
~Monday, September 5, 2022~
Day 813
Day 77 of Alaska Trip
Happy Labor Day everyone with not much to report today from North Pole, Alaska, other than it’s laundry and car wash day. Get this……we found a one stop shop that allowed us to wash our clothes and the truck. The place…….Cushman Plaza Laundry and Car Wash in Fairbanks. What an awesome concept!
Not sure why more of them don’t do this. Together, Jeff and I divided and conquered. While he tended to the coin-operated, self-service car wash, I took care of the laundry duties. But I swear, with every new facility comes getting acquainted with how everything works……they’re all different. We waste money everytime just going through the learning curves. As I’ve mentioned, laundry is not cheap in Alaska. When all was said and done, it cost $35 for laundry and $30 for the self-serve car wash. The wash for Hank alone took about an hour since there were so many layers of dirt. And the laundry shouldn’t have taken as long as it did thanks to an older gentleman who accidentally threw his sheets in with our laundry. He was very apologetic for putting our laundry through another cycle. It was actually kind of funny, yet strange at the same time. These were small machines, so I’m not sure how he wouldn’t have seen clothes already in there. I must admit it made me a little suspicious that maybe he did this intentionally to try and expand his wardrobe? We’ll never know, will we?
I also met a couple about our age, from Texas who weren’t quite used to Alaska prices just yet, since they had begun their journey just a few short weeks ago. Though it seems a little late in the season to be headed up that way, they do have an Arctic Fox truck camper which has a little more flexibility on the roads. It’s not quite as sketchy as towing a trailer if the weather gets bad.
Ah, nothing like having fresh, clean laundry and a clean truck to go with it, though its cleanliness is not quite up to my standards. A self-service car wash doesn’t quite get the truck as clean as if done by hand. But we decided it was good enough for now until we get to more favorable road conditions in the Lower 48.
Nearing dinnertime, as I was putting away laundry, I realized I was missing a few items. Wait, where’s Sadie’s collar, where’s my bra and all my underwear? I quickly phoned the laundromat before their closing time and spoke to the owner. As I named off what I was missing, she found our neatly folded laundry on one of the back tables. It was nice of her to offer to bag them up for us to pick up the following day. Whew! I guess with all the action at Cushman Plaza Laundry, I must have gotten pretty distracted!