Of course, there are paved roads. This is 1980, ain't it? Yeah, Main St., which is the highway we came in on from the airport, is. That's paved. Every other road around here is dirt ....Pure dirt.

Hey, look! They've got real wooden sidewalks built along the dirt streets! This is just like the freaking Old West! Bright July sunshine blazes down on the wooden storefronts and the varied array of SALOON signs hung all up and down Main St. I'm just waiting for an ugly lynching or a big gunfight to break out any second.

Everywhere, stout men in rubber boots and wool shirts and sweaters, all sheathed in denim and duck, loiter beerily in animated groups. Smartly attended by the town's complement of hot little numbers, these groups pass raucously from tavern to tavern, laughing and bellowing salty curses as they go. The local talent naturally gravitates towards the loose money. These hairy, bear-like males are fisherman, ...and they have loose money. Lots of it.

Smaller Asian looking types, colored in various shades of mahogany and pine, many with their short legs up to their ass cheeks in over-sized rubber waders, abound in large numbers, as do Indians and natives of every imaginable stripe. Hordes of clean-cut, blue-eyed Mormon boys and girls balance the vast phalanx of greasy looking hippies and hairy granola girls, all meandering in the cool summer air.

These folks, amongst various assorted others, are the so-called "cannery rats," or cannery workers. Clad in vinyl from head to toe, this motley army wraps the fruit of the sea in plastic and tin and then sends it on its way to Hokkaido and Seattle and beyond to feed the insatiable urbanites.

The dirt streets ascend the steep foot of Kayak Mountain, rising nearly 1600 feet over the village of Corona. Probably named for some wayward Spanish captain who just happened to sail through here 400 years ago, the little town is a jewel on Orca Inlet, ringed by the Kayak ranges.

Now, at the height of the summer salmon runs, the usually tiny village bulges with a teeming mass nearly 6000 strong, that works and carouses twenty-five hours a day. A frenetic energy charges the town, its scores of boats belching diesel exhaust and chugging to and fro ....the great canneries puffing huge steam clouds from their stainless chimneys, as they cook off millions of cans of salmon ....net-laden pick-up trucks careening on the busy docks. And all this, while the bar-lined streets hum with constant reinforcements.

I can't believe this is my first day off in three frigging weeks. Twenty-one straight 18 hour workdays at $6.50 an hour ...plus overtime! I'm bone tired, ....but I'm loaded!

Hey, look at that! That gorgeous big Zippo™ in the window with the ivory scrimshaw case. Now that lighter is neater than shit! Well, it ain't real ivory....or real scrimshaw either, but what do you want for eight bucks?

As the Filippino lady gives me change from the hundred, I'm thinking, "Boy, oh boy, don't that big lighter just feel real nice and heavy in my pocket!"

Beautiful, rugged looking wristwatches with massive gold encrusted bands sit in the glass case beside the lighters. "Genuine Alaskan Gold Nuggets" say the little placards displayed next to them. "When I get rich, I'm going to get me one of them fancy bastards," I vow.

As I leave the gift shop, I pull a fresh Marlboro™ from the crush-proof box in my shirt pocket. It glows bright red where the fat flame of the brand new Zippo™ disappears.















"Click," goes the satisfyingly loud sound of the fine quality American craftsmanship. God, doesn't the ambient lighter fluid aroma taste just divine commingled with that first big fresh drag!

On the corner opposite the gift shop sits the "Alaskan," a three story hotel and saloon right out of the movies. The only thing missing is a hitching post and a horse out front! Rumor has it that the rooms for rent on the second and third floors can even come complete with a girl, ....if you can stand the price.

Years before, some particularly energetic souls salvaged the back bar in the "Alaskan" from an old deserted saloon in Katalla. Katalla is an old ghost town, once a major coaling depot for the Navy's Pacific Fleet.

Somehow, the 50 foot long bar with ornate mirrors, gaudy brass fittings, and the whole nine yards, was wrested out and brought intact by boat some hundred miles up the Gulf of Alaska to Corona. Instead of a brazen nude oil-painting, a giant preserved King Crab, regally mounted on velvet and sequins, hangs prominently on display behind the bar.

Inside the Alaskan, the jukebox music and drunken laughter is punctuated by the staccato clacking of pool balls and the dulcet chime of clinking shot glasses. I'm taking all this in and thinking that the cold beer feels "mighty fine" going down .....a little too fine. I really need to get back to my bunk for some much needed rest before I wind up starting in on an irreversible tear.











They say the busy season lasts straight through August here, and just thinking about six more weeks like the last three, is making me very, very tired.

The lid of the new Zippo™ clicks crisply shut once more as I reluctantly make my way back to the cannery.

Of course, there are paved roads! This is 1980, ain't it?