Day 14 On the road again, the Alaska Highway

Dear Diary,

We had cable TV hook-up last night and watched some action program set in a town around Vancouver.  The leading man was handsome but the story line and acting were bad.  Vancouver is in hysteria with their win toward Stanley Cup.  We have heard of more tornadoes in the lower 48 with one perhaps touching down within 15 miles of our house.  We don’t have cell but have emailed Seth to go check out our house.  It has been so wet at home that grass cutting is delayed and professional baseball games cancelled.  We have followed this weather pattern across the nation and Canada.  We have moved so far north that we have almost never ending light.  And in the last day or so we seem to have entered an entirely different weather pattern.  At 1:30 this morning there was dawn type light in the northwest.  It’s not too bad yet as it gets somewhat dark.  The light will increase until solstice on June 21.  This is why you see campers with tin foil over their windows.  We’ve given up on Scrabble for the time being.  Chuck having a bad run of luck with the tiles.  A beautiful morning and clear.  The sun in the northeast sky sits above a low mountain and Wye Lake.  We are in the middle of this town that is really more a crossroads.  Texas, California, Arizona and Pennsylvania are in the campsites.  So, people actually like camping in the north this early in the season.  The mosquitoes are out in full force, last night there were several cruising the screen door, hovering or clinging, little nervy vampires. They are large and still not in their greatest number.  Thankfully we are fully screened, another necessity in the RV.  There is a 9 hole golf course here, not sure how much it gets used.  We take our morning coffee and walk the short distance to Wye Lake.  It’s warm and breezy, sun, no clouds.  We get some nice pics of the lake.  There are some noisy waterfowl.  Our beloved loons are not present.  I made a mistake on calling the Yukon River in this area a delta.  So not true, blaming it on fatigue and too many tour books.  The headwaters for the mighty Yukon are up the road.  The bird banding in this area must be being done at the many lakes in the area.  We leave the campground around 8AM after showers and breakfast.  We stop at the Sign Forest before leaving town.  This is an area of wooden pools where people from all over the world have put up a sign from their hometown or something that commemorates their visit.  It has gotten huge.  Took a lot of pics of it.  It was much smaller when we came through in ’84.  Thinking we still have the Hudson city sign that commemorated Brenna’s field hockey team as state champs.  We believe this would be an awesome place to hang it.  Must plan for the future.   Aside, it made us feel old when Brenna said, where have you been, you’ve been off the grid for days, I was worried.  Reversed roles?   It’s okay, she’s still in the Will but we vow to live long enough to spend it all.  haha   It was mentioned earlier that bison were left behind on the prairie, but as we travel north we are reminded they transplanted a bison herd into Delta Junction, AK, where they roam and make buffalo chips.  We are retracing our mileage and are now officially heading west on the Alaska Highway, Rt 1.  We re-cross the Laird River, a metal trestle and metal grate bridge.  The river is lined with sandbags here trying to hold off flooding from this swollen river (another one).  Besides the black spruce that grows naturally they have planted white pine, a pretty contrast.  Because land is basically glacial moraine there are rocks/stones everywhere.  All sizes.  We see ‘stone’ graffiti along the slanted sides of the road.  We saw this in Alaska last year and thought it was a great idea.  No spray paint still requires talent and patience to write messages in stone.  And eco friendly!  We pass one that says JUST MARRIED!   We can see the road winding for miles in front of us.  Road conditions are barely a step up from the Cassiar and sometimes are just like the Cassiar.  But this is an area of incredible beauty.  Wide valleys filled with little lakes, pine and spruce, low mountains and high snow covered peaks.  There is a vista of far away high peaks and we know that Mt Logan, Canada’s highest peak is out there at over 19k.  (McKinley is over 20k, highest in North America).  Pat flew over Logan one time and couldn’t get over its size and pyramidal shape.  And the area is so heavily glaciated that all could be seen were miles of ice rivers, many flowing into the water.   Logan is part of the St. Elias range that covers Alaska and Yukon (Wrangell – St Elias ranges flow together).  Very remote and difficult to get anywhere into the US and Canadian National Parks that meet.  If we could hop over the mountains to the west we would be at Yakutat, Alaska, located above the Inside Passage but on the Alaska Gulf.  We will be docking temporarily in Yakutat on our return ferry trip.  We will have traveled by RV up the eastern side of the coastal mountains and will go down the western side on the water.  At one point on the road we slip back into BC and over the Continental Divide once again.  At this point the water divides to Alaska sites, going north to the Beaufort Sea, Prudhoe Bay and south through the Yukon water shed to the Bering Sea coming off the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta.  The local Yupik call is it the YK Delta. The Pacific salmon migrate up the Yukon River while the Beaufort Sea drainage does not.  Local info cites that the run of salmon has determined the lifelstyle and location of peoples through history.   We pass a dog musher with his dog truck and a sled on top.  It reads that he is from Kotzebue, Alaska, the map reminds us how far north that is, above the Seward Peninsula.  He can’t drive there so maybe he shipped his rig and dogs down the Yukon River to this area.  Dogs are trained off season with wheeled sleds.  We can see the Cassiar Mountains to the west of us and they are beautiful, just glad we’re seeing them from this road.   Despite the only fair road conditions this drive is very pretty.  And the sunshine doesn’t hurt!  Most snow is gone from this level, a rare patch.  Alas, the spruce beetle has done its worst in places.  It’s been a problem in Alaska and we’ve seen it throughout from South Dakota.  They have an interpretive center here to explain what has and is happening.  It looks like someone dropped a bomb.  Most of the lakes along the way are at least partially frozen.  We go through an area of forest fire and you can tell it jumped the road; can tell it’s a couple years old by some regrowth.  We weave out of our brief time in BC back into Yukon. There is major bridge construction at Morely River, it will be nice when done.  We are following a couple on a motorcycle from New Jersey.  They have three small hatches connected to the bike for storage.  It appears they are living in their leathers.  What a trip for them!  Of course, it means restaurants and hotel rooms.  But very tiring.  We can see the peaks of the St. Elias looming in the distance, they are biggies.  This area is semi-arid, even with snow and water running.  And they haven’t had rain for a very long time, everything is dry.  The birch trees are prettiest right now.  Bright spring green leaves, long slim white trunks with black markings.   The Wrangell-St. Elias mountains curl around into central Alaska in the Alaska Range.  So, really the spine of the Rockies continues in a way into Alaska.  New realization after studying the maps that the Continental Divide continues into very northern Yukon Territory and curls downward through Alaska in the Brooks Range ending on the Seward Peninsula at York.  We crossed the Divide for the last time on this trip west of Watson Lake, YT.  We’re such nerds, but this fascinates us.  We descend to Teslin Lake with a panoramic view.  We are able to take pictures of this beautiful large blue lake and the longest metal trestle/metal grate bridge on the

Ak Highway

.  The info panels speak of the Tlingit people and they have a heritage center here.  We’re unable to stop but have known of these people over our years living in Ak.  It appears there are designated groups called nations under the Tlingit ‘umbrella’ identity.  This may be similar to the native corporations that have formed in Alaska.  Anchorage has a nice native heritage center where all native peoples are represented.  Tlingit have the ceremonial wool flannel capes etc with hundreds of shell buttons and symbols of their clans.  They are also totem people but we haven’t seen any totems since south in BC.  We know there are lots on the Inside Passage.  The panels also talk about Nisutlin Delta on Teslin Lake, many varieties of birds migrate here.  We pass over the bridge and are reminded of how difficult it is to navigate.  The long length of metal grate causes the tires to swerve.  We have to go slow and are glad the traffic on the other side has waited.  A caribou is feeding by the roadside.  Apparently we aren’t in high enough latitude for tundra yet.  But we know we are in perma-frost.  Reason being is that the local caribou are identified as Woodland Caribou and are on the ‘concerned species’ list.  We have only known tundra caribou.  Some of the rigs are pulling double containers and we think that’s really pushing it.  No train through here that we know of.  The rivers are used for transport too.  We’re at about 60 degrees and full sun.  We cross the Teslin River over a high bridge, no metal grate thankfully.  We come to Jake’s Corner, there is access to Atlin and Atlin Lake (neat looking place but dicey road) and access to the

South Klondike Route

via Rt 8 the

Tagish Road

, leading into Rt 2 to Carcross.  At that point you can proceed further south to Skagway on the Inside Passage.  Once there, there is a ferry that takes an hour or so trip to Haines on the Lynn Canal.  And from there you can drive up to Haines Junction.  Skagway is very fun and commercial, around 1 million visitors a year, mostly on cruises.  Haines is more laid back.  We didn’t opt to do this trip this time, spending time in Yellowstone instead.  But would love to in future.  We come to Marsh Lake, it’s very beautiful and there are many cabins and homes lining the lake.  Takhini Hot Springs are in this area.  We pass a sign for Inn on the Lake.  Martha Steward stayed there and filmed one of her shows there and National Geographic voted it in the top 10 great places to stay in 2009.  On down is Marsh Lake Dam or Lewes Dam, we stop and walk near the dam, this is the headwaters of the Yukon River.  We are shocked by the low water level, in fact we can see where the water was higher recently by about 4 feet.  Knowing the flow of this river from other trips, we can’t believe it.  There is not that much snow pack left in the mountains.  Locals say they haven’t had rain in a long time.  Everything is very dry.  What a contrast with our trip up to now.  The Yukon is an awesome river that flows 2000 miles from here to the Bering Sea.  A vital source for transportation and salmon from the Pacific.  The book says it’s 4^th or 5^th largest in US.  We thought it rated higher.  Looking at the map the Yukon flows just south of the Continental Divide in Alaska.  We believe they are in for big fires in this area.  No wonder there are so many people out here, very soon down the road we come to Whitehorse, around 25k population and capital of Yukon Territory.  The city limits are 162 sq miles.  2/3 of the YT live here.  Lots of minerals, including gold, tourism and commercial hub.   The Yukon River flows around the downtown in a valley.  It’s 70 degrees and we’re too warm for the first time.  There is a lovely golf course as we come into town and a salmon viewing area.  Stop at the visitors center.  We passed the Klondike on the way in, the old riverboat steamer on display.  Have cute pictures with kids and 2 GM’s.  There is no way that steamer could make it on these waters now.  The river is more gravel bar than water.  They have a very nice walking path along the river and a little trolley that also follows the path, only along the river.  This is a very busy place and it’s very young and very progressive.   Yukon College here.  We head to Klondike Salmon and Ribs on the main drag.  Funky place with a tree growing out of the deck.  Inside it is an old log cabin with corrugated roof.  Lots of memorabilia and artifacts in the main dining room.  We choose to sit on the deck elevated above the sidewalk even if the traffic is busy, it’s sunny and 70 and wonderful!  It snowed a foot here last week, so everyone’s in tank tops and white flesh.  We have the best halibut we’ve had in a while and Chuck says the Yukon Brewery ale is quite good.  Their slogan is, Beer worth freezing for.  There is a large bronze sculpture of a lone miner, loaded with gear and pick axe standing with his faithful pack dog, also loaded with gear.  And this is what it’s all about, the Klondike Gold Rush.  All the license plates have a miner panning for gold.  We stop at a gift shop and see the Canadian mined diamonds.  Very beautiful and have the 4 C’s and comparable with any worldwide diamond.  And we see a 12 oz gold nugget about the size of a baseball that was found nearby.  We stop at the local quilt shop to see what patterns and fabrics are going.  Buy a couple kits.  Also stop at a bookstore.  Robert Service is everywhere, books and poems etc.  We really like his work that captures the wilderness and gold mining perfectly.  We decide to push through to Kluane Lake so we can stop and make a camp for a whole day.  The road is only slightly better than Cassiar.  Elk signs appear and we are surprised.  Elk are not in Alaska than we have ever known.  Then there is a sign that it is a managed area and we think they have introduced them, probably for sport.  All of a sudden 5 horses are walking free along the road, no humans or homes in sight.  If we hop over the mountains to the west and have a swim in the Gulf of Alaska at this point we would be in Cordova, Alaska.  We are in a joining up area of St Elias and Kluane Mountain Range.  Incredible views.  Alas, we can’t see Mt. Logan from here but Pat thinks she spots its peak briefly.  These mountains literally rise straight up from the valley floor.  Glaciers are on some.  We pass through Haines Junction, the town is a cross-road but surrounded by lush forest and high peaks.  Rt 2 takes off south here for Haines on the Lynn Canal, the South Klondike Loop.  Can catch the ferry there and to Skagway.  They have been doing road improvement in the Kluane Lake area.  It’s as beautiful as we remember.  The lake is huge and mostly frozen.  The level looks down.  But with all the deep ice it should fill when thawed.  We come to Sheep Mountain in full view in front of us and can see groups of white dots frolicking.  The mountain is now called Tachal Dhal which we like better.  As we move around the mountain we can see sheep clearly with lambs.  We decide to stay at Congdon Creek on the lake.  As we enter the campground it looks so isolated and there is a large sign that tells tent campers (bear tacos) to not camp here in July and August because bears come to eat soapberries and get aggressive.  We find there are campers here at least 12, so we’re not alone.  We find a spot in a cul de sac and are steps away from the lake.  Sunny and warm.  Set up camp, start a campfire.  So quiet.  Only birds.  Walk down to the lake.  Just small areas of thaw along the shore, lots of big stones.  The glacier filled part of the area 3-400 years ago.  It moved in a way that permanently changed the drainage of the lake forever.  Instead of moving to the Pacific, short distance, it now drains the long way through the Yukon.  Take lots of pics the mountain views are great.  The ground is so dry here everything crackles underfoot.  No standing water, a few patches of snow.  No real sign of moose which we find puzzling.  Wolf pack in the area, but no fresh sign of any animals here yet.  We just realize that advertising that water is available is all relative.  If we want water here (Ca Nat Park) then we have to boil it.  As if.  So we now have to ration our water for the next day and a half.  As we relax by the fire the temperature begins to drop.  The sun is fading behind the mountains and we are sitting next to a giant ice cube.  Stay awake as long as we can but sleep calls.  It’s 10:30PM and light enough to do yard work.   Miles:  423.  About 10 hours travel time.  Nighty night.