Whitehorse, Yukon Territory

We've made it to Whitehorse, a veritable metropolis compared to the last few days. It even has a Starbucks and traffic lights. Today's drive was through rolling hills densly covered with boreal forest. No wildlife although there was plenty of evidence of past and present wildfires. We came around the northern end of the Rockies at Teslin, then began to see the rugged mountains of the Coast Range to the west. The ocean inlets and fjords are just beyond the Coast Range, not too far from where we are, but it will be another couple of weeks before we actually reach the sea.

The main point of interest today was Teslin Lake and a stop we made at the Tlingit Heritage Centre just outside of the town of Teslin. It sounded like they pronounce Tlingit as "Klinkit." The native Americans here are called First Nations, and one of them is a coastal tribe called the Tlingit. They are trying to re-establish their traditions and heritage here at Teslin Lake. The Heritage Centre was opened about ten years ago and as part of the opening ceremonies the clan poles for the five clans, Raven, Frog, Wolf, Beaver and Eagle were set up in front of the Heritage Centre for the first time in a hundred or more years.

Some of the photos I took around Teslin and the heritage center I have posted below.


This is the town of Teslin and the bridge across one of the bays of Teslin Lake. The lake is narrow but very long and we drove beside it for miles. The mountains in the background are probably the beginnings of the Coast Range.


The clan pole for Wolf Clan.

Linda standing beside Raven Clan pole.

Two Tlinglit canoes.

The beach below the Heritage Centre and Lake Teslin.

Wildlife, wildfires and the Yukon

We've reached Watson Lake in the Yukon, north of latitude 60. We were told this morning that the best time to see wildlife was early morning, so we left about 6:15. The first thing we saw was a sign saying "Extremely dusty conditions." And they were. The road was being patched for about the first 100 miles and was really very dusty, but there was very little traffic, so except for one stretch where we had to follow a pilot car, we were not forced to endure anyone's dust.

We headed northwest and were soon in the Rockies, and no wildlife. But near the summit we saw signs warning of sheep in the road. They come down to lick minerals from the road, apparently. Near the summit we saw a single small caribou, a cow with little short antlers. Further down the road we saw some ewes and a lamb, stone sheep not bighorns. They are beautiful sheep with much darker coats than the bighorns. Didn't get a picture, though. Cars had stopped in both directions, blocking the road, and then a big truck came up behind us and gave us an impatient blare with his air horn. Can't say I blamed him. We also saw a band of sheep scrambling up the shear wall of the highway cut a little further on, and another cow caribou.


The road was pretty rough through the mountains, narrow, winding, with either patches being repaired or patches needing repair. This was more what I had thought the Alaska Hwy would be like.

About noon we reached Liard Hot Springs, which are quite popular in these parts.



The Canadian government has provided bathhouses and walkways. Linda took a dip in the lower pool, which runs 40-49 deg. C (104-120 deg. F), and she declared it quite comfortable. She did not try the upper pool, which is around 54 deg C (about 130 F, which would probably boil corn). We had lunch here and had our first encounter with mosquitos. As we left the park we saw a black bear grazing on the roadside grass and weeds.


After the mountains the roads improved, but we started through an area where a massive wildfire had recently burned, and was still smouldering in places. It must not have been too hot, because there was not total kill of the trees in most places. The terrain was rolling and forested with birch and spruce, and there were a lot of rivers. This is the Liard River.

Along the route between Liard Springs and Watson Lake we saw a number of signs warning of bison in the road. We finally found a herd of about 20 or so bedded down in a dusty spot right beside the highway, and later one massive lone bull grazing the grassy shoulder of the road. Neither paid us any mind.

We got to Watson Lake about 2:30 and checked in at the Airforce Lodge. It's like a college dorm, twin beds in the room and the "facilities" down the hall. But it is clean and the hosts, a German couple, are very friendly. Watson Lake is a really small town, maybe 1500 people, so the accomodations are pretty basic. But lottery money had built them a first class "Northern Lights Centre" with a planetarium-type theatre and a beautiful show of northern lights. And very friendly and informative staff. The other point of interest in town was the Sign Forest, where people from all over the world have left signs, some they made especially to post here. This last picture is of just one small part of the "forest."

Dinner was at Bee Jay's, a truck stop that was a little rough on the outside but served good food. But it was not very effectively airconditioned. In fact, this is the first time in five years they've even needed airconditioning the lady at Bee Jay's told us. The Lodge isn't airconditioned, either. They tell me it should cool off this evening, though. I certainly hope so.

Tomorrow we will reach Whitehorse.

Dawson Creek to Ft. Nelson on the Alaska Hwy.

Bear with me, I'm finally getting the knack of this. So, this morning we stopped at milepost 0 and took one of two obligatory tourist photos for the trip. You'll have to wait to see what the other one is, but I'll let you know when we get there. We set out to drive what my guide book (Guide to the Alaska Highway, Ron Dalby) calls "the last great driving adventure in North America" and "more adventure than many drivers experience in a lifetime." We passed more fields of bright yellow canola and gently rolling fields of hay and pasture to Fort St. John, where civilization ends and the landscape becomes gently rolling hills of white spruce mingled with stands of birch, and an occasional pine tree or tamarack. We crossed the Peace River, one of the great rivers of the north, then continued on over long, nearly straight stretches of mostly empty highway.

We only drove about 280 miles today. We have stopped for the night at the Ft. Nelson Hotel, which was not much to look at from the outside, being under renovation. The upstairs rooms on the front side had window ACs which had been removed, but the desk clerk told us that the rooms were airconditioned, which was welcomed news because it was hot (about 85 F.) and sticky and we wanted somewhere cool. But the room is great and has a glass door that opens into a central courtyard that has a pool.

Linda has already tried out the pool and declares it a bit cool, but refreshing.

We got here a little after noon and, being early, went over to the local museum. It had an old WWII newsreel-style film of the construction of the highway, and some dusty and moth-eaten stuffed animals, some old antiques and some rusting WWII vintage vehicles. In all, a charming little museum staffed by charming young Canadian college students. They had never heard of the Burgess Shale Fossil Beds and had no idea where they are located. Guess I'll have to Google it.

Tomorrow we will look for the Laird hotsprings, about 2/3rds of the way between here and Watson Lake, where we will stay tomorrow night. They are supposed to be world-famous, but they warn that the upper hotsprings are, unofficially and against the rules, sometimes "clothing optional."

Did it really get to 107 deg. yesterday in Hood River? Yikes! At least it's getting cooler day by day as we get further north.

More Columbia Mountains.

We had lunch here - Huble Homestead Park

The Rockies north of Prince George.

















Folded strata

These are the Columbia Mountains just north of Valemont.

Linda

Dawson Creek, BC, Milepost 0 (Day 3)

Today was our longest day, 455 miles. It was a beautiful day. We started up a valley between the Rockies and the Columbia Mountains, on the Yellowhead Hwy. Very green with lots of fir and spruce, and more and more birch as we got further north. The land gradually changed to rolling hills. The road was good and almost no traffic, especially after we passed the Hwy 16 junction that went to Jasper National Park. At Prince George we got back on Hwy 97, the John Hart Highway. We crossed the Continental Divide, barely noticeable, then the mountains started closing in again as we headed towards McKenzie, Rockies on the right and some other range (Cariboo or Wolverine?). The Rockies were all folded and distorted sediments from probably hundreds of millions of years ago. I'll try to post a picture. Once we got around the Rockies, the land flattened out again and between Chetwynd and Dawson Creek it was very agricultural, mostly hay and canola, which surprised me. Dawson Creek is a good sized town, 10,000, and not at all like either of us had pictured it. We expected a little one-street town with a saloon and a couple of motels, maybe in a wooded valley, but it is flat and busy.

We had lunch at a neat little park just past Prince George which was an old homestead beside a pretty good-sized river. There was a sign that said that if you saw a bear "Don't panic. Notify staff. Go indoors." Okay! But we didn't see a bear. In fact, no wildlife so far, except for some ravens (or crows).

Mollie was quite polite today, no arguments about which route to take. There actually wasn't much choice, anyway, so she didn't have much choice.

Day 2

We're in Valemont, BC this evening. It is at the western gateway to Jasper National Park, in a broad valley surrounded by tall, jagged peaks. The Rockies are on the east and the Columbia Mountains are on the west.

Linda had brought along Mollie, the Garmin GPS device. Diane had already planned to go Canada 97A to Kelowna, then Armstrong, and via Canada Rte 1 to Kamloops. Mollie had other plans, and as soon as we turned onto 97A she began harassing us to turn around. She wanted us to take Hwy 3 to Princeton, then north to Merritt and Kamloops. When she saw we weren't going to cooperate, you could almost here her humph as she rearranged her schedule and gave us directions north on 97A. But at Peachland, just before Kelowna, she again began to browbeat us to turn west on 97C to Merritt. Rather than endure her sulking, we followed orders. I guess she really did know best. We had 4-lane freeway all the way to Kamloops.

It was a nice drive. We started in the Okanogan Valley, which is an agricultural area, mainly orchards and vineyards, and followed a valley alongside a series of lakes to Peachland. Mollie's route took us over a mountain range with a 5800 ft (1788 meter) summit. The vegetation changed from pine and sagebrush to firs and spruce (a lot like the area up around Mt. Hood). There is a tremendous amount of dead trees, whole hillsides were reddish brown rather than green. I don't know if it tussock moth, pine beetle, or some other disease or insect, but it is devastating. Worse than anything I've seen in Oregon.

From Kamloops we were on Rte 5 to Valemont. It got greener and lusher and less agricultural as we drove along. The last 80 km or so was through a narrow river valley, with glimpses of the jagged rocky peaks of the Rockies. But it is still hot, hot, hot. 34 deg (remember, we're in Canada now, but that's 94 deg to you Luddites). We saw our first "Moose crossing" sign, but no meese so far.

Speaking of the metric system, it is taking some getting used to to drive 110 (70 mps) and slow down to 50 in towns (about 35, I think). The car has kph as well as mph on the speedometer, but you really have to squint to read the kph. I bought gas at 1.019 Canadian dollars per liter, which comes out to about $3.47 US per gallon.

Tomorrow we should reach milepost 0 of the Alaska Highway at Dawson Creek.

By the way, we have found "poutine" on the menu both times we've eaten in a restaurant. Wasn't that what Bush thought was the prime minister of Canada? It is french fries topped with cheese and gravy, and is apparently the national dish of Canada.

Day 1

Here we are in Osoyoos, British Columbia, lakefront room. We left a little later than we will be leaving for most of the trip. It was about 9 a.m. by the time Linda's luggage was loaded and her husband Norm had given each of us a blessing. We headed east on I-84 and picked up US97 at Biggs, then followed 97 north through Yakima, Ellensburg, Wenatchee and Omak. We had a picnic alongside the Columbia north of Wenatchee at a nice state park, where we sat on the grass under a tree. Linda brought provisions for an army, so we dined quite well. The big adventure of the day was Canadian customs, where Diane chose the slow lane, as she always does, and we watched three cars go through in the other lane for every one in our lane. When we got to the customs man, he asked the usual questions: where were we going, did we have any firearms or explosives, did we have any fruits or vegetables? We confessed to a small ziplock bag of Hood River cherries, a few celery sticks, and some carrot sticks - illegal to bring into Canada we were informed (which I suppose we should have known). We were directed to a shed where the contraband could be deposited in a freezer (and informed that they would be watching us by closed-circuit TV). The large chest freezer was full to the brim with cantaloupe, watermellons, blueberries, grapes, and other goodies. We added our pittance to the stash, wondering why we hadn't been eating it while waiting in line.

The motel is located on a beautiful lake (we were informed that it is the warmest lake in Canada), but Linda opted for the heated motel pool. Diane forgot her swimsuit, so spent the time blogging. We're about ready to go out for dinner, then probably call it an early night.

Vern, if you are reading this, the corn in the Yakima Valley is six feet high and has tasseled.