Side trip to Skagway, AK May 29

SKAGWAY, ALAKSA

Monday, May 30, 2011

Since there wasn't much to do in Whitehorse, we took a side trip to Skagway. We stopped at Robinson Roadhouse where the White Pass and Yukon Route build a siding in 1899. Gold was discovered and a small town appeared. Low mineral yields caused the town to be abandoned. Bill thought it would be a good fixer-upper for a summer home.

We finally made it to Alaska! Notice the fog in the background. Now I know what it means by "thick as pea soup". Visibility was almost nil on top of the pass.

Downtown Skagway is delightful! Street after street of brightly painted shops, most are original buildings from the early 1900s.

The long summer days do wonders for the plants here. Notice the huge rhubarb plants behind me, about 4 feet tall!

According to our National Park Tour Guide, this is the most photographed building in Alaska. It is covered with small branches in a parquet design. Click on the picture to see details.

Some of the lakes and streams were still partially frozen but they made a beautiful picture with all the shades of blue.

We found this brown bear "grazing" on dandelions along the roadside. He didn't seem to mind getting his picture taken. How beautiful he is. This has been a wonder day with such breathtaking scenery and the colorful little town of Skagway, Alaska.

Below is a video of the bear eating. Click on it to activate.

Alaska Highway, Dawson Creek to Whitehorse May 24-28, 2011

Alaska Highway, Dawson Creek to Whitehorse
Yukon Territory, Canada May 24-28

Well, we are finally on the Alaska (Alcan) Highway! The first part goes through the vast farmland of the Peace Block, then gives way to aspen and pine trees giving the hills a green mottled effect. The Alcan skirts along beautiful Muncho Lake for several miles.

We spend one night at Ft. Nelson and walked to the Ft. Nelson Pioneer Museum beside our campground. Merl Brown, curator of the museum keeps most of the old vehicles in running condition. In 2008 he drove this 100 year old Buick to Whitehorse and back, a round trip of 618 miles, take 3 1/2 days each way.

We have seen a lot of wildlife along the road including this black bear and her 2 cubs, one being behind her.

Our next stop was at Liard Hotsprings Provincial Park. The hotsprings were fabulous, about 105 degrees! It was so nice that we went in the afternoon and again after supper! Slept good that night! A funny thing happened while we were there. One of the workers was running through the campground with a broom chasing 2 buffalo out of the park!

Next stop was the famous Watson Lake Sign Post Forest. It was started during WW II by a homesick soldier, Carl Lindley, when he put up a sign pointing toward his home town of Danville, IL. There are over 71,000 signs posted from all over the world, including one from Spirit Harley Davison in Pittsburgh, PA.

The Government Parks in Yukon are very nice, only $12 a night and this one had free firewood.

One in Whitehorse, we went to the Frantic Follies Review featuring Can-Can girls, music, and poetry by Robert Savage. It was an excellent show put on by all local talent. It was strange to walk outside at 10:00 PM and find the sun still shinning.

This is the world's largest weathervane located at the Whitehorse airport. This picture was taken on our way back to our campground at 10:30 PM. It is hard to make yourself go to bed when the sun is still shinning. And sunrise is around 4:15 am. Long, long days!!

Dawson Creek, BC May 23, 2011

We made it to Dawson Creek and are camped at the Mile "O" Campground just north of town. It is a nice park for $28 a night and includes Wifi.

Our first stop was at the famous Alaska Highway sign near the visitor's center. Every good tourist gets their picture taken here!

In anticipation of the extension of the Northern Alberta Railway coming to Dawson Creek, five grain elevators were built on this site. In 1982 all were torn down but this one. It has been renovated and now houses the Dawson Creek Art Gallery.

The Mile "O" Post has become one of the most photographed markers on the Alaska Highway. The first wooded Mile "O" Post was stolen by Halloween pranksters and replaced with an outhouse. This post is metal and is bolted into place!

There are many murals painted around town. This one depicts the 5c to $1 Store established in the 1930s. There is also a mural at the end of the alley leading you to believe you are looking further down the street. Click on the picture for a better view.

This is the Alaska Hotel, originally the Dew Drop Inn, built in 1933. It holds the distinction in Dawson Creek of being the same type of business occupying the same building for the longest period. Dawson Creek is a picturesque little town made famous by the Alcan Highway.

Tomorrow we continue our journey north on the Alcan Highway.

Canadian Border to Dawson Creek, BC May 19-22, 2911

May 19, 2011 we crossed the Canadian Border to Lake Louise and up the Icefields Parkway that connects Lake Louise with Jasper NP. It is a stunningly beautiful drive with snow capped mountains the entire way.

We stopped at the Columbia Icefield and took a snow coach up onto the Athabasca Glacier. This snow coach costs $1.5 million. It has a 250 hp Detroit diesel and Allison transmission. It is capable of up to 25 mph but what it can really do is go up and down steep grades.

Our driver and guide, Bruce Freeman, originally from Bradford, PA, gave us a good description of the glacier and of the snow coach. Here we are going down a 32% grade to get out onto the glacier.

Bruce took our picture standing on the Athabasca Glacier which is 1000 feet thick in this area.

The Columbia Icefield is at the top of the Athabasca Glacier, one of 5 glaciers in this area.

Bill got this picture of a big horn sheep lying beside the road just north of the Icefields.

This is a small lake behind the William Schweitzer Provincial Park visitor's center, taken late afternoon. I just love the colors and reflection.

We got the last electric hook up in the park as it was Saturday of their Victoria Day Weekend. It was a tight fit with the little RV. I am so glad we didn't bring the Titanium on this trip! The water lines were still frozen in the park. Glad we filled up earlier.

It is light until after 10 pm. Tomorrow we should reach Dawson Creek, BC and the start of the Alcan Highway.



Heading north again on Hwy 40 towards Grand Cache we saw this operating coal mine. Coal and timber are the main industries. There are thousands of acres of pine forests on either side of the road for miles and miles.

Leaving Grand Cache and driving towards Grand Prairie, the pine forests give way to Aspen trees as we travel towards the huge farmlands of the Peace Block.

Hamilton, MT and Glacier National Park May 14-18

Saturday, May 14
We left Jackson, Wyoming and drove through Idaho and on to Hamilton, Montana where we camped at Anglers Roost RV Park on the Bitterroot River for 3 nights. While the area I visited with a high school classmate, Brenda, who lives in Corvallis,MT in the Bitterroot Valley. After church on Sunday we had lunch at "Memories Cafe", which is in an old church building. What good use of the building! It was decorated inside with antiques and lots of pictures of Corvallis in the early 1900s.

Brenda lives in a beautiful log cabin about a mile off the main road. What a peaceful setting, I envy her! The Bitterroot Valley is an awesomely beautiful area of Montana.

On Tuesday we drove to Glacier National Park.

I took this picture of Bill looking out over McDonald Lake and Mt. Brown just at sunset.

After supper we took a ride on "Going to the Sun Road" about 8 miles. It was closed further on because of snow. We saw this black bear crossing the road on the way back.

Next on to Canada and Lake Louise.

Wyoming, Yellowstone National Park May 13, 2011

Friday, May 13, 2011
Yellowstone National Park

Today was the first day the South entrance to Yellowstone National Park was open. This is the only road to Yellowstone from Grand Teton National Park so we were fortunate that it opened today as we are leaving for Montana tomorrow.

Here's Bill in his familiar pose!

More good luck, and on Friday the 13th no less. Old Faithful was to erupt just 10 minutes after we got to the visitor's center. It erupts about every hour and 20 minutes.

Following a tour of the visitor's center where we viewed a film about Yellowstone we were able to witness another eruption of this most famous geyser in the world. A couple named Barb and Bill from Idaho took this picture for us!

We then took a walk on the "boardwalk" that wanders through numerous geysers and mud pots. It is a very strange feeling to be walking over a volcano! Click on this (or any photo) for a closer view of the pool and mineral deposit on the hillside.

It didn't seem to bother this herd of buffalo that wandered through the area, walking close to many small geysers. They even walked over the boardwalk.

There was one cow with a very small calf in the herd.











This was called Anemone Geyser and it really does resemble a sea anemone. It is about 10 feet in diameter. There are so many unusual geysers and pools here.

On the way back Bill took this picture of me to show how high the snow was along the roadway. That's the Snake River which flows into and out of Jackson Lake as it makes it way through Idaho to the Columbia River in Oregon.

What a view of the Tetons and Jackson Lake! It was like driving through a snow tunnel.

Our stay is almost over here in Wyoming. Tomorrow we will drive through Idaho and on to Hamilton, Montana where I will visit a high

school friend.

Did you see Stanley??

Wyoming, Grand Tetons May 9-12, 2011

Monday, May 9

After having breakfast at I-HOP in Castle Rock with our friends, Alice and Charlie Smith from Centennial, we headed off to Wyoming. Thanks Alice for the delicious banana nut muffins you made for our journey. They were delicious! We stayed overnight at the Walmart in Riverton, Wyoming.


On Tuesday we only drove about 50 miles to Dubois before the snow started to lay on the ground. Since the road over Togwotee Pass (9605') was "slick and snow covered" we decided the smart thing to do was to spend the day and night at the Dubois KOA. We did take advantage of the indoor pool, so it wasn't a wasted day. I also made potato soup for supper tomorrow night and baked bread for tonight's supper. Small world: one of the workamper couples was from Espyville, PA only about 20 miles from our hometown of Meadville.


Wednesday was sunny so we headed for the Tetons. I'm sure glad we didn't negotiate the pass yesterday and it still was very wet and was snow covered in some places. The snow was piled 8-10 feet high on both sides of the road and at the summit the road was only 1 1/2 lanes wide! One consolation, you couldn't run off the road if you tried!

We finally made it!

Our first view of the mountains was stunning. They are so rugged and beautiful, indescribable.

We found this campsite at the Summit Mountain Campground inside the National Park. We were a stone's throw (if you could find one in the snow) from Jackson Lake. As you can see there is still a lot of snow here. Good thing we bought this smaller RV as the length limit here is 30'.

This red fox wandered around our campsite for about 20 minutes. From the looks of him, he had a hard winter. Bill finally had to throw a snowball at him to get him to leave.

After supper we drove to Oxbow Bend which is supposed to be one of the best viewing area for elk and bear. Didn't see any wildlife except a coyote hunting in an open field. But the trip was worth it as I captured this outstanding picture of the Snake River with the mighty Tetons in the background just before sunset. This is my favorite picture of the Tetons.

Bill snapped this picture of the Tetons reflecting their image in Jackson Lake. The picture was taken from the dam on Jackson Lake.

On Thursday our first stop on the way to Jackson was the Chapel of the Transfiguration. This rustic Episcopal chapel was built in 1925 and is still in use today. It is built of lodgepole pine, with pews of quaking aspen, cut in the valley. Above the altar is a plate glass window framing the Grand Tetons. Twenty-four hours every day during the tourist season, the door is open to all who come.



Across from the visitor's center in Jackson was this huge arch of elk antlers. There are 4 more like this in the town square.

Our first stop in Jackson was the visitor's center. They have a wonderful display of wildlife including this grizzly bear.

This is an early morning picture of Jackson Lake and the Tetons taken from our campsite. The mountains had the rosy pink of sunrise on them.

Tomorrow we go to Yellowstone National Park.
PS Did you see Stanley??