Alaska: 2012-09-09

Valdez Alaska to Bothell Washington Sept 1-6th

Well, we left Valdez in the pouring rain, on Saturday morning Sept 1st, its a good thing we had the trailer hooked up the night before. We were on the road by 6:15 am. The road wasn't a whole lot better driving out than it was driving in, there may have been a few LESS bad road sections but they sure slow us down. A warning sign in this area of bad road said it was 38 miles long. Not ALL of it was terrible, just some of it was horrible. Most of my pictures came out blurred because I couldn't hold the camera still.....

"Pavement break"...................is what that sign says.
One of the road signs, that I didn't get a picture of is one that says, "Abrupt Edge".................

Driving out of Valdez that morning we saw 'Termination Dust', the term they use for the termination of summer. How appropriate, since we left on September 1st, it was the end of summer and also the end of our time in Alaska.

The drive from Valdez, even tho it rained all day, was the most spectacular autumn colors ever. If there just would have been blue skies it would have been even more brilliant.

Out of Alaska and entering the Yukon Territory...and see the bit of blue sky? So glad to see it and the sun!!!

Construction ALWAYS on the ALCAN highway.

Drove 14 hours that day...

Kluane Lake was where we spent our first night on the road. Its huge lake. It was the one and only campground still open at this point of the season in that area. We arrived at 8:30 that night..the owner was closing down for the summer and that night was the last night he was open. (Even tho there were lots of overnight campers there- I wonder what the travelers who haven't left Alaska yet will do for campgrounds on their way thru.... Theres not a lot of places to pull over for the night) He had trouble with grizzleys recently so he was closing down earlier than he normally does for the season, and for the safety of his campground guests. These campgrounds, such as this one have huge generators for electricity. You can always hear them running during the night, although some turn them off for the night. The generators are usually in a building or cabin of some sort, so the noise it makes is somewhat quieter.

Slept in a little, had breakfast then back on the road again, but first a stop at Sheep Mountain to view the dall sheep high on the mountain. Too far away almost to see with the human eye...

AND....still more beautiful scenery..............

2nd night on the road at Nugget City Yukon Territory (at the intersection of the Alaskan Highway and the Cassiar Highway..........This time we won't be taking the Cassiar hwy, as we did with Connie and Fred in 2006, even though we hear its paved now..we are going on a different way to drive a road we haven't ever been on before.

...Didn't have to do dinner that night....we had dinner in their 'Wolf it Down' Cafe... Family built and run. This really isn't a 'city', it has only this family run gift shop, restaurant, cabins, campground, church, meeting building for caravan groups and fuel. There isn't many travelers still around that area, all are headed home I'm sure.

This is the 'meeting' room for Caravan groups,,,"Best Little Ore House"

The Church... and our truck and trailer is to the right of the picture in the trees.

The blue skies and the lenticular clouds were pretty that night, picture doesn't quite do it justice, just believe me it was gorgeous.

Back on the road Again, We are now in British Columbia Province... and s t i l l ... more wildlife..

Stone Mountain Sheep

Caribou

The smallest of the wildlife ............a caterpillar that I spotted on the highway while we were stopped for about 15 minutes in construction.

Now on to some scenery pictures..

this is Muncho Lake, it has different shades of greens and aqua colors near the edges.. a beautiful lake (reminds me of the north side of Lake Tahoe near my aunt Vera's house)

Another little beautiful stop on our way.....This was one the many rivers we've seen along our routes this trip...hundreds of rivers in the north!!!

One of the places we had lunch along our way...we ate at the picnic table that you see there between the signpost...can you read the sign to the left? It says.....CAUTION.....THERE MAY BE RATTLESNAKES IN THIS AREA. ...didn't see ANY!

....looks like wreaths on the moutainside....just more forests.

SMILING??? doing his most hated job when camping. That was our LAST night in a British Columbia campground...then we'll be in the Good Ole USA !!!! But first we have one more thing to do before leaving Canada.. gotta go to 'Hell's Gate'. An Airtram that takes you to the bottom of Fraser River Canyon in a Goldola.

Gene finally found the Salmon he was looking for... (it was in Hells Gate)

They were filming a commercial for the British Columbia Tourism board, so they told us the gondola's may be delayed or stopped over the river...so we waited around to watch it all. There were two river rafts that were sent down the river, with the Gondolas positioned above the river, and people on the walk bridge. So we were delayed a little more than we wanted to be, but we finally got done at noon, and headed for the U.S.Border.

There were about 4 or 5 lanes to get thru the border, it was hot, and we had to keep turning off the truck because they don't want all the vehicles running and putting all the fuel fumes in the air... It was about a 30 minute wait.

Now hows that for a camping rig???

We had to go the the 'RV' Lane, and it happens to have a detector that we had to drive thru, similiar to what we walk thru at the airport. (That is not us or our rig, but we were in that lane.)

Well thats our BLOG.... hope you have enjoyed it. We had a wonderful trip and were glad to share it with you. A history of Valdez will follow.