The first part of today's drive, I'd rather forget, but the day got better as I got further away from the dust and gravel of Alaska's road repair and major construction.
I left Tok (it rhymes with 'Coke') around 6:15AM. Being a Sunday morning, traffic was very light for the first couple of hours on the Alaskan Highway. It was 51 degrees and cloudy when I left Tok, and neither the temperature or the sky changed much until I got to my destination of Haines Junction, the Yukon in mid-afternoon.
A short distance from Tok, headed southeast, I passed through the "Tetlin Junction" with Highway 5, the Taylor Highway, which I used on July 14th when I entered Alaska via the "Top of the World". It was a painful reminder of my miscalculation that day regarding mileage. I thought the distance from Dawson City, Yukon to the Tetlin Junction was 130 miles, but I mistakenly converted some miles into kilometers and it took longer to drive than I thought.
After struggling with various road conditions yesterday, I was hoping for an uneventful drive today. But, alas, it was not to be. The 92 miles from Tok to the Yukon border had miles of poor road condition. Either patches of gravel, with no sign of when they would be oil sealed and then in one area there was major construction (the old highway gone and a new one being built in its place). What a mess.
With my harrowing experience yesterday, almost sliding into a ditch because of pot holes and wet, loose gravel, I drove extra careful today. What bothered me today was two things. From one stretch of gravel to the next, it was inconsistent such that you never knew what to expect until you were on top of the gravel. One time it was firm and the next time it would be muddy, slushy and loose. The second thing was the number of non-continous stretches of gravel. You would drive over a couple hundred yards of gravel, then pavement and then back to gravel again. Very disconcerting.
I've been on the road for 25 days now, and a lot of what I've seen while driving has been repetitious. Trees, trees, trees. It may surprise you, but I've been counting the trees I've seen and I think there are 7,000,000,000,002 trees in Alaska, give or take one or two.
Because of the total length of roadway with construction and/or gravel patches, I couldn't average more than 40 mph for the first few hours of driving. Once I got into the Yukon, the road conditions improved and my speed improved.
That doesn't mean I didn't stop along the way. I didn't have breakfast before I left Tok, because I wanted to purposely stop for a meal, so as to break up my driving and get out of the car for a while. I made a good choice by stopping in Beaver Creek, just inside the Yukon border. The food was good, the people were nice to talk with, and before I resumed driving, I stopped into see Sgt. Preston of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. I asked him if he needed any help and he told me to get lost. Or maybe he asked if I was lost? I don't remember.
Beaver Creek is the western-most point in Canada, by the way. The other day I was in Anchor Point, Alaska, and its claim to fame was being the western-most city in the United States with a paved highway. Everybody wants to be known for something unique.
Today, I also stopped at a place called Burwash Landing. For such a small place on the highway, it probably has the best museum in the Yukon. Boy, was I impressed. I'm not sure where the money comes from to finance that museum, but the physical facilites are quite new and the taxidermy for all the animals on display was outstanding. The museum attractively displays life sized moose, caribou, sheep, goats and much more.
I thought the museum in Anchorage was good, especially its Alaska gallery. They also had stuffed animals but the thing that set them apart was an excellent mix of things that are important to Alaska's history. The role of planes, the railroad, the native people, the gas and oil industry, etc, etc. So, yes, Anchorage has a good museum, but so does a little Yukon town called Burwash Landing.
A short distance down the highway, still headed southest towards Haines Junction, I came to Destruction Bay, with is actually a town on Kluane Lake. There and further down the highway at Kluane, I took a number of photographs of the lake, with its brilliant aquamarine water. I was reminded of Lake Tahoe, in my home town area, which has its unique identity, and I think the same could be said for Kluane Lake. What a gorgeous setting, with very high mountains surrounding the lake.
I finally got to Haines Junction, found a place to stay for the night, had something to eat, and then looked around the area. My initial plan to was to meet someone while here, but our schedules didn't mesh. Oh, well, maybe next time.
Haines Junction has a unique display at the junction. I hesitate to call it a statue, because it's more like a monument. There is this fifty foot round, man-made mountain, on top of which are replicas of all the major game animals in the northwest (moose, caribou, sheep, goats, bears, etc). Unusual, to be sure. I took lots of pictures.
Tomorrow will be a short drive south, from Haines Junction, the Yukon, to Haines, Alaska, where I will catch the car ferry in the afternoon. I will ride the ferry from Haines to Juneau, drive off that one and onto another ferry which will take me to Prince Rupert, British Columbia. You may ask, why am I doing this? Well, it's like taking a cruise on a luxury liner to see the glaciers along the Inland Pasage, but instead of driving, me and the Explorer (and Tank, and Eeyore) can take a cruise. It will be a novel part of my Alaska trip.
Because of being on the car ferry Monday and Tuesday night, I won't have access to a phone line, so it will be Wednesday night before I post my diaries and whatever pictures I might have. Talk with you later.