Watson Lake, Yukon

Well, I am hoping the sky clears and I’ll get my first sight of the Northern Lights before I leave here.

I walked over to the Northern Lights Center to watch their program and explore the museum but it was not open.  About the only things that are open are the post office and the grocery store.

Now here is a eye-opener …. Those of you in the lower 48 that complain about the price of food …. Let’s see … a 12 pack of Diet Coke is $10; a 4-pack of ice cream bars is also $10; $3.80 each for avocados; I bought a pint of milk for $3 … unbelievable.  The $3 loaf of bread and the $3 half-dozen carton of eggs were at least semi-reasonable. Now I need to go get a $20 bottle of DEF ….  When they say this trip is expensive, you can’t even imagine until you get here.  I was hoping to empty my gray water tank while I’m here (included in site) but my levers are frozen and I can’t get the tank open.  It isn’t until later in the trip that I find out how unfortunate this is.

 

I walked over to the Sign Post Forest.  It has over 10,000 signs.  The first was erected in 1942 by a GI missing his hometown of Danville, Illinois.

 

Tomorrow or Thursday I’m heading for Whitehorse to see what adventure I can find there.  I plan a trip to Skagway and maybe Juneau while I’m there.

Headed to the Yukon

The locals keep telling me this weather is unusual and the snow is usually gone by March.  Leave it to me to pick this year to come.  There is no way I thought it would still be this bad in mid-April.  I’m going with the “I’m not too early, Spring is late” defense.

Another 8 hour drive today.  Finally found some sunshine, blue sky and dry road half way to Watson Lake. Although it was still 29 degrees, it was a nice drive for a few hours, and Alaska became more manageable.  Now that the weather is better I’m starting to see the “pretty.”  I’m thankful for the long daylight hours.  Since it takes me so long to get from one place to another, I’m glad I don’t have to travel or arrive in the dark.

Unfortunately, I had the opportunity to prove I was paying attention when my wonderful son showed me how to jump start my car.  The work-around Jeep came up with for the power steering issue now drains the battery, so I have to jump start it.  I can’t pull it with a dead battery because the power steering issue resurfaces.  Most annoying.  And it is not just stopping and running the car every so often.  I have to “undo” all the towing procedure before I can start the car, then redo it again …. And it doesn’t really run long enough to give the battery much charge.  When I get home I’m going to have a power supply to the battery set up and avoid all this nonsense.

The bison here aren’t as well trained as the deer I previously mentioned.  They actually sleep on the road (I assume for the added heat).  All the ones I saw (tons of them, literally) were awake, but still standing in the road.  A bison herd lives year round on the Alaska Highway right-of-way and about 20 bison are killed by collision with vehicles every year.  You see them all along the highway, either in a group or alone.  It was so odd to drive 30 miles and there would be one bison alone just eating grass. 

The frost heaves in the road are a little bit fun and a little bit scary, but they definitely keep you on your toes.

Since I got a late start from Fort Nelson, and wanted to make it to Watson Lake before dark, I didn’t get a chance to stop at the Toad River Lodge.  They have a collection of 3,600 billed caps nailed to the ceiling.  Also, the view of Summit Lake was a no-go due to weather.

My first week and first 1500 miles completed.  I made it to the Yukon!  I crossed the border between BC and Yukon about 4 or 5 times before I arrived in Watson Lake due to the winding highway.  And I see I’ll cross it a few more times on the way to Whitehorse.

Of course, the sun is gone and it is snowing and frozen snow to walk and drive on again ……

Internet is a rare commodity so the blogs won’t be posted with any regularity …. But I’ll try to keep you updated on my fun as much as possible.

Driving through British Columbia …

This is the view from my rearview camera

This leg will take me from Dawson Creek to Fort Nelson, about 285 miles of some of the most white-knuckle driving I’ve ever done!  Here is a picture of the road …. Can you say Ice Trucker?  OMG. The downgrades were the worst.   I was so exhausted when I reached Fort Nelson, I pulled into the first campground (I was the only tenant) and just sat for a long time.  My coach and car were so mud-covered, I couldn’t see out of any of my windows, the mirrors or my cameras, so I was driving blind.  The wipers gave me a little visibility out of the windshield …. But not much.  When people who have done this trip before posted how dirty they rigs got it was hard to imagine just how awful they actually get.  Every time I stopped I tried to wipe the mirrors, but within a couple of miles I couldn’t see again.

So now I have to get out and plug in and pull the fuse on the Jeep.  The snow drift I had to walk through was thigh-high.  I know those of you who actually live in the white stuff are laughing at me, but as a SoCal girl, this was not that much fun.  Here is my coach unit at the campground.

I had a small disappointment when I left Dawson Creek …. I wanted to cross over the Kiskatinaw Bridge but I thought the turn-off sign said “closed” and then realized that was for the campground, not the bridge, but then it was too late to make the turn.  The Kiskatinaw Bridge is part of the original section of the Alaska Highway.  The location of the bridge site, which was near a hairpin turn on the river, forced construction of a curved right-of-way.  Engineers developed this 190-foot wooden bridge with a super elevated nine degree curve to conform with the bend of highway.  It took 9 months to build and is today the only curved banked trestle bridge remaining and still in use.  Hence my disappointment in missing it, but here is a commercial picture.

 OK, so the fun continues … the next morning (Monday) I go to leave and I’m stuck.  Funny thing about parking warm tires on frozen snow …. I eventually had to be towed out of the camp site.  It is 9 degrees.  I stopped for diesel (again $5.25/gal) and paid $2.00 by the minute to hose off my windows, cameras and mirrors.  I tried to clear my jacks, but they were so encrusted I ran out of money.  Next was propane ($52 for 13 gals) – I didn’t realize when I was hosing off the windows that my propane bay was completely full of frozen mud (it is open on the bottom of course).  We had to get cups of hot water and a screwdriver to eventually clear the cap enough to open the tank.

So now it is afternoon and I have conflicting reports on the road and weather heading north.  Yep, off I went.  About 326 miles to the Yukon!