More from Fairbanks

We've been having so much fun in Fairbanks, we decided to extend our stay for a total of 2 weeks. We finally got caught up on our laundry, and we're back in maintenance mode. We have stocked up on groceries, too.

Statue in downtown Fairbanks

Over the past week we've been on several outings. We picked a wet, rainy day to go over to the University of Alaska Fairbanks Museum of the North. This fine museum is housed in a building that is a striking architectural wonder of its own, and houses a broad range of artifacts which exemplify all of Alaska, divided into the several basic regions that tend to have unique characteristics. For example, in the Southwest section, there is an extensive display about the interment of Japanese and Aleut citizens starting in 1942. Photos, newspaper articles, and first person accounts describe the plight of these people, which ended up being somewhat more severe than the interment of Japanese in the lower 48. In the Aleutian Islands, the small towns were destroyed to keep the invading Japanese from utilizing the structures. Thus there were no homes to return to after the war.

Another set of displays covered the geology of Alaska. Besides gold, the land is minde for coal, lead, copper, and of course, oil and natural gas.

Bear family up close and safe

Natural history displays exhibit the scope and size of the animals found in Alaska. Seeing the normal size of these bears gave me a fuller appreciation of what I might be up against if I should encounter one in the wild. I don't think I would ask them to pose for me. The current conventional wisdom calls for fighting back if one finds you too interesting to pass up, but I'll avoid the entire experience if it is offered and I have a choice. Other native Alaskan animal are mounted for viewing. Its likely the only way we'll see polar bears while we're here.

Eskimo art

Considerable space is devoted to disclosing the customs and art of the native populations and their history. In general, the PC term for these in Alaska is Eskimo, but there are several different groups that inhabited the area, and each has developed their own style. The eastern group, and perhaps the largest, are the Athabaskans who inhabited the eastern and interior sections of the state. Other tribes include the Tlinglit in the Southeast, and the Inuipiak in the Northwest, the Aleuts and Onangan in the Aleutian Islands. While all had to brave the cold, dark Alaskan winters, each developed their own subsistence means, and art and custom followed the materials available.

Finally, we saw two movie productions of the museum, both wonderfully produced. One covered life in the winter around Fairbanks, when temperatures can reach 60 below zero or more. Outhouses are still a way of life here, since running water and sewer lines tend to freeze, and of course, some parts of the area are built on permafrost, which never thaws. The other film explores the beauty and science of the aurora borealis. Since the aurora forms as a ring around the poles, optimal viewing of this phenomenon occurs in a narrow band that includes Fairbanks at its center.

The Nenana

On Wednesday, we tripped to Pioneer Park. It's hard to relate this to similar parks in the lower 48, due to it's lack of focus. In general the park displays the gold rush history of the area, but also includes rides for the kids and a wildly eclectic Air Museum. The park was built for the Centennial celebration in 1967, 100 years after Seward encouraged the congress to buy the place. It is owned and operated by the Fairbanks North Star Borough, basically a county organization. Where enthusiastic volunteers have devoted their blood, sweat and tears to preserving their bit of history, the park shines. An outstanding example of this is the 100 year old narrow gauge locomotive that is kept in working order and brought out on special days for rides. Other displays, like the 230 foot long Nenana riverboat, probably require more care and money than can be provided to keep the display in top notch condition. We enjoyed it nonetheless.

On Friday, Consuelo had signed up for a class at the local fabric/yarn store, so I took the time to look for photo opportunities. I first parked downtown and took my bike on the Chena River Bike Trail. I rode Southeast first, finding the end of the trail at the gate to Wainwright Army Base where I was turned away. I returned to downtown, and discovered an Army Brass Quintet performing in the park next to the river, so I stopped and listened to their music and ate my bag lunch. I tried to venture farther southwest, but lost connection with the trail after it left the park, so I returned to automotive transport.

Giant Alaskan Cabbage

I then went back to the U of A campus to check out the Botanical Garden. This university extension service provides Alaskans with firsthand displays of annual and perennial flowers, trees, and garden vegetables in the ground. If you're considering a garden or landscaping, you can see what luck the U has had growing varieties of your vegetables. Displays include the names of seed companies, and sources are listed if you want to purchase them.

Other areas of study include optimizing production in the 90 day growing cycle, under nearly 24 hour days. Some plants, like soy beans, need some darkness to thrive. Others, like the giant cabbages developed here, flourish under the long, long days. These cabbages get up to about 80 pounds. That's a lot of coleslaw!

Fairbanks for the Solstice, musk ox, pipeline

Fairbanks celebrates the solstice

We don't usually set too many goals for our destinations when we're traveling, unless we have a reservation or appointment. We did set one for Fairbanks, though. We wanted to be here for the summer solstice, just to observe the longest day of the year at the farthest northern point on our route. Besides, if we didn't set a goal to be in Alaska at some point, we might have spent the whole summer in Canada, as there were lots of things to see and do there, too.

We made our goal, arriving in Fairbanks on June 18th. We booked ourselves into Riverview RV Park, in North Pole, Alaska, about 10 miles SW from downtown Fairbanks. It's a nice park, right on the Chena River, just across the river from where a pair of bald eagles appear to be nesting. We spent the first 2 days in a concentrated effort to get the remaining Taylor Highway dust out of our home. That meant vacuuming the ceilings, walls, floors, miniblinds, and furniture. We also replenished our groceries and looked around town a bit. We went to the post office and picked up our mail, which we hadn't seen since Rochester in mid-May. There was quite a pile, and it took a couple hours to handle the bills, checks, and read the magazines.

Skateboard jumping in the streets

Fairbanks had a celebration planned for the Summer Solstice on Sunday. They shut off about a 10 block area downtown for a variety of activities, open from 12:00 noon until the midnight sun at 12:00 misnight. The older young people set up a 3-on-3 basketball tournament, 2 games going at a time and lots of practice space. The food vendors offered a wide variety, from barbeque to Thai to brats to burgers to elephant ears. We decided to have Latino, which was rice and vegetables, grilled pork or ribs, and red beans with bacon. We wandered the craft booths, saw some beautiful things, but held onto our money. And we watched the kids having fun on the climbing wall, the air houses, and the skateboard area. 3 stages offered rock music, dance recitals, and a swing band that sounded pretty good. It was fun!

Full grown musk ox

On Monday we decided to go the the Large Animal Research Center of the University of Alaska. This scientific mission studies the lifestyles, biology and physiology of musk ox and caribou. We took the tour of the facility, had an excellent presentation and learned a lot about these magnificent animals.

Musk ox are a prehistoric species. They were hunted to extinction in Alaska during the gold rush, as the demand for fresh meat spiked as people arrived from their long sea voyages to search for gold. A small herd of about 40 animals was shipped to Alaska from Greenland to reintroduce the species in the 1930s, and the herd is maintaining itself today. But because they are all descendants of such a small gene pool, they have no strength of genetic diversity, and couold easily succumb to disease. They weight 400-500 pounds, live for 10-20 years, live in harems, and produce some of the lightest and warmest wool in the world. Consuelo wanted to buy a few skeins, until she found out that they were $70/skein.

Caribou daddy

Caribou are far more plentiful in Alaska and elsewhere. Whereas musk ox defend themselves by circling and using their horns, caribou run away when endangered. Their longer legs and energy efficient ankles give them the ability to run a long ways, and because the hair in their fur is hollow, they can easily swim away from some predators. In addition, the newborn calves can run with the herd as soon as they are about 1 hour old. The young calves we saw in the pens were about 2 weeks old, running around the pen, chomping on grass, and bothering their moms for a little milk.

Caribou mom & kid

After visiting the musk ox, we shopped in the gift shop, and I had an extended conversation about with our tour guide about what the content of their research was. They have 2 active grants, one to research the physiology of their digestive systems, since they are able to survive on some of the worst forage in the world. They are looking to see if that capability might be transplanted to domesticated animals. The other study was examining the domestication characteristics of these animals to see if they might serve as a future source of meat and wool.

Alaska Pipeline

After leaving the Center, we traveled up highway 2 a few miles to visit the display about the Alaska Pipeline. This 800 mile conduit was an engineering achievement when it was completed in 1977. Since then, it has delivered 20% of the crude consumed by the US. The builders had to overcome numerous technical and environmental obstacles when building the line. The 4' diameter pipe is half above ground and half under ground. Radiators are installed on the mounting structures so that heat from the relatively warm crude oil doe not melt the permafrost below. The pipeline crosses over rivers and under roadways. There are a dozen pumpstations along the way to keep the crude moving. And high tech gadgets called "pigs" are inserted into the stream flow to clean the interior of the line and to measure the health of the pipeline using ultrasound detectors. Hundreds of crossovers were built to allow animal traffic to cross the line throughout its length. I was impressed, Consuelo less so. She just expects us engineers to create such miracles, I guess.

Pipeline "pig"

In order to be completely tired out before we got home, we stopped at Sam's club and picked up some of the few bulk items that we can fit into motorhome, like sausage, chicken, 5 bean salad, etc. We then went home and collapsed. There's still lots more to see in Fairbanks, and we'll get back to it soon.

Ferry Dust to the North Pole

The free ferry at Dawson City

We left Dawson on Tuesday, June 16th. Our first challenge was crossing the Yukon River on the free ferry provided by the Yukon Government. This little ferry takes about 4 minutes to make a crossing, making wide swings and applying lots of power to compensate for the swift current in the river at this time of year. The capacity is about 2 RVs of our size. And there was a line to cross, we arrived at about 11:00 in the morning, so we waited almost an hour to board.

I was concerned about getting on and off the boat, since our Alfa has pretty low clearance. But the ferry masters had the landings worked out on both sides so that the ramps were pretty level, so that was not a problem. We ended up waiting an extra turn in line, because the partial load that queued up in front of us didn't have space for us, but did have space for 3 smaller RVs behind us.

Once we crossed, we started our trip to the US/Canadian Border on the "Top of the World Highway". I found the name to be particularly appropriate, because the road climbed up nearly 2000 feet from the river and traveled near the hilltops at 3500 feet for most of the 65 miles in Canada. It was gorgeous. I'd love to share the pictures of the hilltop where we stopped for lunch, but I failed to check my camera, and found a bunch of over exposed photos later. All part of my training.

We crossed the border with little fuss. I had our passports ready, the agent checked them, asked the usual questions, then told us to have a nice day.

Flags and outhouses in Chicken

Whereas the Top of the World Highway was partially paved with dirt road sections that were in great shape, the so called "Taylor Highway" on the US side of the border was little better than an old country road that got no attention. Average speed before the border was probably 45 mph, but on the US side, that dropped to 20-25 mph. And dusty, dusty, dusty. There was some beautiful scenery to see along this stretch of road, wonderful Alaskan streams. But there were also winding hairpin turns, steep up and down stretches, and lots of narrow sections.

A few miles before we got to Chicken, I noticed that our engine was losing power. The last few uphills were tenuous, and we parked at the store/gas station/campground in Chicken to shop for a few minutes. As we tried to leave town, I could barely get up the first little hill in 1st gear, so we turned around and got a campsite for the night. They had no phone service there, but they did have wifi. Go figure.

Dust collected on our bug from the Taylor Highway

I pulled the air cleaner out and dumped about 5 pounds of Taylor Highway dust out of it, and put it all back together. The next morning, we tried to go to Tok again, but we still had no power. We decided that there was no help in Chicken, so we kept going, crawling up the first hill at a speed so low that nothing registered on the speedometer. About 2/3 the way up the 2 mile hill, the engine popped, issued a thick cloud of black smoke, and then we had power again. Still concerned, we drove another 5 miles, then hooked up our car and made the trip to Tok, about 70 miles, without incident.

We stayed one night in Tok, at a nice little campground in the fir trees, with the lupines flowering all around us. The campground had a wash station, so we spent an hour getting all the highway off the RV and car.

The Tanana River Valley

On Thursday, we traveled from Tok to the end of the Alaska highway in Delta Junction, where we stopped for lunch. Then on the Richardson Highway into Fairbanks. There were apparently some mountains to see south of our travels, but rain and clouds kept them invisible to us. We did get some nice views of the Tanana River along the way.

We decided to stay at Riverview Campground in North Pole, Alaska, just a few miles before Fairbanks. The days are now nearly 22 hours long, since we're just a couple days before the summer solstice. Fairbanks has a big celebration for the solstice, so we'll be downtown checking it all out on Sunday. And the golf courses are open from 6AM to 2AM, so tee times should not be a serious problem if I decide to play golf.

3 Nights in Dawson City

Yukon River, cloudy day

We planned to go to town on Saturday to check out the Dawson Info Center, then make plans from there. We found out that our Annual Parks Pass got us into the Parks, but not the Historic Sites, of which there were many in Dawson. It would be cheaper to upgrade the pass, but we didn't have it with us. We stayed and watched the 3 video movies they showed at the info center, one on the Riverboats, which I found fascinating, one on the Miners and the settlement of Dawson, and one on Gold Mining. We then went back to the motorhome, and got lazy.

Riverboat Keno, parked on the rivers edge

On Sunday, we tripped back into town, stopped at an ATM to get some cash. Consuelo then went shopping, and I went to the Internet cafe, called TastyByte to check my email. After a while, she came around and she checked her email while I strolled the riverfront, watching the ferry cross. After that, we took a drive up Dome Road and caught the spectacular view of the Yukon River Valley. The day was a bit gray, but the clouds were interesting.

Dredge #4

After Dome Hill, we drove up Bonanza Creek Road, toward where the original gold strike had been made in 1897. Most of the road was dirt, and it snaked its way along the creek, between the piles of tailings and ratty looking homes/trailers where some people were still hoping to strike it rich by finding gold. We passed Claim 33, a place where they show you how to pan for gold, with a flake guaranteed in every pan. We finally arrived at Dredge #4, a Canadian Historic Site. The dredge is an 80 foot high monster, that crawled through the terrain scooping up placer gravel, just above the bedrock, and sifted sand sluiced the gold out of it, leaving piles of ugly rock and gravel behind. It was impressive that they had built such a big machine to look for tiny flakes of gold. It also demonstrated the cosmic shift that took place after the streams were played out, claims were consolidated, and big business tore up the remaining land to find treasure. Kind of like Walmart.

After dinner visitor
For supper on Sunday night, I grilled some marinated pork chops and potatoes and onions in foil, a real camp dinner. It was delicious. Some of the local wildlife must have thought it smelled pretty good, too, since this red fox came over to check out the grill after I was done.

On Monday, Consuelo had a dizzy spell in the morning, and was not feeling well for most of the rest of the day. We stayed in, played games.

Since I had some time at home, I looked in vain for cable access to the bottom of the main slide. We had the TV lift working fine, but we still had a cable routed across the living room floor when we used it. The Alfa forums indicated that there was a way to route cable to the bottom of the slide from within the lower compartment, and I opened up one cover in the compartment ceiling, to no avail. All that was there was part of the slide mechanism. I'll need further guidance on that one.

Our campsite, from Dome Road

As an alternative, I decided to investigate how hard it would be to adjust the wipers so that they were stored in the center, where they are supposed to be. When Lesmeister RV mechanics in Rochester repaired the wipers, they showed most of their ignorance in putting things back together. They had them starting in the middle and wiping across each other, and I was able to tell them what was wrong with that setup. But then they had the wipers storing themselves about 10” from the center, not in the middle of my field of view while driving, but far enough into it to annoy me. I realized that all I had to do was remove the link from the motor and adjust the wipers to the center, then mount the link. Removing the link, and I got the wipers where I wanted them. But then I discovered that the link blocked access to putting the nut back on to secure it. A ten minute job ended up as a 1-1/2 hour job, since I had to take the whole thing apart to put it back together right. But I got it done.

For dinner, I decided to thaw one of the eye round oven roasts that we had purchased in Alberta. Black Angus not withstanding, Albertians believe they have the best beef in the world, and I find it hard to argue. It cooked up into a wonderful, juicy, tasty roast that we will enjoy for days. At least 2 days.

Yukon River, clear day

Around 9:00 PM, I drove into town to take some pictures in the late day sun. The shops were closed, the gambling hall was open, and tourists were ambling around town looking at the sights. Afterward, I drove back up Dome Road and caught a few shots of the valley with fewer clouds.
After I got home,

Pelly Crossing to Mayo to Dawson City

Welcome to the town of Mayo

The North Klondike Highway is narrower and rougher, in general, than the Alaska Highway. We encountered numerous short dirt sections, and one long one, about 6 miles. Other sections of the highway had patching done. All of these contributed to keeping our average speed somewhere around 40-45 mph, although there were sections where we were able to maintain 55 (90 Km), the posted speed limit. I have to give credit to the road crews, the road may not be smooth, but where there are serious bumps, the kind that would send us flying out of our seats, they have placed signs or cones to warn us, and I was careful to take heed. It appears that they are widening the highway for many miles, north of Pelly Crossing, as a wide clear strip appears along, with wood from clearing in various states from piled to burned.

Wildlife was hiding from us along this highway. We saw nothing along the road that moved. The fireweed, daisies, roses, crown vetch, and other wildflowers were just as abundant as the day before.

Evidence of other forest fires were marked along the highway, one dating back to 1958, where the vegetation appeared mostly normal, except that the fir trees had not fully recovered.

Another Mayo Clinic

We took a side tour up to the town of Mayo, about 35 miles up to the east. Mayo sports a very active historical association, with a downtown walking tour highlighting the old structures, and a restored 1920 house filled with artifacts. Mayo is situated along the Stewart River, and came to fame by being the shipping point for silver ore (galena) mined upstream. Tons or ore would be piled along the riverbank in the winter, waiting for the river to that and the steamboat to arrive. We found the museum interesting, but had doubts about the 60 mile side trip to see it.

100 miles farther up the road we came to Dawson. The road eventually paralleled the Yukon River, wide and fast in these parts at this time of year. Other areas along the highway appeared to be quite swampy. Close to Dawson, the road is lined for several miles with tailing piles from the dredge that worked though here along the river.

Cheap camping in Dawson City

We thought we would stay in an RV park called GuggieVille, but could not find it where we expected south of town on the highway. We did see 3 others, one that appeared to be all braggadocio (Bonanza), one fronted by a gas station (Dawson City), and one sign advertising “Off Road RV Parking $10.00”, fronted by a construction equipment repair shop. We went into the city, turned around and came back, and found GuggieVille stuffed in the side of Bonanza, actually part of the same park. We went to register, found that they had dry camping, but did not allow generators, which would not work for us. Besides, the lady was quite arrogant about it, wanting to upgrade us to their most expensive site. So we left and pulled into the construction repair place, built on top of the mine tailings. I found the owner quite friendly, paid him for one night. We had a flat empty gravel lot of about 5 acres all to ourselves, free to run our generator at will. As it turns out, our electrical use has been quite controlled, and we didn't even need the generator until the next morning. And in retrospect, Dawson is a working town. It's appropriate that we park alongside some of the equipment that put this place on the map. At least, that's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Views from our campsite

After we parked, we went into town to get some supper. We drove around first, checking out the restaurants, and decided on a Greek restaurant. However, when we checked the posted menu, we discovered that we would be paying $50 for supper, more than we wanted. (OK, those readers that think we're too cheap can choose another blog here...) We looked further, and found Sourdough Joe's, which had great pea soup, fish (salmon) and chips, or (salmon) burgers. Tasty, and much kinder to our wallet.

We went home to finish the evening playing Scrabble (Consuelo beat me... again!) and watching more Johny Carson on DVD.

Whitehorse to Pelly Crossing

Wild roses and daisies

Yesterday we packed up our coach and headed up the road toward Dawson City, on the Klondike Highway. This road is fair to good, with a number of short (100 yard) gravel spots, and narrower (small shoulders). It passes Lake Labarge near Whitehorse, then climbs up into the hills. Most of the terrain is what I call “green rock”, smaller mountains mostly tree covered, with numerous rocky outcrops.

The guide book said to watch for elk and bear, but we spotted none in the likely locations.

We stopped in 3 spots along the way. The first was the Fox Lake Burn site, scene of a major forest fire in 1998. Unlike the forest fire we traversed near Laird Springs, this fire was later in the summer and consumed nearly everything except a small percentage of the fir tree trunks, which still stood 11 years later. The undergrowth had recovered somewhat, but is is still obvious that thousands of acres of forest were burned. There was a short guided trail to an overlook, with signs telling about the fire and its effect. We put together some lunch here.

More Yukon wildflowers

The next stop was the old Montague roadhouse, a historic site with the remains of the old log house still standing. As with the pony express in the old west, the Klondike trail was established for a time as a stagecoach trail, with roadhouses every 20 miles or so. During the winter, this was the only way to travel between Whitehorse and Dawson.

The final stop was to view Five Fingers Rapids, a notable geologic element on the Yukon River. These rapids were the only major impediment to river traffic between Dawson and Whitehorse, and until the steam paddleboats were introduced, a winch was installed upstream to pull the boats through the rapids. The paddleboats were powerful enough to push themselves up through the rapids without assistance.

The most remarkable sight along the way is the profusion of wildflowers that have appeared along the roadsides. The guidebooks claim that fireweed is the major color in July, but we think that the fireweed is bursting forth now, along with lupines, wild roses, small daisies, and dandelions. Some spots were quite beautiful.

Parked at Pelly Crossing Campground

We finally reached Pelly Crossing about 6:30 PM. Church's book said that there was a nice campground here, but we found it under excavation in its heart, grass unmowed, and litter strewn about. Regardless, there was a nice pull through site for us and we stopped for the night. We celebrated the independent lifestyle by watching “Open Range” on DVD.

Whitehorse, the capitol of the Yukon

Main Street, Whitehorse

A short 100 miles up the road from Teslin, we stopped in Whitehorse. We were ready for a couple nights of full hookup camping to get laundry caught up and do a little sightseeing.

We picked the Pioneer Campground, about 5 miles south of the city. The full hookups are in a flat dirt row along the highway, but we didn't either notice or care about the traffic noise. They had acable system with 50 channels, including good old CNN and CBS, and we caught a few US shows on the tube.

Since we arrived around 1:00 PM, we had lunch and caught a nap. Around 4:00 we drove into town to look around, and grabbed a sub at Subway. We did some shopping on Main Street. The camping store was serving wine and cheese, pretty cool, we thought.

Pioneer also had wifi, and after some fiddling, I got online and started catching up on my blog posts. That took most of the rest of the evening.

Goofing at the Macbride Museum

On Thursday morning, I took the ailing tire into a shop in town and got it fixed. According to the tech, it had picked up a small nail, which went right inside the tire. When I got back, we had lunch, took a nap, then went into town to check out the MacBride Museum of the Yukon. This fine small museum was apparently the collection of artifacts started by MacBride in the 1950's, and was a bit eclectic, covering a fairly wide range of topics in a small space. They had an excellent collection of mounted animals, with good descriptive text for each. They also had a collection of geology specimens, and maps showing where the major mineral deposits occurrred throughout the Yukon. They also had a small but impressive collection of First Nation artifacts, covering the hunting methods of the ancient people over time.

Panning for gold

No museum of Yukon history would be complete without some gold panning, and one of the staff was sluicing some nasty looking dirt trying to find flakes in it. He gathered a crowd, but I didn't hear anybody exclaim "Wow!"

After the museum, we looked for a small pizza stone to cook bread (and pizza) in our gas oven. Canadian Tire didn't have any, and referred us to Coffee, Tea and Spice, a local gourmet cookware store. They had larger ones, but they said they had sold 6 of the smaller ones that very morning, and wouldn't have any more until August. Oh, darn.

We picked up a few groceries, and went back to our mobile house to make supper.

Teslin, Yukon

Teslin Lake Yukon Campground

Just west of Muckluk Annie's, which is still closed for the season, and which was to be our overnight stopping point.

It's cloudy and raining. All the more remarkable because we've pretty much had wonderful weather since the states. A couple sprinkes of rain from partly sunny skies, and a few showers at night. Sunny, warm days. Yesterday it was 75 when we parked at 8:30 PM.

Somewhere over the past few days we crossed into Pacific time and missed it altogether. We found out when we got to Watson Lake. So we gained another hour.

We've been dry camping most of the time in northern Canada. As a result, our habits have changed. There's no TV stations, so watching TV is out. We've been doing more reading and playing games: Yahtzee, Scrabble, and two person Taboo. We're playing pretty even.

Waiting for the pilot car at the forest fire

The roads have been mostly pretty good. The Banff-Jasper road, through the National Parks was good to very good, with only a few small areas of contruction. Jasper to Grande Prairie was good with some fair areas, bumpy was all, slowed doen to 40-50 mph. Grande Prairie to Laird Hot Springs was good, a few rough spots. Laird to Watson Lake included a section of forest fire that was still being worked on, so we had to follow a pilot car through that area with a couple dozen other vehicles. Fortunately, the pilot car arrive about 2 min after we met the south point, and we didn't wait long. We followed him for about 20 miles, at near highway speeds.

In the fire area, they were mopping up, putting out small localized hot spots. They had placed 1000 gallon pools of water in the ditches by the road every mile or so, and were adding new ones farther north. We spoke to one fireman at a rest stop, and he said it was a big fire, ove 50,000 acres. The souther part was under control, but it was moving northeast. Fortunately, there was little wind and a sprinkling of rain

Laird Hot Springs

We stopped at Laird Hot Springs for an overnight. Nice campground, dry camping, for $19/night. We got a swim in the hot springs, which were about 100 degrees F, and featured a hot waterfall that you could sit under and get a back/shoulder massage. Very relaxing.

After Laird, we worked our way through the Rockies, stopping for lunch next to Muncho Lake. This section of road was much more winding and hilly that before, so we had to slow down somewhat. They were fixing the road around the lake, but the speed limit there is only 30 km/hr anyway, so we didn't lose any time.

In the morning at Laird, I discovered that the left front tire on the Bug was nearly flat. It still had 5 lbs of air in it, so it wasn't a complete blowout. I punped it up and waited a bit, it seemed to be holding. We stopped after 50 miles and it had dropped by 1/3. I pumped it up again and we got a fix-flag aerosol in Watson lake and put some in, and pumped it up again. I checked it again after another 50 mies, and it seems to be holding. We'll keep checking it.

Yesterday's had mostly good roads, with a couple sections of dirt road. The first was about 2 miles, the second about 7 miles. The dirt was good, though, and we were able to maintain speeds of 45-50 mph. Only the dust was an issue, and part of the second one had been watered to keep the dust down. If we encounter more dirt roads today, the rain will keep the dust down, but may turn the road into mud.

The wildlife has been fun to watch. The highest concentrations have been in the Rocky Mountains, both between Banff Jasper and again over the past couple days as we crossed them to the west. We've seen bear, moose, elk, caribou, deer, a porcupine, mountain sheep and goats, and several small flocks of buffalo. And lots of birds.

Mountain Waterfall

I've stopped a few places to get pictures of waterfalls coming out of the mountains. It seems to me that this must be the high water season here, as most of the rivers are at the top of their banks, and a few running over them in places. I wexpect that the warm weather is pushing the snow melt out of the mountains. We've seen some splendid rapids just longing for a raft of some kind to journey down the river.

Thumper has been doing pretty well. She's still dragging her right rear leg just a bit, but Consuelo is goving her meds every moring which I'm sure helps her some. She'd much rather ride in the car than the motorhome, but of course she can't. We get a couple walks in every day, good for both of us.

Internet access has been close to zero. I tried our internet dish in Grande Prairie, and no luck, we're too far north for it. Likewise with Dish TV. The limited internet access may work against me much more than Consuelo, since I'm now confined to my desktop computer for most everything. This morning I'm writing on her computer, since we're minimizing power drain, and my desktop is a power hog. We tripped to a coffee shop in Grand Prairie that had access, but had to share her computer, a most annoying process. We did find that the Visitor Info Center in Dawson Creek had free wifi, and we stopped in the morning there with the RV and both got online for a while.

Last night we got serious with the calendar, looking at the plan for the time until the kids arrive in July.We've been moving to be in Fairbanks by the solstice, June 21, to be as far north as possible on the longest day of the year. Already, it's still light when we got to bed at 11:00 pm. We look at the clock, then out the window and say, "Wow". So far, it hasn't disrupted our sleep. Traveling has been exhausting enough that, for example, yesterday we stopped near Rancheria and I took a 2 hour nap, then slept another 8 hours starting at 11:00 PM. If it works out, I'll try to get a round of golf in at Dawson Creek at midnight.

Jasper to Grande Prairie

Whistlers Campground in Jasper NP

We spent one night in the National Park Campground called Whistlers in Jasper. We arrived late, due to picture-taking and sightseeing along the way, about 6:30 PM, and the campground was filling up fast. We got site R on loop 64, about ½ mile from the checkin booth. No hookups, but a nice open wooded campground. We thought $27 a night for dry camping was quite high, but then we were in the national park. They warned us when we registered that the elk were calving, and were very aggressive, but we didn't see any. We had dinner, then I convinced Consuelo to take a drive through town if I promised dessert.

Jasper Train Station

Jasper is a relatively small town, but apparently an important rail center. There was a long passenger train in the station when we got to town, and lots of freight train activity. The shops were very tourist oriented, tee shirts and souvenirs of about the national park. There is a gondola ride near the campground.

Like Banff, Jasper is nestled in the mountains. The Athabasca River, which starts at the Columbia Icefield, runs through the town. Canada highway 16 crosses the Icefield Parkway here. When we left town, we took highway 16 east. This section of highway follows the river, and is dotted with many pools and lakes which act as reflecting pools for the surrounding mountains. We stopped near Palisade Mountain to get some pictures. Just off the road shoulder, there was a large, soft sand area, almost desert-like.

Just before Hinton, we turned onto highway 40 north, which would be the bulk of the driving for this day. The road was generally good, with a few fair spots. The terrain was hilly, lots of up and downs, some 8% grades, mostly short. Many, many logging roads and operations entered the highway, suggesting one major business in the area. Numerous gas and oil wellheads were also visible from the highway.

Lunch stop in Grande Cache

120 miles from 16, we climbed into the town of Grande Cache and stopped for lunch at a tiny Chinese restaurant which had a “Smorg” of 3 main dishes, plus the sides, for $12. We then climbed down into the Smoky River valley, which we followed for a ways, then ascended again until we reached Grand Prairie.

We checked our books and found “Camp Tamarack RV Park”, which featured wifi, plus full hookups so we could catch up on laundry. However, on arrival, we found the rate pretty high, $40/night, less 10% senior discount. More annoying, the wifi was $10/day, and we skipped it, chancing to find a wifi coffee shop in the city.

Weyerhauser Lumber Mill, Grande Prairie

As it happened, the Rotary Club in Grande Prairie does a free city tour in a school bus on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday at 7:00 PM in the city, and I cooked and rushed through supper in order to make it. It was interesting, though confined to the school bus, and probably designed to attract people to move there. The city is a regional center serving about 175,000, so there are numerous malls, “boxter” stores (Walmart, Bestbuy, etc), parks, and medical facilities. Major industries are agriculture, forestry, and oilfields, with tourism close behind.

The Columbia Icefields

Athabasca Glacier (behind me)

About 100 miles north of Banff is the Columbia Icefield and the Icefield Centre. This tourist stop boasts plenty of parking and a self guided history and info exhibit on the glaciers in the surrounding mountains. We stopped to take a look.

A major feature of the site is that for $50 they will take you up onto the glacier. This is a two step process. You get a ticket for a bus ride, in a greyhound type bus, ½ way up the mountain to the terminal for the glacier vehicles. You then leave the bus.

Consuelo descending from the Explorer

The glacier vehicles, called "Icefield Explorers" are specially built mountain buses with 4' wide tires. The floor is about 4' off the ground. The trip starts with a steep 18 degree descent into a pool of water at the edge of the glacier, designed to help clean any dirt from to tires so that the glacier stays clean. A dirty glacier attracts sunlight and melts too fast. Then the bus climbs onto the packed snow that is the glacier itself, ove a graded “road” on the ice. A turnaround area in the middle of the glacier provides a place to get out and walk on the glacier.

The day was sunny and bright, and the temperature in the parking lot was a balmy 75 degrees or so, definitely above normal for this area at this time of year. At the glacir bus terminal, a thermometer registered 60 degrees, still comfortable. Up on the glacier, which had lots of meltwater runoff, it was much closer to freezing, but still sweatshirt weather.

Drinking glacier water

We were still about 1000 feet below the top of the ice field, 2000 feet below the surrounding mountain tops, which reach to about 11,000 feet. Where we stood on the glacier, it was 900 feet thick. The glacier had receded ½ mile from it's farther extension, and is now receding at a rate of about 90 feet per year.

At the foot of the glacier are annual moraines, mounds of dirt created as the glacier advances and retreats. Along the sides are lateral moraines. The bus route was built in a flat spot between moraines, partly on the edge of the glacier. The roadway moves about 4 feet every year.

The glacier we traversed is called the Athabaskan Glacier, alongside Mount Athabasca to the south. At the foot of the glacier is a pond which is the headwaters of the Athabasca River, which was nearly a mile wide by the time we left it east of Jasper.

Between Mount Athabasca and Mount Andromeda was a smaller glacier, dubbed “Double A” from the names of the mountains.

Into the National Parks

We left Pincher Creek and tripped to Okotoks, just south of Calgary, to visit Rusty and Mary Ann Stuckey who we met last winter. They introduced us to other friends in Okotoks, including Bernie, Rusty's brother, and his mate Alison. Bernie and Alison have more wanderlust than we do, they bought an around the world air ticket and stayed in hostels all over.
While in Okotoks, we went to the Saskatoon Farm for breakfast, then tripped into Calgary to shop at Costco and visit a few other stores. We also shopped in Okotoks, checking out the shops downtown.

Banff Train Station

We said our goodbyes to our friends in Okotoks, hooked up our car and headed for Banff. We figured it would be a 2-3 hour trip. We took Alberta route 22 around Calgary, then connected with the Trans-Canada #1. On the way, we stopped in Bragg Creek for lunch, and found a gas station there that could fill our propane tank, which was nearly empty. We also stopped at a truck stop where 22 & 1 joined and bought 174 liters of diesel at 78.9 cents per liter. Since I had filled our water tank, and dumped all our holding tanks, we were fully loaded for whatever might come along.

Ariel Tram in Banff

We entered Banff National Park at Canmore, and purchased the Annual National Park Pass for $138.00. We figure it will pay for itself before we leave Canada later in the year. We traveled up to the first Banff exit and turned left into Banff. Consuelo saw a sign for RV Parking, but following that got us into downtown, lost and coming up against a closed road construction area, but we managed to escape through a hospital parking lot and found our way back to Transcanada #1 one exit up from where we got off before. We took the highway south, back to our original exit, and made our way to the Tunnel Mountain Campground. A line of 10 or so RV campers pooled together at another one lane road construction, then we all convoyed to the campground entrance. They moved us along pretty well. We got an electric only site for about $33 for one night. Once we hooked up, it was about 4:30, so we relaxed a bit then made some supper.

Park where Thumper and I walked

After supper, Thumper and I went out in the bug to scout out the town. We found an easy trail along a stream and walked for a mile or so, took some pictures. I then drove back into town and up in the hills toward the gondola and hot springs. Took some more pictures, then went back to our camper. Consuelo was busy catching up on her craft shows that she had captured on our DVR, and watched them into the evening.

Darkness arrived around 9:45. The daytime temperatures had been in the mid 60s and sunny. Overnite lows were expected to be around freezing.

The campground is busy, with lots of class C motorhomes, many of which are rentals. Downtown looke pretty busy to me as well, lots of people walking around looking in the shops and stores. As soon as we hit Transcanada #1, we started bumping into lots of RV travelers. We spoke to one couple at the diesel station, they were from North Carolina, on their way to Alaska. We hope it's not as busy as we head north.