A Time To Talk

We have had an amazing time travelling north to Alaska, and during this time we have had an opportunity to talk to each other - a lot - as well as to some interesting folks we have met along the way. This post is a bit late as internet access has been minimal. Alas, our trip continues.

Day 5 (Llyodminster, Alberta to Edmonton)  170 mi.

Happy Easter! What could possibly be better than seeing the famous “VEG EGG” on Easter Sunday?  We had only a short drive to Edmonton from Lloydminister so we decided to stop in Vegriville, Alberta to see the giant Polanyska – or Ukranian Easter Egg.  26’ long and 18 feet in diameter, made of  2,200 pieces of aluminum  anodized in gold, silver and bronze; quite a sight and not to be missed, especially on Easter.

The Veg Egg



The Boys - Ethan, Dezmond, Colton and Dayton



From there it was a quick trip to Aunt Emma’s and Uncle Bob’s for Easter dinner. We met up with family from the DeAngelis side and had a great day eating, drinking and being merry. That evening, we were spoiled to a wonderful night at the Glenora B & B in Edmonton. Frank and Carole (Anna’s brother and S-I-L) brought up some sashimi and good wine, a great way to finish the day.



Day 6

Monday was our rest day – no travelling other than around the city.  Anna had a long overdue 3 hour lunch with the girls – thanks Ehma, Hanna and Dana for blowing off work and family to hang out- it was great! Tim was put to work by Frank, going to his new lake house to give his professional opinion of the work that is needed on it.

We all met back at Mom and Dad D’s for dinner from Anna’s family’s restaurant. From there a quick drive to Onoway (30 miles outside Edmonton) to stay at Frank’s furnished rental apartment that just happened to be vacant –lucky us!

Day 7 (Onoway, Alberta to Ft. St. John, British Columbia) 404 mi.

 Today we started the long haul north. We stopped in Dawson Creek for an official look at the Alaska Highway Mile 0 monument and spent some time in the Alaska Highway House (Museum). It’s amazing to think that the entire highway was constructed in only 9 months, by US Army Engineers, over harsh terrain and with wicked weather. Tell me again why it takes 3 years to do a small construction project on route 12A in Lebanon? Most of the trip was 4 lane until Fort St. John where it turned to 2 lane – but still a very well maintained and easy to travel road.

                                                                                 

Ethan at the official Mile 0 of the Alaska highway

 

We drove by a small park where we stopped for our picnic lunch. The sun was shining and the grass was dry so we threw the football around for a while before climbing back into the van. There is snow on the side of the roads; I guess this shouldn’t be a surprise. Roads today were in very good condition, 2 lane highway all the way and very little traffic.

It is such a small world.  When we called the hotel to inquire about room availability we found out that the women on the phone was from Claremont, NH and her late husband was a ’66 Norwich University graduate; same as Tim (different class year obviously). We drove to this a small roadside motel, The Shephard’s Inn, which is 72 miles North of Dawson Creek and stayed for the night and had dinner in their restaurant.  Here we also met a friendly old trucker at the coffee chop where we had dinner who gave us a few tricks for the road.  Did you know that you should turn on your heat full blast and roll down your windows when driving up a long hill in the summer? Apparently it dissipates the heat from your engine and drops your coolant temperature by 10 degrees so you don’t risk overheating up the long hill? Well you do now, and so do we! The Alaska Van has been awesome – not even close to overheating, since it hasn’t been above 50 degrees.  This gives you a little clue as to how few drivers there are this time of year and what some will do strike up a conversation at a nearly empty roadside motel/truckstop.

Day 8 (Ft. St. John, BC to Watson Lake, Yukon Territory) 540 mi.

Alcan Safari: Our “Long Day”. Today we travelled 540 miles along the Alcan, from the Shephard’s Inn to Big Horn Motel in Watson Lake. Despite the long travel it was an AWESOME day! Today we travelled through some of the most picturesque scenery on the Alcan (Alaska/Canada Highway) .

It started with an early coffee and stretch break at the Fort Nelson Heritage Museum/Junkyard (we added the junkyard part). Although the museum was closed, we were able to spend an hour exploring all the ‘stuff’ that was on display outside. This included rigs from the building of the Alcan, huge pieces of mining machinery and every other piece of dead equipment circa 1942 – 1972 that has become disabled within 100 miles of Fort Nelson, including an old crashed airplane fuselage, engines, and bent propellers. Who knew this stuff constitutes a museum. We think Papa Pete could probably start a Jericho Heritage Museum in Vermont!  Nonetheless, we really enjoyed this stop and would highly recommend it to anyone passing through Fort Nelson.

We then drove through Muncho Lake Provincial Park – gaining elevation to 4,200feet; the highest point on the Alcan. The road became very “twisty and turny” and we were not able to make very good time – going only about 40 miles an hour for a few hours. The trade off was that we saw a (metric) tonne of wildlife.  It started with a grazing moose in the early morning, then we chased some caribous down the road, saw some elk up on the roadside, a mule deer, and we saw Stone (big horn) Sheep in a few places and then saw many, many, many buffalo along the side of the road. The boys were just as intrigued with the large buffalo chips that littered the sides of the roadways as they were the bison themselves.

                                                                                   

A few hours behind schedule we finally reached our lunch destination, the Northern Rockies Lodge, at Muncho Lake. It was stunning – the largest log cabin in British Columbia, where we enjoyed burgers overlooking the lake and majestic mountains as a backdrop.

After about 8 hours in the van we then reached our next break point which was Laird Hot Springs. This was incredible and probably the high point of the trip so far. Anyone travelling this area should really try to do this; if it’s not on your bucket list, it should be!  It is a natural hot springs with natural pools in and a boardwalk surrounding them. They have built in some natural log and stone dams to create some deeper pools, with sunken concrete benches to sit on.  It was amazing to feel how hot the water was as it was water bubbling out the source. It was too hot for us to get near. If you are brave enough, you gather a rock and go to the source pool and place your rock on cairns that are surrounding it.  I couldn’t get within 10 feet of those cairns before bailing out for cooler waters.

Laird Hot Springs

                                                                                        

After our soak we drove for a few more hours to Watson Lake, where we spent the night at another road side motel – the Big Horn. It was clean, and came highly recommended over the other motel in town which was hosting the NHL playoff party.

This was a long but epic day of travel, and we all fell asleep quickly and readied ourselves for more!

Day 9 (Watson Lake to Destruction Bay, Yukon Territory) 440 miles

In the morning we ventured out to the world famous Signpost Forest in Watson Lake.  Back in 1942, a US soldier who was homesick, nailed a sign from home to a post and travelers have been doing the same thing since. There are more than 61,000 signs. It is very impressive to say the least. We came prepared with our Valley View Road sign (thanks Allyn) and found the perfect spot for it. As memorable as this was, it will be even better in the future if/when any of us travel back this way and go and look for our sign. Ours was one of the few with washers and a big spike to ensure our sign will be there in perpetuity (engineers!). Be sure to look for it if you ever make it as far as Watson Lake.



Sign Post Forest



 From there it was back in the Alaska van – which by the way is getting 13-14 miles to the gallon – yahoo – especially since we are paying over $5.00 a gallon in Canada!

On our drive to Whitehorse (capital city of the Yukon territory) this morning we saw a few caribou. We stopped in Whitehorse and checked out the Macbride Museum and had a nice urban hike through town. The boys were thrilled that we splurged and had A & W for lunch, complete with frosty mugs of root beer! We also went into the town library to get a little internet access – but they only allow you one hour – not enough time to post a blog, but at least we had a chance to catch up on e-mails. We then continued on the road towards Destruction Bay. This was the best scenery yet. We skirted the Kluane Mountain Range and drove along Kluane Lake for miles and miles. It was spectacular. We had no idea the Yukon had such impressive mountain ranges. This made for easy driving, even thought the road was quite slow at times with hairpin turns and rollercoaster like hills. We reached our destination, the Talbot Arm Motel. This was surprisingly clean and quite. All in all another great day on the Alcan.

Kluane Lake at Destruction Bay

Day 10 (Destruction Bay to Sheep Mountain Lodge; Mile 113 on the Glenn Hwy., 113 miles North of Anchorage) total 438 miles.

Ok – today we finally experienced the rough roads that we read so much about.  We laughed at our GPS – as it was telling us it would take 9 hours to drive from Destruction Bay to Tok, Alaska – which is only about 230 miles. “What? That should only take us 5 hours at the most!”  Well, we were lucky and it took just a bit longer, but we were the only ones on the road – it was extremely broken up and bumpy with huge frost heaves and broken up pavement and short sections of gravel road. We could only imagine what this would be like in July with hundreds of other motorists, mostly motor-homes, travelling on it.  We are all getting nauseated – even the driver – who was Anna; there is NO way she would tolerate being the passenger  on this stretch of road without some antiemetics! We were able to pass the 2 other motorists – who were driving large motor-homes, right before the border.

We were thrilled to be back in the USA as the road was like the track at the Indy 500; it had smooth pavement, painted lines, and signs of roadworkers actually working. In the Yukon we saw signs, but no actual workers.

Beautiful Driving

As we drove along today we were graced again with the beauty of the Alaska Range. These mountains are impressive beyond description and they seem to go on and on. They are all snow covered, making it difficult for the kids to pick out the glaciers, but they are getting better at it with experience. The landscape changed as we drove along the Tahneta Pass where the trees thinned out and we seemed to be surrounded by peaks. It is so beautiful. We took a break for a picnic lunch at the State of Alaska Visitors Center in Tok, where once again we had a chance to throw the football around and stretch out before getting back in the van.

                                                                                      

We then drove to the Sheep Mountian Lodge,  just 113 miles northeast of Anchorage, where we sit and look out over the Alaska Range as we type out the past few days’ experiences. We’ve made it! We’re in Alaska and so far it is more captivating than any pictures will ever show.   It is now 9pm Alaska time, it is getting cloudy, but still full daylight.  We’ve travelled at total of 4,247 miles from our start and have only 339 left to go.  93% OF THE WAY THERE!!