Alaska Summer

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Day 95 Telkwa BC to Sedro Woolley Washington

September 19, 2017

I am able to write today as I am in the Sedro Woolley library and have a good enough connection to get a post done. After leaving Telkwa British Columbia, we worked our way east. Our first stop was at Fort St. James, an old Hudson Bay Trading Post site. Fort St. James Trading Post The town is small but in a magnificent setting on Stuart Lake. We camped in a Provincial Park for two nights along the lake and spent a day in town seeing the old trading post as it has been mostly reconstructed. It was pretty fascinating to tour the buildings and listen to or read about the life in the trading post in the early 1800's. Initially, the traders were very dependent on the local tribes for securing the pelts and learning the travel routes as well as extremely dependent on them for food sources. As a result, the interaction grew into a mutually beneficial endeavor though as the fort became the center of Hudson Bay's focus in the western Canada area, missionaries arrived and bas

Day 86 Telkwa, British Columbia

September 10, 2017

In Hyder, we were between salmon runs for bear watching. There were still salmon in the river and we did see some black bears trying their luck but it was a pretty quiet evening based on the record for the previous week. We broke camp on Friday morning and made our way to New Aiyansh (like ain't with an sh on the end.) We drove down the Cassiar Highway until we reached FS 113 which went over to the town in 30 miles instead of following the Cassiar and then route 16 to Terrace and back up to New Aiyansh. Not much traffic on the forest service road. We saw one car behind us for about a mile and only had one truck pass us going the other way. Pretty quiet trip that saved us about 200 miles. When we got to New Aiyansh, we looked up the campground and found it in a wooded area in the middle of the lava field that had buried a native village of about 2000 people in the early 1700's. It is amazing to me that it still looks the way it does today, some 300 years later. The a

Day 82 Hyder, Alaska

September 06, 2017

It has been almost a week since I have had an internet connection that is capable of loading pictures so will try to get this out this evening. I know most of you will not see it until day 83. After leaving Valdez, we traveled north to Tok, pronounced with a long o. We had an over night there and managed to get the truck and camper washed and some groceries acquired before leaving in the morning. We decided to travel the Taylor highway to Chicken and then on over the Top of The World highway to Dawson City. From just short of Chicken and all the way past the border, the road was gravel and it was raining and misting. Made my wash job look really good. Fortunately, it was mostly a light rain to heavy mist so views were not impacted other than lack of sunshine. The fall colors were spectacular. Top of The World view We had more than 100 miles of this type of view. Most of it was above tree line, 3000 feet, and unobstructed. We met very few cars and only got passed by a cou

Day 73 Valdez, Alaska

August 28, 2017

We left Seward, Wednesday, Aug. 23, and headed to Whittier. It was only about 85 miles so there was no hurry and, as it was not raining, we were able to enjoy the scenery. We camped at Williwaw Campground, a Chugach National Forest Service campground. We took a hike after setting up and went to the visitors center about a mile from the campground. The visitors center sits right on the end of Portage Lake coming from the Portage Glacier. We also made the short walk to Williwaw Creek viewing platforms to watch salmon in their spawning beds. Quite amazing to see dozens of salmon appearing to idle while going upstream just in such a small area. Remember the "Find It: puzzles in "Highlights Magazine" for kids? Williwaw Creek Salmon (Highlight's finding picture - how many Salmon) We were looking forward to the Phillips Glacier Cruise the next morning and the trip through the shared tunnel. It rained all night and was still raining and windy the next morning. A

Day 65 Seward, AK

August 20, 2017

We arrived in Seward yesterday afternoon. We were able to get into Miller's Landing CG with a site backed right up to Resurrection Bay. With mountains in front of us and across the bay, we have some spectacular views. Camped on Resurrection Bay, Seward, Alaska We were in Soldotna a week and were able to use that campsite as a base for seeing the places on the west side of Kenai Peninsula. We made the trip down to Homer two different days. The first trip down, we took a fast ferry to a small village, Seldovia. We had about four hours to see the area until the ferry returned to Homer, so we did some hiking. There is a trail from town to the north end beach through the forest and over some bog area. Sparky enjoyed the trip in the backpack. Old hitch hiker The second trip was to see the things in Homer. We had a nice sunny day for that trip and spent some time hiking on the beach as well as visiting the Islands and Oceans Center. It had a lot of information about th

Day 58, Soldotna, Alaska

August 13, 2017

After four days without internet and a day in transit to Soldotna, we have limited internet so will not be able to include pictures. We left Talkeetna a week ago and stopped first in Wasilla. The campground there left much to be desired. Since it was only about 50 miles, we were able to go visit the Independence Mine in the mountains east of Willow. It was 30 miles back in the mountains and over Hatcher Pass, 3850 ft elevation. The first 16 miles were paved, then mostly maintained gravel the rest of the way. As we approached the pass, the road was just wide enough for vehicles to pass, and then with caution as one side was looking down into the valley. No guard rails. The views were terrific but as the driver, my concentration was not on the scenery. We were surprised to find dozens of vehicles parked at the pass and people hiking the trails or picking blueberries. The berries were about half the size of peas. Because of the attraction of a beautiful day and summer coming

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