Sunday, July 31, 2011

Our fearless leader of the Loosey Goosey Last Frontier Gang (Dennis & Carol Hill) left this morning for southern borders.  We will miss them, but should see them in less than a month at the Escapade.

This afternoon, Don and Sharon Del Rosario made it to Whitehorse.  They had trouble getting one of their jacks to go down, so we will stay here for one extra day before heading to Hyder, AK.  We hope that they will be able to get it fixed tomorrow so they can leave on Tuesday with us.

This morning, I worked on my monthly news email, and this afternoon we went to see salmon climb the fish ladder, but they have not started yet.  We may stop by tomorrow too.  Afterwards, we went to WalMart, and, of course, they did not have half of what Marilyn wanted so we also went to the Canadian SuperStore.

Type at you later.

Friday, July 29, 2011

We left Haines, AK today, driving back through a little of British Columbia in the Yukon, ending up in Whitehorse, YT at the Pioneer RV Park.  We were last here in May.  In other words, we have come full circle, and are back on roads we drove on the way to Alaska.  We do plan to drive into one more Alaskan town on the way back south- Hyder, AK.

The only animals we saw on the trip to Whitehorse were a couple of swans and a bunch of ground squirrels.  The temperature is a little warmer than on the coast – 58 at 8:15pm.  Otherwise, it was a good trip.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

There is not a lot to do in Haines. The town is noted for its Eagles, but they winter here. Thus there are not many bald eagles in the area now. There will be over 600 pairs in November. We did drive to the right and to the left of town center to each sides’ dead end. That was a relatively short, but pretty drive. Here is a pretty shot of Haines taken from the beach. And then there is a picture of Haines from the other side of the bay.

We drove out to see if the bears were out again, and they were feeding on salmon in the Chilkoot River about 9pm once again.  First, here is a picture of a totem pole on the way out to see the bears.  Then there are pictures of momma, two cubs, and a male bear.

Tuesday, Wednesday, July 26, 27, 2011

Tuesday, we left Tok (after our final breakfast at Fast Eddy’s in mainland Alaska), and headed towards Haines, AK.  This requires a drive east to Haines Junction in the Yukon, and then south to the coast.  The road from the US (Alaska) border towards Haines Junction is a road on perma-frost which means that it is full of frost heaves.  It is even worse than I-10 form the LA border to New Orleans.

Along the way, we stopped at the Tetlin National Wildlife Refuge visitor center for some information on bird migration, etc.  The entrance door had a cute bird.

After leaving the Refuge visitor center, we drove into Canada, in the Yukon.

We stopped at the southern end of Kluane Lake (the largest lake in the Yukon) for the night at a beautiful pull-off.  Jim and Pat, and Gary and Mary spent the night with us.  These three pictures not only show off our RVs, but the beautiful view we have.

Wednesday, we left Kluane Lake, and drove to Haines Junction, where we hung a right down to the coast and Haines, AK.  The drive continued in the Yukon, then into British Columbia, and finally back into the US at Haines, AK.  Here is the back of Mary & Gary’s rig going through US Customs ahead of us, and the US Border sign..

After dinner, we, Marilyn, I, Dennis and Carol drove out along the shore to see if we could see any bears along the Chilkoot river.  We saw momma and her twins.  I apologize for the blurriness if you try to blow it up.

 

Type at you later.

Monday, July 25, 2011

I changed the air filter in the motorhome this morning with some tool help from Gary along with some supervision and help from Dennis.  Marilyn did laundry, and in the afternoon we went to the Post Office, a gift shop, grocery store, and a visitor center.  Dennis & Marilyn decided that I should post pictures of my dirty self changing the air filter.

Here are some pictures taken during our drive from Anchorage to Paxson Lake, and to Tok, AK.  They include a picture taken in the same pull-off that we spent the night in on our way to Anchorage in June, as well as another picture of the Matanuska glacier.

While in Paxson Lake, Marilyn took a picture of a ground squirrel.

On the drive from Paxson Lake to Tok, we took pictures of Wilds Preston Richardson’s memorial, another glacier, and said goodbye as we saw the Pipeline for the last time.

Before arriving in Tok, we stopped in Delta Junction to take pictures of mile post 1422, the Alaskan end of the Alaska Highway.

The Delta Junction visitor center also had a couple of statues of Alaska’s state bird.

Sourdough Campground, where we have stayed last night and tonight, has a contest every night to where you toss pancakes into a “Buckit”.  If you complete the toss correctly, you receive a free breakfast in the morning.  This youngster made a bucket with some helpful bucket movement.

Friday, Saturday, Sunday, July 22, 23, 24, 2011

This morning, Friday, one of the techs came in and checked the temperature in the fridge and in the freezer.  Both were doing well.  The ice maker had not filled, so the tech checked the fill valve outside, and it needed turning on.  Then they asked that we wait around until it made ice,  So, we went to Fred Meyer’s to shop for those things that we needed to eat, and to fill the fridge and freezer.  When we returned, the ice maker had made ice, so we paid up, and, after getting fuel, started down the highway about 11:30am.  We did see a moose shortly after we started south on the Glenn Allen Highway.  We stopped at mile post 177.5 for lunch.  This was the same pull out that we spent the night at on our way to Anchorage for the first time back in late May or early June.  The highway looked quite different from when we traveled it going north because all the trees had leaves now.  About 6:30 we pulled in to Paxson Lake BLM Campground to join our friends – Hill’s, Del Rosario’s, Olson’s, Livingston and Smith.  Jean and Claudette had departed our group from Fairbanks, while we were in Anchorage.

Our cell phone internet access is non-existent, and I am too lazy to take my computer to Dennis’ rig so I will add Saturday to this blog which probably won’t be published until tomorrow.  So I will probably add Sunday to it also,  On Saturday, Don and Sharon, and Pat and Jim left us worrying about bad weather.  Before they left, I talked to Don about salmon fishing in Haines.  He said he would check it out on the internet before we arrived there.  We had no significant rain, but it is clouding up tonight.  Marilyn & I, Carol, Mary and Gary went for a walk around the campground, and down to the lake after lunch.  We were able to have our normal 4pm social hour, and I grilled some halibut for supper to go along with Marilyn’s salad.  Since we have a refrigerator again, we were able to get our three remaining pieces of halibut from Dennis’ freezer.

Sunday.  We left Paxson Lake BLM Campground this morning.  We drove to Delta Junction, and then on to Tok, AK (we were here in Tok on May 30th) where we are staying at the Sourdough Campground for 2 night.  On the drive, we saw a rabbit and moose in the morning, and a moose and calf in the afternoon.  At the visitor center in Delta Junction, we picked up a certificate for completing the Alaskan Highway – all 1,422 miles from Dawson Creek to Delta Junction.  After setting up, 10 of us went back to Fast Eddy’s for another good dinner.

Typing more tomorrow.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Wonderful day.  The refrigerator was put in this afternoon, and they only need to check temps in the morning.  We should be on the road again by mid-morning.

This morning Marilyn did wash, and got a haircut.  I spent the morning wandering Best Buy.  Didn’t buy anything, but enjoyed looking at gadgets.  We went back to the house to have lunch, and they said they would work on the fridge after lunch.  No windows had to be removed, the one behind the driver’s seat in the slide turned out to be an emergency window that the refrigerators could fit through.

We returned this evening with the refrigerator in and starting to cool.

During the afternoon, we wandered through the various exhibits at the Anchorage Museum at the Rasmuson Center.  They had exhibits from the Smithsonian of Alaskan art and artifacts.  We thoroughly enjoyed the exhibits of artifacts, paintings and photographs.

Type at you later.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

The refrigerator was not in, so they did not install it today.  Karen said she had been calling the port to try to get it delivered, but so far, in had not been.  They all said that we could stay here in the alley again, so we did not move the house this morning.  However, we did start getting some errands done.  First, we went to the Quest lab to get the blood work done that our doctor had ordered.  Then we went to Kriner’s Diner again for breakfast.  I had coffee, 3 eggs, hash browns, bacon and sourdough toast.  Marilyn had tea, 3 eggs, hash browns and wheat toast.  Total was $23 including tip.  After breakfast, we went to the Cat dealer to get an air filter for the motorhome.  They did not have one, but said that NAPA had one on the shelf.  Cost was $124.  Now I have to put it on, but we had a suggestion that we not put it on until after the Haines highway.  At any rate we have one.  Next was a stop at a credit union, followed by a drive down to the Portage Glacier for a tour.  The Portage Glacier created Portage Lake, and now calves into the lake.  It was a nice boat tour.

As we started down towards the Portage Glacier, we stopped at a pullout where we could see snow covered mountains behind us.  Looking at the map they must have been the Chigmit Mountains,  At any rate, they were beautiful.

A little further down the road, we saw several people looking up at the cliff, so we pulled off to see what they were looking at.  Several Mountain Goats.  Great views.

The boat that took us on the tour to the Portage Glacier was named for Alaska’s State Bird – the Ptarmigan (note:  Chicken, Alaska was supposed to be named for the Ptarmigan, but they could not spell it).

The Portage Glacier was wonderful to look at.

There were several other glaciers overlooking the lake, along with water falls. There was even the terminal moraine of former glacier.

Type at you later.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

This morning, we awoke to beautiful sunshine.  So at 9am we walked over to the viewing area, and the Big One, Denali or Mt McKinley was visible from top to bottom.  This was totally different from last night when the clouds were dark thick and dark with rain obscuring most of the mountains.  These first pictures are from about 7:30 last night.

Then there are the 9am pictures from this morning.

Next we have shots of the Ruth Glacier from last night and from this morning – clouds versus mountains.

We continues down to Wasilla, AK, and stopped to see the Museum of Alaska Transportation and Industry.  They have old trains, cars, trucks, outboard motors, tractors, a hearse, etc.

After lunch, we moved to the Wal-Mart parking lot.  I called Karen’s RV Service, and they said the refrigerator had arrived in Anchorage, but did not know when it would be received at their business.  We stocked up on a lot of supplies, and then I started this blog.

We continued our drive to Karen’s RV Service, where we are parked in their alley for the night.  I had hoped that being present might speed up our installation.  However, we were told that the fridge might not be in until Thursday, and they said that they could guarantee that it would be installed on Friday.  We shall see.

Type at you later.