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Monday, June 5th.
I hate the car. I hate the car. I hate the car.
And that doesn’t even begin to explain the contempt I feel. We woke up early, YES, actually early, 6:30 to be exact. The first thing I saw was the mountains and the sun, it’s my favorite way to start the day. We were on the road about an hour later. Smither BC is located in south central BC, we drove all the way through the province and we are now in Watson Lake, which is in the Yukon Territory. Upon map questing the distance we discovered that the estimated time between the two was ALLEGEDLY 17 hours, we did it in 11 hours. Needless to say, Laura was a passing bandit. I believe that the final count on the number of RV’s, trucks, and buses we passed way 46! At some points I felt like we were on a one way highway. But we weren’t. We took the Cassiar Highway, rt. 37. It is a one lane highway, with a few passing lanes here and there and a total of 450 miles. The road brings you all the way up through BC and meets up with
the Alaskan Highway. This highway was completed in 1972 and is considered a rougher route than the Alaskan Highway. AND only about 85% of it is paved. The other 15% is unpaved, full of potholes, one lane bridges, and full of hairpin turns. Thankfully, I was not the driver today.
Tuesday, June 6th.
The sun did not set last night. We were hanging outside out of the tent, doing camping things, and all of a sudden I realized it was 10:45 at night, and the sun was still high in the sky. The darkest it got all night was comparable to twilight at home. I have enough trouble falling to sleep at night when it’s dark, can you imagine how hard it was in a tent with the light coming in and shinning on my face. Needless to say, I woke up in a grouchy mood, after only 3 hours of bright sleep.
We drove from Watson Lake, Yukon, which is on the Alaskan Highway at historical milepost 635. When the Alaskan highway was built in 1942 it was used by the US Army and only used for military use. The highway did not open up to civilian
traffic until 1948. It was originally called the Alcan (Alaska and Canada combined) Highway but became known as the Alaskan Highway once it was opened to civilians. However, you do still see some signs along the road calling it the Alcan Highway. Now, the road is anything less but straight, smooth or direct. The road has lost over 35 miles in length as highway departments keep trying to straighten it and make it a smoother ride. Due to these efforts the original mile posts are off and not accurate. Parts of it could seriously be called Roller Coater Alley. The frost heaves that we encountered along this road make the frost heaves of New England non existent. There were so many orange cones with frost heaves signs that they started just blending in with the trees. Oh yeah, and the pot holes…… not even going to get into that subject. Road construction is an on going thing here, there were many times when traffic (and by traffic I mean us and maybe two other cars) were stopped for 20 minutes at a time. This made for some stretching time and photo opportunity times.
However, the scenery was unbelievable. We
ice melting.
you could actually here the sound of it melting.. so amazing. drove through about 5 mountains ranges, The Coast Mountains, The Mackenzie Mountains, The St. Elias Mountains, The Big Salomon Range and the Cassiar Mountains. The biggest mountain that I have seen yet was on in the Yukon, Mt. Logan, it is 19,520 feet. (The Rocky Mountains in Colorado are all less than 15,000 feet!) There was a five minute period where we saw snowcapped mountains as far as we could see, a bear eating berries on a hill, a moose grazing in the grass, and three bald eagles flying over head! The mountain ranges are so long and massive here, there was one stretch of road where it looked the road was ending and the mountains were all I could see, it felt like I reached the end of the world, but the road took another turn and the mountains and the road stretched on further again.
We ended up staying in Beaver Creek, Yukon, historical mile post 1202, 20 miles from the US boarder. It was a very long day in the car it was our fourth consecutive day of doing nothing but drive for easily 10 hours a day. We opted to not make it all the
way to Alaska and cross the boarder because we wanted to be full of energy and fully enjoy the experience, and at by the time be got to Beaver Creak we had spent 11 hours in the car and driven almost 600 miles. Once again I did not sleep very well as the sun was even brighter here. I am not joking when I say at midnight it looked like 6 or 7 at night. It is so crazy. I don’t know if other people adjust better than me, but my body is not doing well with all the light. I was still doing my laundry at midnight, the sun was up and everyone was sleeping, except for me.
Wednesday, June 7th.
After 5 hours of not that enjoyable sleep, we got ready and got in the car to make the “big push” for the boarder. I am writing this from the car. We just crossed the boarder into Alaska. Actually, right about now I could careless about what state I am in, I am happier to be back on American soil. The second I saw the American flag waving in the wind my little heart skipped a
few beats. We pulled over to the welcome sigh and then I literally got out of the car and did a dance of joy! I was almost tempted to kiss the ground, but there where people looking at me!
Let me explain something, it’s not that I didn’t enjoy my 5 nights in Canada, I had a good time, but right now at this exact moment, life is great! I don’t have to deal with the metric system, I can think in NORMAL money, I see normal products, and I heart it! I never thought I would feel this pride, joy, patriotism whatever you want to call it, but I do. I feel it so much I had to write this from the car (before any other Americans with road rage piss me off, and I start cursing their soul!!)
I got my first view of the Alaska Range Mountains today, and it puts all the other mountains ranges to shame. Okay, shame is the wrong word, they are just in a league of their own! We are staying in Fairbanks, with Laura’s friend Pam. Pam is from the Worcester area, and moved out here 4 years ago.
I don’t have any great pictures of them yet, but believe me, I will get some.
Fairbanks is a cool little town/city. We went out with Pam, her sister, Annie, and some friends to a place called The Pump House. All I need to say is that the drinks were cheap (but not very strong) and there was karaoke. However, it wasn’t normal Karaoke, the people here where professionals or something. Everyone was good, in key and took it serious. Clearly, my rendition of Material Girl and 8675309 was not up to par with the locals, but it sure was fun.
Anyway, I’m so looking forward to chilling and doing nothing for the next few days!
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Danielle
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Singing Jen
Okay, so in the time we've known you I would not have said you were a "Karaoke Girl" so when we get to Disney I'm looking for Karaoke!!!! Love the pictures but I would have hated the car way before you!!!