Monday, August 27, 2012

Skagway

August 13th –17th 2012

Skagway is the oldest incorporated city in Alaska. Another city that started up because of the Klondike gold rush.  Today tourism is the main economy in Skagway, if you need a T-shirt this is the place to go.  Every day there is 3-5 cruise ships in port, they arrive in the evening and leave the following evening making room for the next ship.

P9150001 Bridge going to skagway 

Views as we are entering Skagway.

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A couple of the cruise ships and a harbor seal in the harbor, and looking across the harbor at the mountains and glacier fields.

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A very unique front on the visitor center.  The biggest rotary snowplow I ever saw, I figure they must get a lot of snow here to need a plow that size.

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Statue dedicated to the miners that climbed the 33 mile Chilkoot trail to Lake Bennett to pan for gold.  It took an average of 3 months to transport the tons of goods that were required (a years supply) to survive.

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We spent an hour at the theater taking in a show called The Days of 98 Show, the longest running show in the north.  A musical drama that is based on historical records about a con man Soapy Smith’s reign over Skagway during the Klondike Gold Rush. 

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Skagway Museum has a large display of Alaskan historical material, including this quilt made from duck necks.  I do remember the green in the quilt is mallard, not sure what the other ducks are. 

We did some wondering around town in and out of a few gift shops, and if you like that kind of shopping there are a few to choose from. 

Mike and I took a whale watching boat to Juneau while in Skagway.  Wait for the next posting. 

 

Saturday, August 25, 2012

Camping With The Bears

Friday August 24, 2012

Mike and I are taking a vacation from touristing.  Found a lovey provincial park, Anderson Flats, right on the Skeena River near Hazelton BC.  Only 4 campsites in the park and no fee, FREE, we love free.  Sandy and Steve headed south to Washington and should be home today, we wanted to extend our time in the north a little longer, and glad we did. 

About 4pm we are setting out by the campfire having a glass of wine, out of the corner of my eye I spot movement turned and saw a black bear on the beach coming up to the field that we are camped next to, he was no more then 50 yards from us.  I got up started yelling bear and clapping my hands, making all sorts of noise, he ran into the field and off into the woods.  Got my heart pumping.  Do you call that a close encounter.

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The beach and field were the bear was.

About an hour later, along comes another bear, but he is across the river, which made me feel much more confortable. He was doing a little salmon fishing, showing Mike how it’s done. 

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We watched him for at least a half hour, he was pretty good at fishing caught a couple of salmon, always took them to the woods to eat.  A ranger told me this time of year the bear just eat the skin, for the fat, and the brains, not sure why the brains, but use your imagination.

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He swam across the river to our side, but he never came back to check us out, thank you God.

Skeena River Skeena River Hazelwood BC 

Earlier in the day Mike was watching the fishermen, he did try his luck a couple of time but came back empty. 

I will be posting the blogs up to this point, I just wanted to get this one written and posted, it was so exciting. 

 

Leaving Fairbanks Heading South

After the Artic Circle we spent one more night in Fairbanks and headed south to Tok to start our trek back to Washington..

We stopped in Delta Junction the official end of the Alaskan Highway. Delta Junction was first known as Buffalo Center because of the bison that were transplanted here in the 1920s.

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Love the road sign with the buffalo hitting the truck. 

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It seems to get a bit chilly in the winter and not that warm in the summer, average temp in July is 58, not were I would like to live.

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Giant mosquito sculptures in front of the visitor center.  We were told by many people that the mosquitoes would be horrendous in Alaska but so far we have not run into any big problem, a few here and there.  I guess we came on an off year, lucky us, mosquitoes love Mike.  If there is one in a mile radius it will find him, they are out to get him, so he thinks.

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Sullivans Roadhouse in Delta Junction P9110082

The Sullivan Roadhouse is an original log roadhouse from 1905, it has been moved twice once by horse and the second time by helicopter, to it’s location now across from the visitors center.  The gardens are amazing but then they are all over Alaska and British Columbia.  They really like their flowers in the north, I suppose because the winters are so long and drab, summer is the time for color.

Only spent a short time in Delta and it was on to Tok for the night.  We once again spent it in the Chevron Station parking lot. 

 

Friday, August 17, 2012

The Artic Circle

Thursday August 9th 2012

It was catch up time again. Steve and Sandy were in Fairbanks it was about 600 miles from Homer.  We spent one night in the parking lot of Fred Meyers store in Soldotna, the next night about 80 miles south of Denali Park and we woke up to sunshine and the most amazing view of the mountain, Fairbanks was a mere 231 miles for there.  The next day we all drove in Sandy and Steves car to the Artic Circle which was a thirteen hour trip there and back. I think about 440 miles round trip, most of it on a narrow wash board dirt road. 

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The Dalton Highway runs north to Prudhoe Bay the beginning of the pipeline, It ends in Valdez.  I,m not sure how long it is and I don’t have internet access tonight to look it up.

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We stopped for lunch, and after lunch what do you do nap.  The last picture is were we got gas, one pump in front of the white tank.  The old cars were driving all the way to Deadhorse on Prudhoe Bay at least a 2 day trip.  Hope they all make it, and only one way back the same road you went in on. 

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Crossing the Yukon River, which we have done many times this trip.

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Everywhere you go there is road construction.

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The pipeline does not go in a straight because of expansion and contraction.  As you can see from the pictures there was some blacktop on parts of the highway believe me not much.

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The road is in the back ground of the first picture.  Some points of interest on the road.

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We did a nice certificate stating that on Aug 9 2012 Sandy and Mike Bubar crossed the Arctic circle in the land of the midnight sun.  Why did we do it, not sure just something that had to be done so we could post it on our blogs and you guys would think we were pretty cool.  How many other people have crossed over to the Artic Circle that you know .Kind of like when I went sky diving and parasailing, and white water rafting in Colorado, hot air ballooning in Spain, Ziplinning in Alaska and all the things I would never admit to, because my kid read this blog.  We like to have fun.

Mike is pointing to the spot were we are.

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We went 20 miles past the Artic Circle to a place called Gobblers Knob.

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Steve's truck after the trip 2 inches of mud on the running boards.  

We have driven 6477 miles since June 4th leaving Washington and if you count from the time we left AZ to drive to Washington it was a total of 8127 miles.  I did not keep track of the mileage for the truck, but pretty sure it has to be about 1000 miles. 

The most we paid for gas was $5.62 a gallon in Prince George BC.  The least was $3.72 in Fairbanks.  What we spent on  gas from AZ to Washington was $1201, from Washington to were we are now and I’m not sure were we are just a turn out off the highway $3992.  I may not know were I’m at right now but I know we are going to Stewart and Hyder to watch the bears eat the salmon out of the river.