Day 50
8/9/26 Sunday
Mosquito count: prevalent in the morning. Several in the van.
Weather: This morning is overcast with a cool breeze. As the morning progressed the sun was trying to break through and take the chill off. But it turned into a mostly cloudy, gray drizzle day.
Highway conditions. Today’s highways are notoriously rough. Everyone is always talking about this stretch as the worst on the Alaska Highway. It will be paved, then gravel. Lumpy and bumpy, dip right, dip left. The gravel sections are typically smoother than the paved. Road construction with pilot cars. There’s everything today. With permafrost underneath this highway it is susceptible to frost heaves and cracking everywhere. However all told it wasn’t that bad.. just a few short stretches. I suppose if you were hauling a camper the frost heaves would be a different story.
Terrain. We are surrounded to the west by mountains. In the foreground is the boreal forest of skinny spruce trees. Beyond these mountains ranges is the Guif of Alaska.
We’re having a rain shower as we drive which we welcome because our windshield was pretty bug splattered. We bought gas first thing this morning but apparently it’s asking too much to have water and a squeegee to clean dirty windshields! Hopefully it will keep the dust down.
Burwash Landing. Museum was really nicely done. Their beaded and fur garments were works of art. The museum also had a significant wild animals in the area display.
Outside the museum is the Largest Gold pan in the world to advertise their town. Not much of a town really.
The highway improved significantly after Burwash.
Haines Junction. We stopped for lunch. Mr. Frosty was hopping today. It is the place to get a bite. From this junction you can drive south to Haines and catch a ferry to Skagway or Juneau.
Back on the road it’s another 100 miles to Whitehorse. After lunch I really needed to take a nap. Last night I started feeling a cold coming on. Headache, scratchy throat… you know the feeling. It’s been with me all day. I needed a little sleep.
Block ice! Whitehorse is a resupply for the 4-6 day Cassiar Highway coming up. We know exactly where to get BLOCK ice. It was the last place we were able to get that kind of ice on this trip. Not anywhere we were in Alaska… only cubed.
We stopped in Whitehorse for groceries, Canada $$, gas and found a nice pullout on the Yukon River about 20 miles out of town. That’ll do for tonight.
cinnicrew 