We sit in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory trying to work out where we will go next. It rained on us part of the way here from our last campground and it has poured down since we got here. I am sitting under a tarp with the rain pouring off of it as I type this in. The forecast for the next week anywhere along our path is for rain!! Currently the consensus is to go ahead and drive to Dawson Creek and then make a decision on where to go after that. We canceled out of Haines and Skagway due to the weather and just headed out for Whitehorse.
That's our current status, now let me fill you in on our trip after we got to Anchorage.
We spent 2 days in Anchorage waiting for the weather to clear up some. On the 13th day of the trip we headed down the Kenai Peninsula toward Homer. It was raining when we started out as you can see from the pictures of the Turnagain Arm (bay) and the Turnagain Pass.
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| Rainy Turnagain Arm between Anchorage and the Kenai Peninsula |
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| Rainy Turnagain Pass on the Kenai Peninsula |
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As we went further down the Kenai the weather cleared up and we has some spectacular views of the Volcanoes on the other side of Cook Inlet. Both Mt Redoubt and Mt Illiama were very clear from the peninsula.
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| Mt Redoubt |
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| Mt Illiama |
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I had always been told the view of the mountains across the bay from Homer was spectacular. It is. I put together a small panorama of the view and still did not get all of it in.
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| Homer Panorama |
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| Our Bikes with the view of the mountains behind homer in the background. |
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After spending a bit of time exploring the Homer Spit and being pummeled by the wind we headed for a campsite for the night. We arrived at Anchor River State Campground and had it all to ourselves. As we were setting up the tents we were visited by Eagles searching for Salmon in the stream, and a Moose with her two calves. They stuck around for almost an hour eating and playing before heading back into the forest. They were just across the stream from us and paid no attention to us at all. Just to be sure we did not get any visits by bears we hung our food in the trees for the night.
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| Cow Moose and Calves about 150 feet away across the stream from our tents!! |
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The morning of the 14th day of our trip (July 15th) we headed out for Seward on the upper east side of the Kenai Peninsula. The weather held out for us and we enjoyed a great ride back up the peninsula. We stopped at Exit Glacier to look around before going on into Seward.
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| The end of Exit Glacier, it starts about 3 miles up the hill. |
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We went on into Seward and the views again are breathtaking. I put together another small panorama of the Mountains you see when in Seward.
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| Seward Panorama |
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We noticed a lot of boats coming into the campground and talked with a young couple from Homer. They had come up to Seward because the Silver Salmon were starting their runs and people were limiting out in just a few hours.
As we left the morning of our 15th Day of the trip it was like there was a mass exodus of people from Anchorage area going into Seward. Anything and everything that could pull a boat was on the road, it appeared to us that Anchorage should be a ghost town with all the traffic headed into Seward.
We went back through Anchorage and Wasilla and then turned up the Tok Cutoff road. The further we got the more the weather started to change. We started running into rain showers again, but we were still treated to some great views.
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| Along the Tok Cutoff Road |
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| The end of a long glacier along the Tok Cutoff Road. |
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| Looking to the south of the Glacier the rain was starting to come our way. |
We made our way to the Tolsona Wilderness Campground and were fortunate to spend a dry night alongside a gurgling creek. The Mosquito's on the otherhand were flying in formation just waiting their turn at us.
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| Tolsona Wilderness Campground |
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| Alongside the Creek at Tolsona |
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On our 16th day we got up fairly early and headed out for the Yukon hoping the rain would stay away. We spent the day dodging rain, potholes and frost heaves. By the time we go to the Yukon we were pretty tired and Marilyn spotted a campground called White River Campground. It turned out to be one of the best places we have stayed at on the entire trip. The hosts are great congenial people who were very pleasant to talk with. Bob the owner even fired up his old US Army 6 wheel drive dodge truck and took quite a few of the guests out into the forest looking for bears. They build a fire in a large above ground fire ring for everyone to set around at night. We really enjoyed our stay there, and I will be back again in the future.
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| White River Campground |
Our luck held for one more night and we packed up the morning of our 17th day and headed out for Whitehorse. The road in the Northern Yukon is being worked on for most of the way between where we camped and Destruction Bay along Lake Kluane. I thought we were going to drop the bikes along one stretch as the dirt was very soft and the tail ends of the bikes were sliding sideways. I'm not sure even of the drycleaners will be able to get the stains out of my undies!!
We finally made it to Whitehorse and that is when out luck went south. It has rained hard here for quite awhile today and it looks like it will not let up for a few days. We will be heading out tomorrow for Dawson City (won't get there for a couple of days) and may have to hotel it if the weather does not cooperate.
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