Whitehorse to Tok

July 9-10: We woke up in Whitehorse to solid rain. We had such nice warm weather until this point! But no matter, we have rain jackets and thankfully weren't in a tent! We got packed up and tried a Tim Horton's fast food for breakfast. Pretty good! Then, we hit the road.
The drive today was long, and the terrain was the most sparse that we'd seen so far. Quite literally, we filled up the gas at Haines Junction, and didn't see another gas station until we were hovering just below 1/16th of a tank. We had beautiful views of mountains and the Kluane River for our drive. The road on this stretch was the worst we had seen so far. Lots of portions were potholed gravel, and we finally ran into the notoroious frost heaves, which are like nature's speed bumps. Driving was slow going, but Dustin did a great job.

We all started feeling a little beat up until.... we finally saw the border between Yukon and Alaska!

After crossing the border, we found a campsite that had a restuarant attached. Sadly, it closed at 7pm, so we headed to "Fast Eddy's" for dinner, which was delicious! We went back to the campsite, enjoyed a comfy evening, and had a delicious sourdough breakfast the next morning.

Meadow even did a bit of driving the trailer and did a great job!

Pink Mountain -> Liard Hot Springs -> Whitehorse

July 8-9: Slept in a bit this morning, after such a late arrival last night. Woke up to a sunny day and fewer bugs – yay! After we got ready, we hit the road, aiming for Liard Hot Springs. The drive was beautiful! Uneventful at first, then we drove through some amazing geological phenomenon that makes up the Northern Rockies. On our drive, we saw a black bear, a caribou, a herd of bison, and some stone sheep (I think). So cute!

We pulled in to the Liard Hot Springs Provincial Park a little before 9pm, and set up camp. While the gents started working on making fajitas, Meadow and I trekked to the hot springs. We exited the electric fence that surrounds the campsite (put in to deter bears.. apparently in 1997 the “Worst Bear Attack in North America” occurred – yikes!) and walked the appx. .5 mile boardwalk to the hot springs. After a quick soak, we headed back, ate together, and had a roaring fire before bed. Lovely!

After breaking up camp the next morning, Dustin, Logan and I went to the hot springs for a nice soak while Meadow read and stayed with the dogs. The drive out of the park to our next location was long and dull. Just miles and miles of straight roads with subalpine fir and shrubs. When we made it to Whitehorse, we were hungry, tired, and bored, but we found a really unique restaurant with amazing food, drinks, and hot sauces! By the time we finally got to our campsite, it was close to 11pm, and beautifully bright out still. We stayed at The Caribou RV Park, which was clean and cute. We set up camp, settled in, and slept hard.

Barkerville to Pink Mountain

Woke up early with the dogs and took them around the campground. Loved the bear warning signs!

Love the recycling/garbage scenario. Polite Canadians and their polite campgrounds. :)

Definitely woke up in bug country… we were swarmed by no-see-ums. Once we got up and running, we headed 2 km into Barkerville. It’s a cute historical townsite that was maintained and converted from an old mining town. Dogs aren’t allowed onsite, but they provide cheap day-use kennels, so we put Buddy and Duke in a shared kennel for a few hours. Pretty convenient, but they were unsure about it.

We entered the town (small fee - $20 CAD each) and stepped back into time. We explored some of the historical town, and made our way to the Wake Up Jake restaurant. We had the most amazing breakfast in the old fashioned restaurant!

After touring the town a bit more, it was time to hit the road. We had a long slog ahead of us, but eventually made it to Dawson Creek – mile 0 of the Alcan Highway! We wondered about the connection to the TV show, but rememberd the show was called Dawson’s Creek, so, different Dawson, apparently. Heehee. We had a great meal at a dog-friendly restaurant – Original Joe’s Restaurant (patio seating), then hit the road to our camp for the night – Pink Mountain RV & Campsites. We pulled in around 12:40 AM!!! Dustin did a great job staying awake while the rest of us were crashed out. It was dark and we had no idea what site we were supposed to use, so we just found an empty one. All exhausted, we quickly bunked down in the camper for the night. A few more pics from Barkerville...

And Logan made friends with the local cat. :)

Adventure Day!

July 6: It’s travel day! We had great hopes of leaving by 7 or 8 am but didn’t make it out of the house until around 10! Oops. :) No biggie. Filled up the gas, filled up with Starbucks, and then we were on the road. Easy drive to border. We crossed at Sumas. A little bit of a wait, but no problems with the crossing. So happy Meadow’s passport came in on time!

Once we crossed the border, we began driving on Canada’s Highway 1 East. We drove through so many different biomes in just a few hours! We stopped for a late lunch in Cache Creek, BC. It was an amazing taco place with the best salsa bar I’ve ever seen. Watermelon, kiwi, cantaloupe, and blueberry salsas were available, as well as just as varied hot sauces. Delicious! Our next leg of the trip was quite a haul. I drove for a few hours with the camper – it was fun!

Turned off HWY 97 to head to the Forest Rose campsite near Barkeville, BC. It was around 10 pm and we had an hour drive to the site. Nobody was on the road, it was very dark, and we started to see the first wildlife of the trip! There was a roly-poly black bear who lumbered off to the side of the road, and then we saw multiple big animals that we couldn’t quite tell if they were small or cow moose, or elk. Very cool, though!