Day 5 - The Adventure Continues - Whitehorse YK to Fairbanks AK

June 6, 2018 Whitehorse, Yukon to Fairbanks Alaska - 580 miles

Left the hotel in Whitehorse, Yukon this morning and headed out for coffee and donuts - Tom to Tim Horton's and me to Starbucks.  Then off in search of a car wash - yeah that didn't happen - we couldn't find it.

So my poor car still looks like this.  Hopefully we'll find one in Fairbanks.

Today was another fun day for critters -  Critter count is ---
     Moose - 2  (Only pic was the moose)
     Wild horses - 3 (one was a foal)
     Elk - 3
     Potgut - 1
    Swans - 2

We finally arrived to Alaska at noon today and of course completed a major goal for Tom.  He has now traveled to all 50 state.

But we had to leave this lovely sign and continue on  up the highway.  We still had 6 + hours of driving to do to get to Fairbanks.  But first a stop in Delta Junction and the end of the AlCan highway.  So having started in Dawson Creek, British Columbia and traveling 1387 miles we stopped in Delta Junction for another photo op.

Dawson Creek BC - Mile 0 - Alaska Highway

Delta Junction - Mile 1387 - Alaska Highway

Just a bit of trivia about the Alaska Highway.  It was built in 1942, was 

originally 1700 miles long, and the Army Corp of Engineers only 

took 9 months to complete it.

Finally arrived in Fairbanks around 4:30 (having gained an hour) and got to our Hotel, or rather Inn.  We are staying at the Minnie Inn and have a wonderful small home to stay in for the next 4 days

These are actually panoramic pictures so a bit distorted and only show the entry, living room, dining and kitchen.  There is still the bathroom, bedroom, laundry room and back deck.  It's a great place.
We'll be here for 5 days and plan on enjoying our stay very much.

Until tomorrow - have a day.

Tom and Debra Stephens

Day 4 - Fort Nelson BC to Whitehorse YK

June 5 2018  Fort Nelson BC to Whitehorse Yukon - 592 miles

Day 4 of our trip found us leaving Fort Nelson in British Columbia and heading to Whitehorse in the Yukon Territory.  Weather this morning was rainy and heavily overcast so we weren't sure of what to expect of the day.  Since the last two days started out sunny and turned stormy by the middle of the morning our hope was that since this one started out stormy it would clear up by mid-morning and give us a nice sunny day.  Well, that is what happened.  We had a beautiful day with only an occasional spritz of rain in some of the higher elevations. It started getting light this morning by about 3:00 am but we were in no shape to start that early.  We finally got ourselves going by about 4:30 and were out the door by 5:20.

We had a great drive today and arrived at our hotel here in Whitehorse at 5:20 pm completing another 12 hour day on the road.  One of the things that made the drive so much fun was all the wildlife we were able to see.  Today alone we saw 3 black bears, a dozen or more bighorn sheep, thirty to forty buffalo including a number of young calves and Debra and I each saw a Bald Eagle at separate times of the day.  The scenery was spectacular and at virtually every bend in the road we saw incredible vistas that would make any travel brochure sparkle and pop.  I must confess that our photos that we did capture will likely fail to show how great the views were.

We did hit a couple of construction areas today and they were quite the experience.  Apparently the way they repair the roads up here is to literally plow up the old road surface, run a grader over it to level/smooth it out and then repack it with steamrollers.  Now we're not sure if that is all they do or if they come back and put oil and gravel on or how they finish the surface.  What we experienced first hand is that if you drive on that road after it gets wet your car gets covered in a fine mist of mud.  Here are a couple of photos showing what our car looked like after traversing two of those construction zones.

I guess that's about it for today.  We are having a great trip and everything is going well.  This is our last night in Canada on the way up and by tomorrow around mid-day we will arrive in Alaska.  All the people we have interacted with here in Canada have been great and we have enjoyed it all.  Until tomorrow,  Happy Trails Everyone.

Tom & Debra.

Day 3 of our Grand Adventure -Prince George BC to fort Nelson BC

June 4, 2018 - Prince George BC to Fort Nelson BC  503 miles

Writing this evening from Fort Nelson, British Columbia, Canada where we arrived at approximately 5:15 pm local time (PDT).  Today was a shorter driving day than yesterday as we made our hotel here in about 11 hours from our starting point in Prince George this morning.  Although the day started out sunny and clear by mid-morning we hit rain and later in the afternoon we even ran into some snow.  The terrain was fairly smooth and the speed limit was mostly 100 kph along the way (about 62 mph) so we made pretty good time even in the rain and snow.

We started the day with another visit to Tim Hortons in Prince George where I got coffee and a couple of donuts and Debra got a toasted sesame bagel with cream cheese.  We stopped for 2nd breakfast in Chetwynd when we stumbled across that lovely town with its chainsaw carvings.  If we come back to Canada we would definitely want to come by there for its annual International Chainsaw Carving Championships. This year it is being held on June 7th so we were just a few days early.  The sculptures are amazing and we have a number of photos to share.  I did post some on Facebook earlier today.  Check out our Chetwynd photo album.

The town is small (pop. 2503) but the main street is lined with carvings from previous years.  Please take a moment to browse the photos posted in the album.  These are probably only a 6th of all the carvings around the town.  Also take a close look at the sign for the churches listed in the city.  See if you can guess which one cracked us up.  A good chuckle is always good for the soul.

Another stop on our day was in Dawson Creek, BC.  As you can see from the photo below, this is mile marker 0 (zero) for the Alaska Highway.  So we are getting closer to our goal of visiting Alaska.  Only tonight and tomorrow night in Canada, then the next ten or so will be in Alaska.

Our weather today went from beautiful sunshine to pouring rain and even some snow.  We had to stop for gas sooner than planned, due to the lack of available gas stations along the route.  So we stopped at Buckinghorse River, in the rain/sleet and experienced a new type of gas pump.  It's an above ground tanker.  Back door to pay with credit card.   Front of tanker has the hose.  You kids all know how well Dad handles frustration ---  enjoy the pictures.

The last couple of comments for today is that the scenery is wonderful. The photos of the trees and lakes and rivers and farm land just don't do them justice.  So many different kinds of trees, I want to take individual pictures of them all.  The interesting thing is that the towns are not overly abundant with them.  But then the towns aren't overly abundant with people either.  It's along the highway were the beauty is.  And the only wild critter we saw today was a brown crane or some such bird along the road side.  It was about 2 feet tall.

One more tidbit - did you know that there are only 35.15 million people in Canada?  Pull out an atlas and check the size of this country.  Just for comparison, there are 311.6 million in the US. (info from 2016 census)  39 million in Los Angeles alone.  

Our adventure continues but for now - sleep well

Tom and Debra

Day 2 of our Grand Adventure -Lethbridge AB to Prince George BC

June 3, 2018  Lethbridge AB to Prince George British Columbia - 617 miles

Upon leaving our hotel this morning at 6:30 am our first task was to get gas.  Not an easy thing to do. We stopped at a gas station just down the street from our hotel.  Pump didn't work so Tom went to the window to talk to the attendant.  She said sorry we don't open until 7:00 am and pumps are lock.  So on to the next gas station - they weren't open either.  On to the third - opened but card wouldn't work so inside to get that handled, have to tell them how much (prepaid required) trying to mentally convert liters to gallons because everything is metric, finally decide on 50 dollars and then get to pump the gas.  Fun times.

The rest of the day was just drive, drive and drive some more.  The fun thing about the driving is again the metric system.  Speed limit 110 - great - oh wait that's 100 kilometers not mph.  More mental conversion going on.  That's only 68 (about) mph.  All day yesterday we were booking at 80.

The scenery from the border up to Banff was just like northern Montana - flat farm land.  Pretty but flat.  Once we got to Banff National Forest is was gorgeous.  The road goes through the Canadian Rockies and it like driving thru a mountain corridor.  Beautiful pines, thick and green, rugged snow capped mountains on both sides.  Unfortunately the road is mostly a two way road and the speed limit drops to 50 and 60 km.  And of course construction much too often slowing us even more.

But there were perks.  We got to see mountain sheep and a very young elk.  We also saw a bear but weren't able to get a picture.  Tom also got to get a Canadian snowball.

Another perk to being in Canada are the donuts.
When in Canada you have to have a Tim Hortons donut.  (Robin would be so proud).

It's very late and I'm falling asleep.  Chat more tomorrow.

Day 1 -North to Alaska - Eagle Mountain to Lethbridge AB

June 2, 2018 - Eagle Mountain to Lethbridge Alberta Canada - 780 miles

Our first day on the road to Alaska went perfectly according to plan. We pulled out at 5:59am just as the daylight began to fill the valleys in Utah.  We had decided not to make coffee at home so naturally our first stop was at the Maverik gas station 3 minutes down the road for a much needed break and my first cup of coffee.  14 minutes later we pulled out of the Maverik and went straight to the bank. Maverik's coffee is expensive.  Just kidding about that.  We had decided last night that we'd wait until this morning to pull our cash for the trip.  We left the ATM and headed for the highway. Normally weekday traffic on I-15 in Utah is brutal during rush hour but as today was Saturday and with two of us in the vehicle to utilize the HOV lane we cruised right on up the highway at full freeway speeds.

We made great time all the way up the freeway from Utah and through Idaho

with very minimal delays for construction and by 10:50 we had crossed the Continental Divide for the first time which is at the border of Idaho and Montana

a full 325 miles from our starting point in Eagle Mountain, Ut.  We didn't hit any delay of any significance until we had reached Butte, Mt where we had a short delay of about 10 minutes for construction. They had the road ahead closed down to one lane while they used some heavy equipment to trim away loose rocks from the mountainsides above the road.

Our first gas stop and lunch break wasn't until we reached Helena, Montana where I was pleased to see gas prices were lower than we had been paying in Utah.  Our car uses at least 87 octane and it was only $2.94 per gallon in Montana whereas we were paying around $3.25 per gallon in Utah.  I hope the prices continue to improve as we move further North.

We arrived at the Canadian border at 4:48 pm

so we were just a little under 11 hours at that point.  There was only one car in front of us and we moved through in under 5 minutes I think.  Debra took a couple pictures of the drug sniffing dog that checked out our vehicle or maybe they were of the Canadian border patrol agent who was handling the dog;  I'm not really sure.  Check out the photo so you can decide for yourself.

The speed limit on the freeway from the border to here in Lethbridge (AB4) is 110 kph which is the equivalent of 68 mph so it was a little slower than the 80 mph we had most of the way up here but still not too bad.  Our hotel here in Lethbridge in the Premier Inn & Suites just off the freeway.  The room is fairly nice with two queen beds so we get to stretch out and relax after the long day on the road.  We had dinner at a little restaurant right next door where I had a delicious liver and onions dinner before we came back to the hotel to settle in for the night.  This hotel also offers free breakfast so we will get our coffee here in the morning and head out for Day 2 tomorrow.

Happy Trails Everyone,

Tom & Debra.

GPS tracking

Hi,

If any of you would like to follow us along on a GPS map just click on the link to the right, under Fun Links to Follow, anytime after June 2, 2018, 6 AM Utah time.  If it works correctly this will take you to a map that will place dots every 30 minutes showing our location and pin points showing our stops. 

😀(Big brother is always watching).   

Now it only does this if we've set it up correctly.  These old owls 🦉🦉are not the best at learning new tricks and technology.

Also, if you're reading our blog please 'follow' us so we know you've been here.  It would be greatly appreciated.

Have a great day.

Tom and Debra

24 Hour Countdown.

 We are super excited as we have less than 24 hours to go until we depart for Alaska.  This will be our first trip to Alaska and actually our first visit to Canada as well.  Our last day will be spent doing laundry, washing the car, and getting everything packed in it and ready for take off tomorrow morning.  Our intent is to be on the road around 6:00am.  We've been anxiously awaiting our departure and Debra has said several times this week that we should just get in the car and take off early.

We've managed to stay patient by working on the trailer getting it ready for Phase 2 of this summer and by hanging out with family.  Debra attended our granddaughter's high school graduation last night.  KayLyn had also graduated fron her technical college a couple weeks ago with her CNA.  BTW she already has a job at Primary Children's Hospital in Salt Lake.  I went to that graduation but not to the HS ceremony.  The traffic and crowds at those events drive me crazy.  I'm great with traffic on the open road but hate stop and go city traffic.

The first leg of our journey will take us from Eagle Mountain, Utah to Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada.  This will be the longest leg in our trip in terms of mileage at 712 miles but it is all freeway miles so we will be doing 70 to 80 miles per hour for most of the day.  With rest stops and meals along the way we anticipate about 12 hours on the road tomorrow.  Debra has created a way for everyone to follow our progress on this trip in an app that tracks our GPS and updates the app so anyone who has access to our trip can follow us.  She will post a link to the app here on the blog later today.

Happy Trails,

Tom & Debra