Talkeetna

We arrived in Talkeetna on Wednesday the 24th and the mountain was out.  We caught an exceptionally great time to be there as the weather was beautiful and the mountain stayed out the entire time we were there.  Pictures?  Here's a few.

Alaska Range at Sunset our first night there.

Kim points out Mt. McKinley

Kim and I in front of the range.

And one final picture in the sunlight.

While in Talkeetna we also took a Jet Boat ride up the Sustina River.  The final destination was the devil's gorge, a class 6 rapid!  Here's the boat and a picture of me at the class 6.

McKinley was out and spectacular so here's a picture of the mountain from the boat.

On the way back the boat stopped and we took a guided walk through a replicated Athbascan fishing village.  They also had a display showing an old school trappers cabin, which is pictured below.

The following is a panoramic picture I took with my iPhone.  Not to sure how it will look in the blog

We got to see two new wildlife creatures while in Talkeetna.  The first is this beaver who swam by while we were taking pictures of McKinley on our last day there.

We then saw this swan swimming gracefully across a lake on our way out of town.

 It was then off to Palmer.

Denali National Park

We arrived in Denali National Park on Sunday the 22nd.  Needless to say it was pretty cold.  Kim and I jumped on our bikes and pedaled up to the visitor's center to find out what programs were going on.  After hitting the center we rode back out to the main highway where I posed for the above photo.

On Monday we hiked down to Horseshoe Lake.  It is about a mile and a half down the hill to get there. Above are Kim and her Mom in front of the Lake.  Around the lake there were lots of trees with "Burls" on them.  We couldn't find any information on where they come from but the are basically big bumps on the trees.  You can kind of see them in the picture below.

We attended Ranger programs both nights we were in the Park.  The first night's program was on the raptors in the park and the second was on a cute little critter called the Pica.  After the second nights program we hiked the McKinley-Station trail up to the visitors center then the bike path back to camp.  the next morning it was off to Talkeetna.

Finally, the mountain wasn't out - while we were in the park!  (foreshadowing anyone)

We are in Homer, Ak

Greetings from Homer, the Halibut fishing capital of the world (at least that's what the sign says - I'm not much of a fisherman).  I'm planning to use this post to update on our travels in the last 9 days, then hopefully, get some detailed posts up with pictures.

We left Fairbanks on Sunday the 22nd, driving down to Denali National Park. (Map)  We spent two nights in Denali then headed down to Talkeetna.  (Map)  On the 26th we drove from Talkeetna to Palamer (Map)  From there we headed down to the Kenai Peninsula, staying in the town of Kenai. (Map)  Finally, we drove down here to Homer. (Map)

Highlights from these days on the trip to follow.

Last day in Fairbanks

We have been in Fairbanks since Wednesday and it has mostly rained on us.  Yesterday the sun broke through briefly and we took advantage of it.  First, we went to the University of Alaska at Fairbanks large animal research center (LARS).  We had lunch as the Musk Oxen hung out in their pen right next to us.  What's a Musk Ox you say?  This is what they look like:

Then, I played nine holes at the Fairbanks golf course.  It's a nice course that is in good shape - for Alaska.   Back home in Az it would be considered not such great shape but it was still fun.  Feeling the need for some exercise I did walk!  Yeah me!

We closed the day by taking a hike around the Creamers Field State Migratory Waterfowl refuge.  While on our hike we came across this interesting mushroom.

It's is called Amanita Muscaria or in English the Fly Agaric.  We looked it up here and found some very interesting stuff.  It's listed as deadly, however it then indicates that it is really a "strong hallucinogen".  It goes on to say that the effects can be "recycled", but you really need to read about that for your self.

Tomorrow we head down to Denali National Park.

Trip Update

We have been in Alaska for two nights.  We drove from Chicken, Ak to Tok, Ak (Map) on Tuesday and spent last night at the Sourdough campground.  We had lunch yesterday and breakfast today at Fast Eddies at historic mile marker 1313 on the Alaska Highway.  Today we drove up to Fairbanks from Tok. (Map)  In addition to the two moose pictures below we also saw this guy.

We decided it was a wolf and not a husky - What do you think?  Let us know in the comments (then send me an email at dukebauer@gmail.com with your address and we'll send you a postcard)

Here's some pictures of the amazing scenery up here.

And 1 more picture of the moose.

Two Moose today!

We drove from Tok to Fairbanks today.  We had an incredible experience as these two moose walked right in front of us!

Internet is kind of slow right now.  Will try to update the trip later tonight.

Giving up on Inuvik, Off to Chicken, Alaska

We drove up the Dempster Highway to the Tombstone visitor center yesterday.  It took us a little over 2 hours to drive the 70 kilometers, the road was incredibly bad.  The Peel river ferry crossing was still closed when we got to the visitor center and the lady there indicated it was raining up in Fort McPherson.  At this point we made the executive decision to give up on Inuvik!

We turned around and headed back here to Dawson City for the night.  We had an excellent dinner at the Jack London grill in downtown - the finest dining room in all of the Yukon.  (It said that on the menu so it has to be true - doesn't it?)

Today we are off to the exciting hamlet of Chicken Alaska.  It's only 174 Kilometers but it's up on to the Top of the World highway which could be just as bad as the Dempster.  Here's the Map.

Time to move on

We have spent four nights here in Dawson City.  The Dempster Highway up to Inuvik has been closed at the Peel river crossing.  Apparently high water and debris forced the ferry out of the water.  We were told that they had to cut a cable, and that they don't have a replacement.  Hopefully it has been repaired as we are planning to head up to Eagles Plain in the next hour or so. (Map) (If it's still closed we are probably of to Alaska)

We had a good time herein Dawson.  We went to to see the Can-Can girls at Diamond Tooth Gerties on Friday night.  Yesterday, we hiked the ninth street trail, it's a dirt path that travels around the city.   We saw a family of foxes when we got to the Moosehide Slide!

Dawson City, Yukon Territory

So this is my first post ever on our blog!!!

We've been on the road for two weeks today and it's been so exciting with an amazing amount of things to see and do. What is incredible is the fact that we'll be out for 7 weeks which really isn't even enough time to see and do all we really want to do! I am just grateful to be here sharing this experience with my Mom and Doug. How many people really get a chance to spend time with their Mom or Dad making some special memories?!

We're currently in Dawson City, Yukon which is a city so rich in history that every corner has interpretive boards explaining the goings on. Dawson City was the location of one of the world's largest gold rush back in 1898. The story goes that a man by the name of George Carmacks found a 5-dollar pan of course gold back when finding a 10-cent pan was a great find. Word got out and that set off a  gold rush that people had never seen before. People from all over the world made the horrendous journey here which took them months. The sad part is that by the time most stampeders arrived in Dawson, many of them flat broke, all the claims had been staked. Many of the stampeders booked passage home although some remained making money supplying the gold camps. But those who struck it rich, lived lavish lives with some of the finest things money could buy.

Today Dawson City is a small quiet town with about 1,900 people; quite different from the gold rush days when there were as many as 40,000 people! I can't even imagine the chaos in town plus how about the smell! It must of been overwhelming! There are many of the original buildings remaining with stories about the people who owned them or worked there. Of course there was a red light district in town with many interesting stories about them. What a city this must of been!

We are supposed to be heading up to the Northwest Territories today although one of the river crossings we cross by ferry is closed due to high water and debris. It may not sound like a big deal to us, but those towns in the province rely on truckers everyday bringing them supplies so they are virtually cut off now. We've checked the board outside the Northwest Territories center here in Dawson City to find out the status of the river several times today and it's still not looking good. Hopefully tomorrow it'll be open so we can head north. We'll keep you posted!

Happy Friday the 13th everyone-may it be a good luck day. And Happy Birthday Wendy!

Golf on the Top of the World

Yesterday was absolutely beautiful here in the Klondike.  I took advantage of the weather to play the 9 hole golf course just outside of Dawson City.  The course is aptly named the Top of the World Golf course.  Here's a couple pics.

Sign on the Top of the World highway.

5th fairway

6th Teebox, Klondike River in the background

Self portrait on the 7th tee box

Hike up to the clubhouse.

The week ahead

We are leaving Whitehorse this morning as we head further north.  Today's trip is from here to Dawson City.  (Map)  We will be there two nights, hoping to play golf at the Top of the World Golf course and take in the Diamond Tooth Gertie show while we are there.

Then it's off to Inuvik. (Map)  From Inuvik the plan is to take a plan up to Tuktoyaktuk, it's so far off the grid that there are no roads to get up there.  Here's a Map of the planned flight.  Internet service will be sketchy to none existent for the next week or so.

Wildlife Photos

Lots of wildlife along the way.  Here's some pics.

The road to Whitehorse

We have arrived in Whitehorse, Yukon.  The trip was accomplished in three parts.  First, we drove from Hudson's Hope to Skianni Chief River (Map).  There is a little RV park right next to the Peace river which had electricity!  Always a good thing.  We spent one night there then drove to the Liard Hot Springs Provincial Park. (Map).  On the way to Liard we saw this guy kicking it next to the road.

We also started seeing Bears, six of them on this part of the trip.  Liard was fun as usual but - and this is a big but - the mosquitos were horrid this year!  We still spent 3 days in Liard soaking in the hot springs and riding our bikes.  Here's Kim at the Liard River bridge just south of the park.

Yesterday we drove from Liard to Whitehorse (Map) and we really started seeing wildlife.  We counted 13 bears, around 10 buffalo and 1 red fox. We will be here today, Kim and her mom are headed into town for some shopping and I am hoping to get some golf in, then we head further north to Dawson City and Inuvik.

Hudson's Hope, BC

We covered about 260 miles yesterday, spending the night next to the Peace river just North of Hudson's Hope. (Trip)  Today we are headed over to see the largest dam here in British Columbia.  The owner of the campground here told us that the dam is releasing water and that it shoots out about 1/4 mile.  There is also a tour that we hope to go on.

The biggest town that we went through yesterday was Chetwynd.  It has an interesting visitor center with several chainsaw carvings outside of it.  This was the one we found most interesting.

 The piece was entitled "Building Character".

We also saw our first Bear and Moose of the trip yesterday.  They appeared and disappeared so fast that we didn't get any pictures.

Happy 4th of July

We made it almost 400 miles up the Cariboo trail here in British Columbia.  We had hoped to get north of Prince George yesterday but it was just too much.  Here's the map.  We found a great little campground, the Crystal Creek Campground RV Park.  It has a nature trail that follows the path of the creek that the campground gets it's name fun.  Internt is to slow or I'd post up a couple pictures.

Our goal is to be at the Liard Hot Springs Provincial Park on Friday.  The provincial parks are great but no electricity and of course no internet.  We will be spending 3 nights there then it's off to the Annie's Lake golf course and Whitehorse.

Here's a map for that part of the trip.

Goodbye US of A - Hello Canada!

We have spent the last 2 nights in Portland, Or.  Our campsite is on an Island between Oregon and Washington.  The name of the place is the Jantzen Beach RV park.  The park isn't really on the beach and we couldn't find away to get down to the river while we were riding our bikes yesterday but it was still a nice place.

We spent yesterday wandering through the Washington Park Rose Garden.  Here's a picture of Kim enjoying the flowers.  I, of course, was bored out of my gourd.

After that we headed over to the semi-world famous VooDoo doughnuts shop.  We tried to go to the one downtown but the line was at least 100 people long!!  Fortunately they have a second location so we did manage to find a place to park the RV and pick up a dozen of the craziest doughnuts ever.  Here's Gerry about to work out on the Blood Filled Voodoo doll!

Today we head into Canada where we will be traveling around for the next 20 days or so.  The Map for our trip up I-5 to Portland is here and the one for today's journey to Hope, BC is here.