We saw a Grizzly Bear

June 1, 2014.

We left our campground around 9:00. This bird was singing all morning.

 

Our view coming down the hill

 

  It had mostly cleared out by then.   We started driving down the road, and were the only ones on the mountain, and I thought I saw something on the road around a corner and I told Tom to get the camera ready.  I was driving.  Around the corner was a big o’ grizzly bear walking down the middle of the street.  

 

You know how you see those pictures of wild animals walking down streets?  Well, I never believed them until we saw this big guy.   We stopped, and started taking pictures.  He was not bothered by us at all, we slowly just followed him down the road for about 2-3 minutes.  He looked back as us, but just kept going.  This was really exciting.   We did not expect to see a Grizzly Bear on this trip.  Black bears, yes, but not grizzly’s.  I could have driven up beside him and pinched his bum….. 

Then a tour bus came from the opposite direction and scared him away. I think the driver may have seen him run off to the side, because the bus stopped, but we watched him run off into the woods on our side and Tom said he disappeared and could not see him anymore.  

We left Denali National Park and headed to Anchorage.    Not much to see on this drive.   A two-lane highway with lots of signs to watch out for moose, but we did not see any.

There was a nice lookout stop where you could see the mountain ranges and Mt. Huunter in the distance.  This was just about ½ hour before the clouds started rolling in and covering the range.

 That's me in a wolf hat

We did see the largest Igloo, and it was for sale.  Tom was a little interested but when I offered to drop him off, he declined.     

 

 It started to rain about noon and has not stopped since.   Definitely our worst weather day.  We have been extremely lucky with the weather, in that it has not stopped us from taking walks and exploring around our camp sites.   Today, it is cold and rainy,   so it’s a good driving day.    Went about 250 miles today. Stopped to see the largest Ice Cream Cone, and I had to have one, in the rain. 

 

Dang mosquitos everywhere

 

Duh!

Went to Iditarod Headquarters today.  Very interesting

Bolt

 New puppies

Their idea of a mall.

 

 Had a reservation in Anchorage at an RV Park, but when we drove by it, we said “no way’.  It was awful, so we ended up at one called Ship Creek RV Park, it got the best rating on Yelp, as the other ones were awful.   This one is not a lot better, lots of permanent people living here. But it will do.  Thank goodness we have internet again.    
 

At least we have full hook ups, can empty and refill the tanks and can do laundry.  We had hamburgers and hand make Ukrainian Perogies for dinner tonight that I bought in Vegreville Alberta, Canada.  I fried several onions, had some sour cream and thought about my grandmother, mom and aunt.  They loved them.

 

We are starting to use up our groceries and making meals from what we have in the freezer and fridge.   I still plan on having Alaskan Crab for dinner one night, but we will probably eat out.

Filled the RV today for $120 instead of $200 in Canada.   Much better.   Just have to top it off and we will come in under budget for gas.  I figured about $2,500 to $3,000, but it should be about $2,100 when it is all said and done.  We passed the 3,900 mile mark on the RV as we came into Anchorage.    Our contract allows 3,900 miles and we pay for every mile we go over which will most likely not be more than 100 miles over. 

Another busted business

Mother duckies and her babies

It’s supposed to be clear skies tomorrow, so we will probably head to downtown Anchorage and tootle around the big city to  see what is going on. 

Its 10:00 at night here and still like 3:00 in the afternoon.    There are 20 hours of daylight each day and it never really gets dark outside .  I woke up at 4:47 and thought it was around 7:30.    Once I'm awake its daytime and time to get up. We have had to tape things over the skylights in the motorhome.   There are two boys playing ball on the grass outside right now.  Rain sky has cleared and its blue sky all over.   I think it might be a nice day tomorrow.  

We saw a MOOSE

May 30, 2014

This was our most uneventful day.   In Fairbanks, we went to a University of Alaska Large Animal Research Station, with muskoxen, caribou and reindeer, but as we pulled up, the gates were closed and they were having their Grand Opening for the season May 31, the next day.    But ,we were able to see some of the muskoxen through the fence. 

 

We then drove from Fairbanks to Denali National Park.  It was only 125 miles but took us about 4 hours.   Four times during the drive, they had traffic stopped, the roads became gravel and it was one way traffic, so we had to get in line and follow a Pilot Car.  The roads were wet down for dust control, so they were a muddy mess.   We went 3,500 miles without a rock hitting the windshield but as we were sitting, waiting in line for the cars to pass so that we could go, a semi buzzed by way too fast and a rock hit the windshield hard.   We thought it would have broken the windshield, but it just but a  star/ding in it.   They told us that 80% of the motorhomes would come back with a cracked windshield.  We are now one of the statistics. 

 

Stopped at a trading post and met a woman who told us her life story.  We just took a picture of the bear and left. 

 

We pulled into Denali and the winds across the bridges down into the park were so strong, it almost blew us off the road.  A little scary there for a bit.  We saw all the Princess Cruise ship buses going in every direction for their excursions.   We saw the Princess Lodge, where dad and Arlene stayed on one of their cruises.  We drove past that busy section and entered the park, were we were able to secure a spot in Riley Campground tonight and Savage River tomorrow night.   Because it is a weekend, we decided we better reserve something for tomorrow night too.  We may stay over on Sunday night as well, depending on what we do the next couple of days.   There are buses and trips we can book, so we are looking to see what we might want to see while we are here.

 

We were just cutting up the veggies for a good beef stew tonight and there was a knock on our door, and a young ranger told us a Moose and her two babies just walked through our campsite about 10 minutes earlier and asked if we wanted to see the baby’s hoof prints.   I took pictures of them, but you need a trained eye to really know what you are looking at.   She said they would probably come back this way, but since we are parked here, they were not sure what path she might take.   I am on MOOSE WATCH.

 

May 31

Well, no moose siting’s at our campsite.  I watched a squirrel about 2 feet from our window eating.  He was so light, he could hang over the end of the branch without falling off.  

 

There was one other wild animal.   Tom is ready to disown me.

Before we left the camp site, I made my own little Inukshuk.   We have seen many of these along the highways.   They are rock sculpture  forms from unworked stones used by the Inuit Indians as a form of communication.  

 

We walked up to the Visitor Center and found out we could drive most of the way that the free bus would take us though the Park, otherwise the shortest tour was 5.5 hours long.  

 

Tom’s stomach was not in the mood for a 5.5 hour bus tour with no bathroom on board, and being dependent on their scheduled stops, so we decided to drive it ourselves.  The vistas were just beautiful once again!

 It was on our way to our next camping site anyway.   Lucky for us, as we drove 15 miles up the mountain towards our next camping spot for the night, we saw two cars on the side of the road taking pictures of a bull moose feeding in the bushes on the side of the road.   We stopped and watched it for about 10 minutes.   He didn’t seem to mind we were there.    

 

 

 

Right before that, Liz called me on my cell phone, but since we were heading into the high mountains, we lost signal just about when we said Hi.   Sorry Liz.

This camp area cleared out for the day, and there are only about 5 RV’s in the whole area.   We expect it to fill up tonight, since it’s a Saturday night.  We took a really long walk along a Trail, (with our bear spray handy) and then headed towards Savage River.    We were able to see Mt. McKinley and a beautiful mountain range view as well.    This is why we did this trip, to see the country we have only experienced from a cruise ship.

 

There was much more evidence of beetle rot on our walk.

 

It really clouded over this morning and rained for about 15 minutes,, so I decided to take a little nap with the wind and the sound of the rain hitting the motor home, but it was so short, I was disappointed.  

 

 It cleared up and there is blue sky with only a few clouds, the wind kicks up every once in a while, but overall, it is so pleasant out, its 64 now, about as warm as it is going to get today.   Tomorrows forecast is showers for most of the day, so we will probably head to Anchorage.   We really have not done any touristy stuff so we might do that in Anchorage.   I think I want to go on a whale watching boat and maybe rent bikes or Segway’s and go on a town tour.   We will play it by ear.

May28 and 29

May 28 and May 29, 2014

We started off at the Caribou RV Park in Whitehorse, Yukon.  It was a commercial RV park, but we were able to do laundry, empty our tanks and refill with fresh water.  We have to do that every few days.  I have to say that with Whitehorse being the capital of the Yukon Territories, it was unimpressive.   Typical downtown, with some retail, local folks and what appears to be lots of vacant businesses.    

We decided to push on for Alaska.    I drove most of the day, and it was yet another day of spectacular views.  We saw this mountain they called “Craggley  Face Man”   

 

 

  Stopped at the Canyon Creek Bridge which was an original bridge used during the gold rush days.  We saw this German vehicle called a Wohngebiet.   

 

 

Spectacular mountains along the way.  Stopped at an Interpretive Center in Haines Junction run by the First Nation folks.  That is what American Indians are called in Canada.  It was an interesting interaction.  They built this nice new center, but were rather cold to talk to.  We went out the back, and a young First Nation girl came up to us and explained they had killed 8 moose this year and were getting ready to process them in this huts.  They use all parts, including brains to soften the hides and even the hooves and antlers for tools. 

 

All along the way we saw signs of beetle devastation.  First it was the elms, then in these pictures, it is the pines.  The beetles kill thousands of tress each year and you can see the dead gray-looking trees next to the green ones.  Sad part is that the green trees are dead too, it just takes about a year for them to turn gray after the beetles have killed them.

 

This lake was partly frozen in many places.  After crossing a bridge, there should have been full of water from run off from the mountains, but most of these wash-outs that have been full for many years are now running dry.  Global Warming.  Even the mountains are less than covered in snow.

 

World’s largest Gold Panning pan. 

 

The roads we encountered today were by far the worst we have yet to see.  Because of the frost heaves due to the perma frost, the roads heave and buckle.   It was like being on a roller coaster.  The last 20 miles to the border too us about 1 ½ hours.  We had to go about 10-20 miles per hour on a non-paved, loosely graveled road.  I thought the motor home was going to split in two.  

 

We left the Yukon and entered Alaska

 

Once again at the border, we had contraband, BELL PEPPERS….    We bought strawberries, nectarines, potatoes, onions and banana to declare, and he asked me where I purchased the groceries and I said Whitehorse (which is the capital city of Yukon) and he said I am going to have to take the peppers.  I think he just wanted peppers for his dinner.  We turned them over. 

Luckily we had just give away a lot of food we had to a guy on a bike we asked to take our picture at the Canadian/US border. 

Now this border is out in the middle of nowhere.  NOWHERE and here is this guy riding his bike.  We asked where he was riding to/from, and he said he was on day 9 and just rode across Alaska, and he was riding AROUND THE WORLD.   He gave us these orange rubber bracelets and said to visit his web site at www.selfpoweredtravel.com    I have not had good internet to check it out, but we invited him back to the motorhome, made him sandwiches, gave him lots of our food and the rest of our Canadian money.  He had quite a story to tell.

Stayed the night in a rustic park near a beautiful lake and meet a nice couple from Vermont on the same adventure as us.   We talked until the mosquitoes were about to carry us all away.  They are BAD here.  Glad to be back in the US of A…

 

 

May 29, 2014

Started the day down by the lake. 

 

 It was so quiet.   I woke up early because it was day time all night.  The sun drops behind the horizon about mid-night, but it never gets dark.  My view at midnight from the dinette in the motorhome.

 

Just dusk-like, so when I wake up in the morning, I think it’s time to get up because it is daylight and its 6:30 but really 5:30 because we gained an hour when we crossed over to Alaska last night   We still  don’t know what time it really is, we turned our phones on, but there  has not been a signal, so Tom’s says one thing, mine says another and our table4ts each say something else because there is no signal to update everything  We are on the road at 8:30, but I think it is really 7:30. 

 Too early for my co-pilot.

 

 

Stopped in TOK, Alaska this morning and we finally had a signal, briefly  

 

  Our phones reset and it was now 8:48.    Opps, I really did leave the campground at 7:30.    The drive from Tok to Delta Junction was about 100 miles and it was more miles of dead pines and beautiful mountains, with a little more snow on them.

  We saw a moose along the way on the side of the road, but didn’t have our camera ready and when we approached, he ran into the trees. 

 

 More dry run-offs what should have been full of at least some water in them.

 

Another abandoned business.  So sad.

 

 

Stopped at the Delta Meat and Sausage Company.  We tried, Buffalo, Elk, Reindeer and Moose.   Only bought the beef/pork hotlinks.  That’s all I am going to say about that.

 

Next stop,    Delta Junction which was the end of the Alaska Highway.  We had gone 1,422 since Dawson Creek on May 25 (5 days).   

 

The mosquitoes here were the biggest we have seen yet.  You know they must be big if there is art work dedicated to the stupid things. 

Don't mess with the Buffalo either

 Stopped at a Rika’s Roadhouse and Landing which is a State historical park where minors and road worked would stop for a meal and stay the night.

 

 

 

We saw this bridge with a huge pipe by it and when we got back into the motor home and drove around the corner it was the Alaskan pipe line suspension bridge.  This was an unexpected surprise and very cool.   Very well guarded with security dedicated to it on land and in the lake.

 

Stopped at the Knotty Shop.  They have this wood up hear that looks like “buts” and other body parts.   Loved this place.  Bought a few things.  Don’t know how I will get my carved bear home.  Might have to buy him an airplane seat.

 

As we were coming out of the shop, two fighter planes buzz us and flew over.   We were very near Elision Air force Base and they were doing maneuvers. 

We made it to Fairbanks.

 

Stopped at the North Pole.   Cute place.  Spoke with Mrs. Claus and her mother.  Bought some stuff here too.   Aw-oh, I see a pattern.  No shopping opportunities for 5 days and I am in withdrawals. 

 

We are at a State Campground in Fairbanks tonight (Thursday)  and heading to Denali National Park tomorrow to spend 2-3 nights, then down to Anchorage where our adventure will end on June 5. 

 

Still lots to do and see.  We have gone over 3,500 miles so far and have seen and experienced many wonderful and new things we have not done before.   The question is, “Buying a motorhome when we get home?”    “Not a Winnebago”    Leave it at that!