Sunday, August 23rd

Prophet Springs (MP222) to Whirlpool Canyon (MP557)

 

Ok… so here it is Sunday and we are still heading north on the Alaskan Highway.  We spent the night around Milepost (MP) 250 and headed out with an actual goal today!  We were heading for Liard Hot Springs a mere couple hours drive away.  The road keeps changing from dirt to gravel back to asphalt back to dirt into asphalt and once again gravel… and then doing it all over again.  Kinda keeps you on your toes when you’re driving.  The visitor’s guide to Canada states “don’t be afraid to drive on the best part of the road.”  So far, I think it’s about 50/50 as to which side of the road we are driving on…

We keep one eye on the road and the other eye along the road looking for that every-evasive Moose.   We did manage to see a Porcupine scurrying off the road into the shrubs… and a couple Stone Sheep lounging along the road.  Then, as we came around a bend in the road… there’s this adolescent Caribou just taking his morning jog down the middle of the road!  He is just lumbering along in his awkward manner about 20 feet in front of the truck… and he wouldn’t move out of the way.  Sure, he would look left and then right like he was going to get off the road and do some trail running but he just stayed right there in our lane.  It was pretty cool seeing him there so we just drafted him for a while until he had enough running on the asphalt and got off to the shoulder.  We just sat there laughing at the whole thing not quite believing what we just saw.  It must have been that day when all the teenage Caribou skip the weekly herd meeting as we had just got back up to speed when we came across another one just off the side of the road trying to figure out how to get across the guardrail.  Next turn and there’s a whole group of mamas and their little ones. NOW we’re talking!  We were getting all excited about the wildlife and talking about how different it is to have Moose, Caribou, Sheep, Grizzlies, Wolves and the like as your everyday local animals.

We pulled into Liard Hot Springs about 4:30pm all giddy from the drive and decided to soak then go and get a few more miles behind us before dark.  These hot springs are back in the woods and you access them via a boardwalk built over the wetlands.  The walk back was beautiful and we read a couple information boards along the way.  It turns out that due to the microclimate created by the hot springs there are 14 varieties of Orchids living there.  It was like a tropical forest really….(boreal, actually) The springs were semi-improved with stairs into the water and benches in and around it with just a small  changing room.  The water came out of the ground at like 136*F and fell down this nice waterfall into the main pool where it mixed with ground water to cool it down nicely.  You could get in at one end where the water was like 104*F and slowly work your way towards to hot end… and get this… it was too hot even for Susan!  Not THAT’s saying a lot about how hot it was.  The water fell over another falls into a cooler pool which was more my temperature.  We hung out there for about an hour and a half… some of which was spent helping a lady try and find her wedding ring that had come off in the water… bummer… no luck.

So… north we go again… this time with a warning to watch out for the Buffalo.  Buffalo?... if you say so.  It was about 6:30  and we did want to be off the road by dark so we had a target of Whirlpool Canyon about 50 miles ahead.  All refreshed, we headed out… road was good, weather was clear and traffic was non-existent.  Much to our amazement, it didn’t take us too long to come upon a Buffalo lying down on the hillside along the road.   He was beautiful… just hanging out there.  We were still excited about our Buffalo sighting when we went around a bend and came upon an entire herd of Buffalo taking up the entire road!   There were probably 50 or 60 of them there… from little calves to the Big Daddy Pappa Grand Puba Bull!  In fact, Mister Puba was walking right towards us and not looking like he was going to change his course.  We had pulled over to the side of the road and stopped and just sat there watching Daddy come at us and at this point Susan says, “maybe we should go.”  But I couldn’t go anywhere with that many Buffalo around and Puba polishing our front fender.  He came walking right beside the truck… Susan’s window open… his shoulder almost touching our mirror and his shoulder higher than Susan’s head!  Absolutely amazing!  We just sat there in awe of the size and beauty of these animals as the big ones walked slowly by and the little ones ran and hid behind their mothers.  Simply incredible… no other way to describe it.  We did manage to get a couple blurry pictures.

The last couple miles to our camp were filled with “did you see that?” and “Holy #%&#!”.  We made it to Whirlpool and backed into a spot…

 

But that’s another story……

Miracle of America revisited....

Just a quick note on that “Miracle of America Museum” in Polson, Montana… Look it up!  See if it is on the internet somewhere.  It should be!  It is one of those places that you see along side the road and just keep driving.  Nothing to really draw you in and spend time there exploring.  The front facing the road is a simple building with “MUSEUM” on it in big letters.  There is the typical old army vehicle out front… along with a battered helicopter and your typical huge wooden tug-boat type thing and a couple old cars.  You step inside and are lost for hours!  I mean like you can’t take it all in without literally going on overload.  I left there after 3 hours or so feeling like I had motion sickness.  For 3 hours my eyes were in constant motion moving from this 1930’s hair curling machine to that Japanese Rising Sun Flag from WWII signed by the troops before battle to the 1912 Harley Davidson shaft drive motorcycle of which only 1000 were ever made to the interlocked antlers of two bucks that died because they couldn’t get apart from each other and subsequently died due to starvation!    There were 37 buildings ‘out back’ that were  stocked up as a blacksmith shops, a doctors’  office, milking barn, schoolhouse, grainery, trappers shack or general store.  There was a barn full of oddball antique cars and bikes.  And one full of steam engine tractors.  There was something everywhere and more behind that.  It wasn’t arranged like a typical museum… no that would make too much sense.  Instead, it was arranged by theme, each room or part of a room dedicated to a particular subject… but in no particular order.  It went from early 1900’s household goods to WWII to old motorcycles to Boyscouts then to vintage lunchboxes and Wizard of Oz statues of a flying monkey.  We could not believe that all of this “stuff” was there… and why it was not in some major museum somewhere else.  There was no way you could get through that place in one day and really take in what you saw.   No way to truly comprehend the vastness of Gil’s collection (Gil is the founder).  I know we all have a collection disorder of one type or another but Gil has taken all of our disorders and arranged them all in one place.  As he put it… “This is not my job, it’s a hobby gone wrong.”

 

Photos won’t really do this place justice but I will put some here anyway.  And as Susan said… if you ever find yourself in Polson, Montana you HAVE to stop by and see this amazing place.

North to Alaska

August 22, 2009

And so we begin our first day officially on the Alaskan Highway.  We camped last night at MilePost 29 at the Kiskitanaw Provincial Campground.  We met the camp… host… I guess you could say, but Alex was much more than a simple “host”.  He comes there in April or May and stays until October and really takes care of the park.  “This is my park” he told us… not in a possessive or arrogant way, but in a proud way.  He walked around the park about 10pm with his dog ‘Moose’ (an aptly named Lab/Rottweiler mix of about 125 pounds) and stopped in for a chat.  He liked our solar LED Christmas lights we had strung up on one of the smaller spruce trees in our camp.  He stayed and chatted for a while before moving on.  We are pretty deep into Canada at this point and I knew the “eh’s” would start popping up… and they have… pretty much after every other sentence.  It’s the little things that ya just seem to notice, eh?  Alex left us with a new map, his business card so we could look him up next time we were in the area and a word of advise… “Watch out for the moose, eh?”

We left right on time… 10:12am again this morning.  Been really trying to beat our record of 9-something but just can’t do it.

We made it about ¼ mile from our camp before we hade to make our first stop of the day.  No, the road wasn’t THAT bad!  The last remaining bridge still in use today from the original Alaskan Highway built in 1942 was right in our path.  It is made entirely of wood similar to railroad trestles and cool thing about it is that is curves about 7-degrees as it crosses the river 150’ below.  Of course we got a picture of Thumper on it.

Not much further up the road, we passed this big sign that said “Honey”.  Did someone say Honey?... having not seen the sign till it was too late we made a U-turn and headed back.  There we met Mr. Van Han, who was now retired and, by all means, out-of-business… that is until we showed up.  He pulled his John Deere tractor (the big kind) right up behind us and got the key to the door of the shop off the telephone pole and in we went.  We got a whole lesson on bees and honey and plowing snow on the Alaskan Highway.  So, we got our standard 15-pound drum of honey and headed on down the road, spoon in hand, scooping and savoring the new treat.  One thing before you go though… “Watch out for those moose, eh?.”

We keep Aunt Alvina’s trip journal close so we can read about what they did and saw as they traveled this road.  One of our goals was to stop at the gas station at MilePost 136 where Grandma & Grandpa knew the owners, the Warrens, from their previous trip to Alaska and spent a night there during their trip in 1974.  We did find the station, still with the campground behind it, but the Warrens were gone and the folks there now didn’t know much about them.  Still, it was neat to be there.

Now… we are really making good time!  That is until we pulled into Saint John where there was a farmers market… and a yard sale… and diesel fuel… and a sporting goods store… and this guy making wooden signs… and… let’s just say we were there for longer than we planned.

We are now camped at this de-commissioned Provincial campground at Prophet River where Aunt Alvina and crew stopped and got some spring water… and so did we.  Nice to know that they were in this same place drinking from the same spring a mere 35 years ago.

 

Oh… and for you keeping track at home… we have seen… 6 Whitetail Deer, 29 Chipmunks, 4 Bald Eagles, 1,467 Crows and one small dog…

But NO Moose!

 

 

Oh, Canada!

Hmmm, where’d we leave off?  Flathead lake it seems, saying good bye to Chrissy and Dave with a case of their yummy beer in back (thanks again!) and a pile of  Glacier Brewery stickers to liberally distribute. We are now official ambassadors!

For those of you keeping track that would have been Sunday August 16. We headed up to Polebridge, MT-almost the end of the road, 24 miles from Canada, but you can’t get there from here. It's on the west side of glacier National Park. Our  only reason for going was because when Chrissy described it, she said the first thing they thought upon seeing the place was how much Jim would love it J And they know him well! It’s a collection of wood cabins on a creek in the mountains, closed off to anyone without a snowmobile or the ability to cross country ski distance for 6 months of the year. When we pulled up to the Polebridge Mercantile (circa 1900) there was a jam band on the stage out back of the bar next door and more than a few folks who looked like, well, our friends. It could have been State Bridge (minus the river and the train). Unfortunately the guy who owns the Northern Lights Bar forgot to renew his liquor license...  oh well, the mercantile sells beer (and REALLY amazing, creative scones,  like feta/olive/onion-we shared 3 for dinner!). That night we camped at the most beautiful river rock beach ever!  EVER! Greens and purples and red and grays and browns, smooth and lovely.  We wandered about for several hours before dark (have we mentioned it gets dark late here?)  finding  6 or 7 LOVErock sets almost without trying. It was so amazing, peaceful and hard to leave…..

But we did, and spent the next day driving around Glacier (being too long for the Going-to–the-Sun road) but happy as there was no traffic and spectacular views of mountains and forest (some of which had burned in the past couple years, leading to a cool, unexpected way of seeing the landscape and crazy amounts of wildflowers).  We took a much needed hike around Two Medicines lake, almost seeing a moose and perhaps several beavers (their home was in evidence) before heading up to Many Glaciers campground, where we were turned away(!) for having arrived so much later than all the other campers. Oh well. The drive was glorious, heading into the valley between spectacular, sharp cut mountains along a green/blue cascading river of glacial runoff as storm clouds gathered around the peaks.

So into Canada we went on Tuesday, without so much as a “we’ll be searching your trailer now”, and up through Glacier/Waterton International Peace Park (which Glacier National Park evolved into in 1932 celebrating the longest ‘undefended’ border in the world). It was a gentle transition into this new world, still espresso shops all along the way (I forgot to mention that Montana has the most coffee huts per capita of anywhere on earth, much to my delight), Safeways, Walmarts and Home Depots. What they did have which we’d never seen before, was a town (Frank) that was covered in rocks (big rocks) after the side of a mountain gave way. Devastating, of course, but so amazing, too. Perhaps Mother Nature's way of protesting all the mining going on around there.

Next day we made our way up to Banff National park, hiking around Lake Louise and up toward the glacier that feeds it. This is a place I remember visiting as a kid. We were loving the clear blue water and the beautiful forest that surrounds it rising up, seemly straight up in places, to cover the mountains. 

The road running through Banff and into Jasper is counted as “one of the ten most beautiful drives in the world” and we believe it! Cruising along between the majestic peaks is pretty amazing, but then you start getting to the glaciers and Oh my! Just incredible walls of ice and snow hanging off sculpted peaks. They figure every person in North America could stand together on the Columbia icefield and still have room. Wow!  Lakes and rivers of unbelievable blue and green (and sometimes white) runoff carving rock canyons like I’ve never seen. Panther falls (unmarked, which we found only though because a kind someone encouraged us to follow a trail off a turn out) jumps straight out of a hole in the side of the mountain after winding it’s way through deep carved rock channels up above! It’s ridiculous, really. And based on Janet and Karl’s word, we ain’t seen nothing yet! :-)

 

 

How far will we go????

Jim's got a pool going on how many miles we'll actually drive this trip. The winner will get a special treat from Alaska :-)  Mileage will be counted from 611 33 Road in Clifton to our last known stop at Tom's place, Harmony Hill, in Grants Pass, Oregon. We are hoping to get as far North as the Arctic Circle (not the Arctic Ocean!) and wander down to the Kenai Penninsula. We will most likely take the ferry from Haines to Price Rupert so those miles won't count.   Anyone can play so just make your best guess! 

After months of talking, planning and trailer rebuilding Yobps finally left Shady Acres (so renamed by our fine caretaker, John) Sunday August 9.  We made it as far as Palisade for our first stop-to drop off Zuma with Janet and Karl for the start of his 2 month couch surfing adventure (thanks J&K, Amber & Chris!!).  

We then headed up to Echo Ranch in Carbondale where  Deb & Guy made us a super yummy meal, toured us around their new and improved place and blew us away (again) with Deb's most recent paintings... after which we got to enjoy the fruits of Guy's recent labor as the recording engineer for Law, Mosley, Snipes and Droll. We can't wait for that music to be released-they have something seriously good going on! 

Monday we headed over Cottonwood pass and up to the Steamboat area, where Leann and Kamaria are staying at their family cabin for a few weeks. The rest of the day was spent on a friend's boat tubing and water skiing (Jim not Susan!). Pretty good fun! The next day we all got to play a round of golf at the Cow Chip Country Club, a course designed and built by Leann's dad, Bill. A perfect course for everyone involved ;-)  That afternoon, after an unsuccessful attempt to fix the fridge (the only appliance not replaced in the rebuilding of Thumper) we headed up to Wyoming through beautiful and bumpy back roads.

Wednesday morning found us just south of Jackson and the day gave us an AMAZING drive through the Tetons and Yellowstone, which included a stop at Old Faithful

 (how could you not?) and a pretty cool hike around the MANY geysers in that area.  We

spent the night just outside the east entrance to the park sharing a site with two sweet young Canadian girls just back from their first big road trip-from Alberta to Nova Scotia and back!

Thursday we tried to bust a move up to Flathead Lake, Montana to visit good friends of Jim-Chrissy and Dave Ayers, but we took a 3 hour short cut (a truly beautiful back road, but rough!!) and made it only as far as Butte.  This turned out to be a good thing since  a)we got a night in the national forest away from everything-except the lightening of a huge storm. It was so crazy! The thunder was shaking the camper. Sooo thankful for rubber tires :-) and b) we got to check out Butte the next morning. What an unexpectedly cool old town. Wild mining history which resulted in some of the most amazing buildings (and stories).

Finally, Friday made it up to Polson, MT where Dave and Chrissy have the Glacier Brewing Company and two awesome daughters, Abby and Ellie (10 & 7). We hung out in this great little town for a couple days, enjoying time with our friends as well as a great "fly-in" air show. Small planes from all over the place-you could just walk right up and check them out. Jim even lent a hand moving one around. We also visited the "Miracle of America" Museum. Words to describe this place fail me, but if you are ever in Polson, don't miss it ;-)

Whew, that was a big week. We made 1387  miles and we are just getting started....

Next week we head into the Canadian Rockies.

More soon.....