Before we left Whitehorse we took in the Frantic Follies Show, a vaudeville review that was quite entertaining. One of their skits was based on a Robert Service poem, “The Cremation of Sam McGee”. The Yukon River flows through Miles Canyon in Whitehorse and we hiked around the canyon and found the ghost town of Canyon City. Here the Gold Rush Stampeders unloaded their rafts and carried their belongings overland to avoid the famous Whitehorse Rapids in the canyon. All that remained in Canyon City was hundreds of rusted tin cans. We left Whitehorse and headed to Watson Lake. Watson Lake is famous for its “Sign Forest”. Over 60,000 signs have been left and nailed to posts by travelers. These included road signs and handmade signs. We left the Yukon and entered British Colombia.
There was one striking difference between the Yukon and British Columbia. We were in the Yukon for 3 weeks and saw one black bear. We were in BC for 10 days and saw 3 grizzly bears, three black bears, 60 bison, four caribou, three moose, several deer, a coyote and a cougar - better than a drive thru the zoo! Several friends had told us not to miss Liard Hot Springs. The first night we visited these natural pools, we had the hot springs all to ourselves. We camped at the park that night and we were back in the hot springs in the morning.
The original Alaska Highway was built by the US Military in response to a threat to the Aleutian Islands by Japan. Our troops were working on the highway a month before Canada approved the highway project. The road was completed to Fairbanks in 9 months in 1942. It was only passable with military equipment, so the following year, a civilian based project was started to improve the roadway, reroute it where needed and build more permanent bridges. The Alaska Highway was opened to the public in 1948. Despite a few areas under construction, most of the paved roads in Alaska and the Yukon are in pretty good condition. No need to carry extra gas or extra spare tires. (This does not apply to the unpaved roads heading to the far north).
While surviving the Alaska Highway was no big deal, surviving the September Blizzard on the Bighorn Highway was a big deal. We had spent the night just north of Grand Cache, AB and when we woke up we noticed an inch or so of snow on the ground. We took some pictures and packed up and headed down the road. We gassed up at Grand Cache and were told that there were some accidents due to the storm. It didn’t seem too bad at the time and we only had 88 miles to go to get back to a main highway. The road conditions grew progressively worse. Several vehicles slid off the road, and we passed a few big haul trucks just spinning their wheels. We considered stopping somewhere, but there really was nowhere to stop. Stopping on the side of the road might mean being stuck there for days, so we slowly proceeded down the road. Several times we had to stop in the roadway and clear ice from our wipers. After three nerve wracking hours we made it to the main highway. We were thankful we had front wheel drive. We found a campground and awoke to 12 inches of snow on Sept 15. We heard the road to Jasper NP was closed, so settled in for a day in the RV. The following day we dug ourselves out and headed into the park.
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