A rainy day on the Dalton Highway in Alaska
This may be hard to believe (: but not every day of our travels
in Alaska offers beautiful scenery. We had some great days of majestic scenery, with more yet to come but we
did have our share of wet soggy days, too.
I am sharing one of those days here.
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| The Dalton and the Alaska Pipeline |
Some days were a true test to the driving ability of Keith
and the other RV’ers. The many miles on
the Dalton Highway are mainly dirt with lots of potholes that becomes quite
slippery when wet. Visibility was often poor
partly due to the weather but the smoke from area fires was a factor, as
well. The speed used was ‘slow and
slower’!
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| A lone cyclist on the Dalton Highway |
Cyclists were rare but we definitely saw more than I would
have expected to see on these remote roads.
This cyclist wasn’t very visible through the window for this photo but
it shows that there are some very brave and adventuresome people out
there! He was alone.
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| Slippery road in the rain |
Other than freight trucks that cover this road on a regular
basis, we are the largest RV vehicles on this near 500 miles of the Dalton Highway
that we saw on our journey. Although this
was July, which should be one of the busiest RV tourist seasons in Alaska, we
saw very few on our travels.
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| The E.L. Patton Bridge |
The Yukon Bridge is officially known as the E.L. Patton
Bridge. This ½ mile long span is a
girder bridge and carries the Dalton Highway and the Alaska Pipeline and was
built in 1974/75. This is the only
bridge crossing of the Yukon River in Alaska. This is at the Yukon River Camp
which is one of the fuel stops we made going up to Prudhoe Bay and again when returning to Fairbanks.
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| Muddy vehicles |
Dusty when it is dry and muddy when it is wet, our RV’s have
never been as dirty as they are on this trip.
I doubt we will ever have all of the mud and dirt cleaned out of the
crevices under the unit, even with all the cleanings that have been done. This gives you a good idea of how dirty we
were and this was not the first time, we’d had a wash or two on previous stops
and there would be more to come.
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| Dorothy's Gift Shop |
There is very little there at the Yukon River Camp other
than a service stop that includes fuel and a café for the camp plus a ‘gift
store’ that we visited. This unique gift
store had some great little gift ideas and we enjoyed shopping and supporting
Dorothy for her talent and her tenacity for being here, in spite of the weather!
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| Dorothy's jewellry |
There was a wood burning stove inside this little very
rustic gift shack for heat but other than that, there were not too many
comforts. Dorothy, who has been doing
this for many years, makes all gifts by hand. Her tags are hand written on
birch and tell a story about the item; there are several different birch and
fur gifts, too.
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| A long muddy road |
This is a remote area and it is a good idea to travel with
others and to be prepared for emergencies and occasional breakdowns. A guide to help with this is The Milepost. It is one of the longest running guide books
and has grown over the many years. It
marks every mile along the route with information to guide you about the road
and area. It is a great reference for
anyone travelling Alaska.
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| Milepost editors |
There are field editors in Canada and Alaska who cover these
many miles every year to check for changes and make updates. This couple, seen on the previous day, were
making the Dalton Highway their project this summer. One of our group had met them and enjoyed the
visit learning about their interesting job.
Our next stop is in
Fairbanks, Alaska, we have some cleaning to do.
