Week Eight ~ Alaska Trip June 5-11

We settled for the night in Dawson Creek. They have had snow this last week plus some heavy rain. There is a lot of quality mud around. We settled in for the night and had a good sleep. In the morning we tried to do some banking, but it did not work. You would think we were from a foreign country or something! I was surprised how user unfriendly the banks were, considering the thousands of Americans that travel through to Alaska. Oh well, that is less of our money that we will spend in Canada.
After lunch we headed out to see some sights. We watched the PBS movie at the Alaska House on the building of the Alcan Highway. It will give us a better appreciation while driving through it. Then we took in some of the local tourist attractions.
          Build a road WHERE?   Mile Zero Alaska Highway





Curved railroad trestle









Historic Downtown Hotel
The next day we only traveled as far as Ft. St.  John to a Cummins Dealer again. The RV was throwing codes again and Phil felt that the power and the mileage had dropped. They could not see us on Tuesday, so we sat until 2:30 Wednesday afternoon before they could fit us in. The tech hooked us up to the computer and all that he could find wrong was the fuel filters. Phil had brought some from home, but NAPA had given him the wrong ones. The dealer had some in stock, so he replaced them. We then took a test drive back to Taylor BC which took us over the Peace River Bridge (which is a squiggly metal bridge) and up a 10% grade. We then turned around and came DOWN the 10% grade and across the squiggly bridge for the third time! No codes appeared, thankfully. Phil purchased two extra sets of fuel filters to take along with us. We stayed the night in their lot again as it was about 4:30 PM before we were all done.
Thursday we headed on up the road and drove about 250 miles up to Fort Nelson. We parked in a nice campground that has free Wifi, thankfully. Saw a black MOMMA bear with a cub today. It was too quick to snap a picture. There is a Kodak moment around every turn. Absolutely beautiful countryside.
Friday we drove to Watson Lake. It was a rainy day to begin with. There was a lot of fog on the tops of the mountains. We saw a lot of wildlife today. Bear, sheep, moose and buffalo.

It cleared later in the day and we settled at a good campground in Watson Lake. Unfortunately, we had suddenly hit a very rough patch of construction going into Watson Lake. The RV must have thrown up a stone and made a hole in the radiator. NOT Good.
So, we went to dinner, that was not  good either. Saturday morning Phil went to the local repair shop. They said that they were not set up to handle such a large RV repair but they would transport us to Whitehorse where we could be fixed. So…….they had Phil BACK the RV onto a flatbed trailer, over two 12” x 6” boards. WOW, it made my eyes hurt to watch, to say nothing of what it did to my stomach! Phil worked with the driver very well and VOILA! it was loaded.
  

 So, off the RV went. We stopped for a bit at the Signpost Forest. We wanted to locate the sign that Dennis Hill had put up a few weeks ago. Phil walked and looked all over, but I found the sign!

We did not have a sign to leave, maybe we will make on to leave on the return trip.

We set off to Whitehorse and had a good trip north. We saw very little wildlife today. We decided that the wildlife is only under contract to come out for RV’s. They know we are tourists with cameras.
This is an example of Yukon graffiti. It is all along the road as you travel. Everyone makes a trip out of town to write their name in stones. It is cool to see.

So as of Saturday night we were settled into the parking lot of the Kenworth/Cummins dealer here in Whitehorse YK. Hopefully they can repair the radiator and we will be on our way again. I’ll let you know.