Day 31: Alaska Highway - Mile 217 to Mile 442

May 15, 2014

Wow! What a day!! At 4:00 am Scout woke us up. Well that would be 6 at home and 5:00 by yesterday's time zone, but really? 4:00 am? Then we looked out and it was snowing! Checked the temps – 36 outside and 49 inside – we didn't run the furnace last night. That's what happens when you don't have internet to check the weather. We ended up with no snow accumulation at our campsite but less than 10 miles up the road there was 1-2 inches accumulation. That's significant when you are from Alabama. Fortunately – no travel problems. It just made for some postcard type pictures of the spruce pines and mountain tops. It started snowing again for a while, then the clouds broke and it was a beautiful, sunny day.

It was a banner day for wild life. First we saw a sand hill crane. Sorry, didn't get a picture. Then after refueling in Fort Nelson, about Raspberry Creek area, we saw our first black bear. Not a great picture but you can tell it's a bear.

Shy black bear

We then climbed up to the top of Steamboat pass, elevation 3,500 feet. Beautiful scenery. Then on to Tetsa where, yes, we stopped for one of the famous huge cinnamon buns. For fellow RVers coming after us – the one from Shepherd's Inn was better, less expensive and just as big.

We then saw stone sheep. So cute. Stone sheep are darker brown and somewhat smaller than the bighorn sheep. Dall sheep are found in the mountains of Yukon and Alaska and we hope to see some of those later in the trip.

We then went thru Summit Pass – elevation 4250 ft. This is the highest summit on the Alaska Highway.

Summit Lake – still covered in ice

After the summit there was the area of erosion pillars – or what we know as hoodoos. They are no were near as impressive here as Brice National Park but to be here – in the Rocky Mountains – were totally unexpected. We hiked the short trail to get a better look and all three of us had fun playing in the snow.

We weren't through for the day. Next we saw a moose standing in the river as we passed Centennial Falls. Well we forgot all about the falls and watched the moose and took pictures.

Not-so-shy moose

Shortly after seeing the moose, we saw a caribou run into the woods, again too quickly for us to get a picture. Then it was on to Muncho (means big lake) Lake. The lake is known for its beautiful deep green and blue, crystal clear water. We've seen beautiful pictures of people out on the lake in canoes and this lake is one of the reasons we brought our inflatable kayak with us. Yep – it's iced over too. Well – maybe on the way home if we come back this way. It is still very pretty and the ice seems to be melting quickly. We will be here for 3 days so..... maybe by Sunday enough will be thawed?

View out our windshield

Today's travels were much more what we expected our travels on the Alaska Highway to be like. Less traffic, more remote, beautiful scenery, wild life, awesome!

We have very limited and slow internet here but – it's better than nothing. The pictures are smaller and we may have to limit the number and then add more later. Thanks for following along.