Beavers, Reindeer, Wood Bison, a Bear, more Sheep..and now the Yukon!

The drive from Toad River was British Columbia at its best.  The skies were a soft blue and filled with beautiful cloud formations.  The rivers were wild and roaring, tumbling over huge boulders.  Wildlife was everywhere.

In Toad River we watched three beavers eat small branches.  One carried those tender branches to the big beaver lodge in the middle of the pond next to the campground.

The reindeer ( I know wild reindeer are called caribou but they will always be reindeer to me) were plentiful along the roadway.  One ran down the roadway ahead of us.  Breland slowed to let him go to the roadside but he just kept trotting down the road.  Another gave us a challenging look as we went by.

We saw many more stone sheep.  I have lost count of how many we have seen since we left Dawson Creek.  These look much healthier than the ones we saw in Jasper.  A ram was standing proudly in the roadway.  A small black bear ate grass in the ditch alongside the road.

The wood bison is much larger than the American buffalo.  The bulls often weigh more than 2000 pounds. There was a nice herd of them along the road right past Liard Hot Springs.   One mother was tending to her newly born calf.  He was still wet and was having trouble rising to his feet.  She kept coaxing him but we had to move on before he finally stood.

Tonight we are at the Continental Divide RV Park in the Yukon.   This is a beautiful new campground with big pullthroughs separated by trees.  There is a river through a grove of trees.  Their is even good internet access.  But...it also has more mosquitoes than anywhere I have ever been in Louisiana. We let some into the camper before we realized how bad they are.  Poor Clark is hiding under the table.  He hates bugs.

We should be in Whitehorse tomorrow.  I hope we can find an open glass repair place.  There is a small star in the windshield from a passing truck.  There are several areas of road repair going on and lots of loose gravel.

Still in Velvet

Cinnamon Buns and Stone Sheep

Today we retraced 150 km of yesterday's route so that we could stop at the overlooks and search for wildlife.  The morning started out overcast but the skies soon brightened. It was a glorious day.  The section that we drove is the highest section of the Alaska Highway.  We stopped at Stone Mountain campground.  Yesterday we went right past it, wanting to make Toad River our stop for two nights. The campground is on a lake and has a rocky stream running through it.  It has spacious sites with no hookups.  The air there was clear and clean.

Gayle's favorite part of the trip was the time she got to spend with the stone sheep.  We stopped at a tiny pullover on the mountainside to take pictures of the enormous landscape.  A beautiful stone sheep ram came very near as he waited for the rest of the herd to catch up.  The others were more timid.  It is fascinating to watch them walk along the cliff edge so nimbly.

We turned around at Testa Road Services.  There's a campground there and a place to fill up with gas but, most importantly, they make incredible cinnamon rolls and great sourdough bread.

The Alaskan Highway

During our second day in Jasper we re-visited the Icefields Parkway in the car so that we could linger a bit at some of the beautiful pullovers  That is hard to do in a rig that measures 62 feet long.  I was able to take out the tripod and fully enjoy some of the spectacular glaciers..

That afternoon we went along Maligne Lake Road to look for wildlife.  We saw two enormous elk and some really scraggly sheep.  I was horrified to see the ram climb under a car to lick the mineral salts from underneath.

Elk along the Maligne Lake Road

Sheep along the road

Licking the mineral salts from the bottom of the car

Our next stop was Dawson Creek   We spent two nights at the Milepost O campground in a very nice site.  We were first sent to see the only pull-through left or a small back-in.  That pull-through was muddy and someone else was setting up in it.  We went back to the office and the man at the desk apologized profusely and then gave us a site he was holding for one of the workcampers.  We shopped a bit in Dawson Creek and Bre checked all of the systems to make sure we were in good shape for the trip.

Gayle looked into buying an aircard to use while in Canada. It would cost $250 for the card and $65 a month for service.  I just can't justify the expense for only a month, though it would have been nice to have been able to contact everyone while we were marooned in Banff.

Of course we had to take the obligatory photo at Milepost 0, the beginning of the Alaskan Highway.  Gayle took a photo for a couple that wanted a picture together at the sign.  They were from Germany and had brought over their military-style RV with them.   These RVs are set up to travel in a wide variety of terrains and have solar systems to power their lights and entertainment centers and can recycle the grey water so that one can go a month without refilling the water.

Tonight we are in Toad River, British Columbia. Here's a link to the RV campground if you want to find out how children get to school here http://www.toadriverlodge.com/  Tomorrow we will take the car and travel around this area a bit.  I am still hoping for a moose!

The Road is Open!

It was a pre-hurricane type experience to go to the grocery store here.  There was no bread or milk available nor was there any fresh produce.  No supplies can come in to town and the hotels and restaurants are worried about running out of supplies.

The roads were opened today as far as  Lake Louise and out to Golden.  People are taking the long route around back to Vancouver. Calgary is flooded and 23 surrounding communities have been evacuated.   Breland and I discussed going out toward the west and then taking the Cassiar Highway up to Alaska but that is a rough highway at the best of times and we don't have information about the conditions of the roads leading to the Cassiar.  We decided to stay put for now and spend our day in Lake Louise. 

It was a beautiful day there.  The sun was out and the day was very warm.  We ate at the Fairmont.  The view from our table was absolutely incredible. Bre had the Bison Rueben, made quite differently from a standard Rueben.  Buffalo, pickled red cabbage and melted Brie on a hearty rye bread.  See the photo below. 

Preschoolers Field Trip to See the Flooded River

A view to the south from our camping spot

A bridge to allow wildlife to cross the road safely

View from our dinner table

Bre's Bison Reuben

This train is on its way to haul freight through a tunnel that spirals INSIDE of a mountain

Some more of the train

Kayaking on a flooded creek

Sandbagging the library

Elk calf

By 6:00 p.m. the towns of Banff and Lake Louise had lost all electricity.  It didn't come on until the next morning.  I am getting tired of Banff.

6/23/2013

Highway 93N is open!  The mudslides have been cleared and there is little damage to the roadbed.  We could now head on to Jasper to continue our journey toward Alaska.  To get to Jasper we first had to cross the Icefield Parkway. The glaciers along the parkway are enormous.  There was still quite a bit of repair and road construction going on along the route.  At two spots bighorn sheep blocked the roadway. 

We are camping in Jasper for two nights.  There are many elk in the campground  and most cows have new little calves.

Wild rose

Parked by the Weeping Wall

Sunset in Jaspar

Icefield Parkway

Waterfall on the Parkway

A bus on it's way to the Columbia Glacier

Flooding in Calgary and Banff

Crossing the border was a painless experience.  Breland says that keying our passports into the border computers must come up with "Boring Old People".  We don't carry alcohol, tobacco or firearms and have all of our papers ready.  It took less than a minute to stop and be waved on.  Despite the weather reports the drive was pleasant, only slightly overcast.  We drove through a hundred miles of cattle country, rolling pastures and barns as far as the eye could see.  

The freeway ran right through Calgary.  I wish I could figure out a way to get around that city.  There's always a lot of traffic and a light rain was falling.  Breland handled the frequent stops well. 

The rain got heavier as we rode toward Banff.  The only wildlife we saw along the way were several coyotes. 

The Tunnel Mountain Trailer Court is one of the many national campgrounds in the Banff area.  We pulled in and were given our choice of a back-in in the full hookup area or a pull-through water and electric only.  We chose the pull-through for three nights.

That turned out to be a mistake.  It rained all night and the next day and by noon we found all that we couldn't go anywhere for a while.  The Trans-Canada highway, the only route through Banff, had washed out in several places on both sides of Banff.  An unprecedented amount of rain mingled with the melting snow and flooded rivers to Calgary and Lethridge and back to Crowsnest Pass.    The rivers were roaring and there were slides that blocked the roads.  18 communities were evacuated by the night of June 20. 

We went into town and I was struck by the large number of tour buses in town.  All of those people were stuck here with us.  It is Thursday and the rains are supposed to continue until Saturday.  The Spray River runs through town and is out of it's banks already.  I wonder if the town of Banff will begin to flood.  We are camped on a hill right in between two large mountains.  I feel that we are relatively safe.  The ranger at the entrance to the campground told us we will be informed right away if Banff floods.

We came into town again today, Friday June 21, to post. It is still raining.   The town is showing more signs of flooding.  The water is only one half block away from the library.  A road toward Vancouver has been opened and is the only one out of town.  We may extend longer here in hopes that the Icefield Parkway will open soon that we can continue our journey north.
Today might be a good day to stock up with milk and bread.  We have a month's worth of food in the motorhome, a very full tank of diesel and a fair amount of propane.  The campground has 30 watt hookups so we have been able to run the electric heaters instead of propane.  We will be warm, dry and comfortable.  I am just anxious to continue our trip north!

Meadows and Mountaintops

At the southeastern end of Glacier National Park there is a ranger station and a campground popular with horse riders.  It is 19 miles to the entrance for that campground from St. Mary and then 7 miles over a very dusty unpaved road.  I wanted a quiet day today and thought this would be perfect.

There were the usual herds of horses on the roadway.  Montana's open range policy can provide a challenge at times.  I had to wait for quite a while for the herd to move off of the highway.

The road was perfect.  Dusty, bumpy and almost totally empty of cars.  I could hear birds singing the entire way.  The meadows were filled with wildflowers, red, yellow, white, pink, lavender and blue stretching as far as the eye could see.  

Clark didn't like today's ride either.  The roads were too bumpy for him.  I should have left him back in the camper.

The road to the campround is winding and steep