British Columbia and the Yukon Territory

Left Kamloops with John and Mary and traveled to Williams Lake for the first night. Beautiful country along the way....

After traveling through Prince George, with a stop for beer, we headed on just past Lake McLeod and stayed at one of the beautiful Provincial Parks.

After a sleepless night worrying about fuel (Alan not me, I slept like a baby) we headed out and found gas 5 miles past the park. Off for Dawson Creek and the beginning of The Great Alaska Highway. Along the way we saw our first black bear and our first moose.

Along the way we stopped in Chetwynd to see all the wood carvings. They were spectacular......

Made it to Dawson Creek and settled into Northern Lights RV Park....still lots of rain. The next afternoon we went into the town to look around and get pictures of Mile Marker "0"...the start of the Alaskan Hwy.

Saturday, June 15th....Took off north again and along the way John blew a tire. We unhooked the trailer and Mary and I headed down the road to get cell coverage and call the tow truck. By the time we got back the guys had the spare on and were ready to head down the road again, only about a 1 1/2 hour delay.

At this point we can't believe how many RV's there are on the road. Every make, size, shape, and color...they are every where.

Made it to Fort Nelsen and stayed at the Triple "G" Hideaway RV Park so John could get his tire fixed on Monday.

Had a great Father's Day's Brunch at the restaurant at the RV park then went over to the Fort Nelson Heritage Museum. Lot's of old stuff............the curator was this old guy with a long white beard down to his knees. Very friendly....we found him asleep in one of the old cars as we toured the old car garage.

Monday June 17 After getting John's tires and a little shopping we were off for Toad Lake and arrived around 2:30 p.m. Wow...what a great place. After getting settled Alan took off to take some pictures between the rain drops and I was lying down after running into the trailer with my head....Mary came running over to get me to see Mr. Moose. We watched him for an hour....he was gorgeous, if you can call a moose gorgeous.

We also got to see a mother black bear with her three cubs along the way and there were lots of ducks and a huge beaver dam at Toad River....although it was raining we decided to stay another day just to watch all the wildlife.

We had a great spot right on the lake. I could sit at my back windows and just watch for hours. The next morning I woke early and while I was making breakfast I looked out my back window and there was my moose....what a great way to start the morning.

The whole river/lake was beautiful...later in the day Alan caught a moose swimming across the lake and Mary and I had fun watching the beavers.

Next stop Liard Hot Springs....along the way we had beautiful scenery, again, and saw lots of animals...just after Toad River we saw some caribou (a little hard to see in the picture)

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Another moose then Lake Muncho and some wild sheep. The lake was beautiful, that beautiful color it gets when "glacier flour" is present.

After leaving the lake and before the hot springs we saw a heard of bison (learned just recently we do not have buffalo in north America only bison, buffalo are found in places like Africa, I've always called them buffalo..oh well). Anyway, it was a heard of about 30 some on both sides of the road. There were a least a dozen calves and to our surprise they looked just like other calves, couldn't really see the bison in them yet. Wish there was a wider spot in the road to watch them, they were great to see. One female bison was lying down and really panting, looked as if she were getting ready to have a calf.

Liard Hot Springs was a great spot. Beautiful camp site and the hot springs were wonderful. They have a nice changing area set up and a long boardwalk to get into them. It was getting close to the end of our time with Mary and John so we enjoyed sitting in the hot springs and playing Mexican train in the evenings.

Friday, June 21st Off to Watson Lake and the Yukon Territory....along the way John took us on a side trip to see a waterfall. The waterfall was very pretty but the road in was a bit narrow and bouncy with fallen trees to avoid along the way. Leave it to John.....

After the water fall we saw another moose and some wild horses...then we finally made the Yukon Territory.

There was only one RV park open and it was like a giant gravel parking lot with poles and hook ups but we got a couple spots along the fence with a little more space and settled in. On Saturday we went over to "The Sign Forrest."

Back when the Alaska Hwy was being built in 1942 a homesick U.S. Army G.I., Carl K. Lindley of Danville, Il., Company D, 341st Engineers erected a sign pointing the way and stating the mileage to his hometown. Since then everyone passing through has added to his first sign.

After the Sign Forrest we headed over to the Northern Lights Center. We sat in a big theater but the seats were in a reclined position and the movie presentation was on the ceiling....the first half was about the solar system and the

second half was about the northern lights. We spent the last night with John and Mary with another beautiful midnight sunset and said our goodbyes the next morning. We stayed another night in Watson Lake. Got the trailer cleaned, laundry done, and some grocery shopping done with extremely high prices. The next morning we headed up the road enjoying more beautiful scenery.

Along the way we found Rancheria Falls. A lovely little walk and break to two small water falls.

Found a nice little camp ground on Teslin Lake and called Jane and John to let them know we would wait there for them to catch up. We booked a space for 2 nights and settled in to wait. After dinner I noticed a rig that looked very familiar and it was Jane and John....we were surprised but pleased they had finally caught up....watch out Alaska here we come.

Our final days in the Yukon Territory and Alaska to follow.......................