A beautiful red fox sauntered through our site at 4:15am and the dogs went nucking futs. It was light enough to see the animal clearly. Another fox had sauntered through earlier.
The dogs looked so comfortable in the van. Sadie was sharing my foam pillow and pad with me and was facing me as I awoke. Instead of grabbing a book to read in silence, I just stared back at her, remembering the moment. I did plenty of staring at Sara and Sammy when we'd camp in the foothills...
I didn't get them up for our morning walk until 8:20am. We took the Millenial Trail toward the dam and walked up the hill for an overview of the Schwatka lake, a reservoir created by daming the Yukon. The trail was very sandy. Lupines and crocuses bloomed up here. We circled the hilltop and returned the way we came back to our site, where people were now breaking camp. This was an easy two-mile morning walk. There are plenty of trails available from near the dam. The one up Grey Mountain looks like a cold hike up Mount Katahdin in Maine.
I was hungry and headed to Tim Horton's again for coffee and a sausage-cheese sandwich. The place was crowded. There was a table of loquacious First Nation people across from me. I'm really liking the coffee. What I like about the dining area in all the stores I have been in is that there are USB ports and AC outlets by every table.
Now it's time to gas up and .continue toward Beaver Creek on the Alaska/Yukon border. Weather is overcast again. In Whitehorse at 10am it's 6C and should reach a high of 13C.
The road going north from Whitehorse quickly became rough. The surface was more gravelly with faint yellow lines dividing the lanes. The shoulders were 3/4 wide. The mountains faded out to more rolling hills studded with pines. This was true wilderness. Sixty miles away from Whitehorse I saw my first grizzly bear. At 200 miles I saw my second. Both bears skirted the forest line and disappeared back into the forest when they noticed me.
The drive west from Whitehorse to Haines Junction wasn't that spectacular, but the views then quickly opened up as I approached the Kluane Preserve. Here lie Canada's tallest peaks. The valley opened up with glacial slides and mud flats. This was an area worth exploring more, but the sky opened with fog and rain for the rest of the day. The rivers became wider, the hillsides more eroded but it was a landscape worth admiring for its ruggedness. People wanting to hike these snow-capped peaks would have to travel out of their way to get to them.
At one point I pulled over along the Donjek river, another wide glacial slide with a view west toward the peaks, but opted instead to continue on toward the border. I was now getting anxious to get this drive over with. Beaver Creek didn't offer much besides a place to park so I continued on toward Tok, the first town in Alaska. I drove into town just at 10pm as the diners were closing.
I was relieved to be in Alaska. Now I just had one final push to the Anchorage-Knik-Seward area. I ended up parking behind the convenience store and a nap turned into an overnight stay. I had driven 404 miles.
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