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Virginia pulled up by Harvey at 10:00 A.M., and drove them all over Saskatoon. Earl was camped in their fifth wheel at his uncle's house, helping out on his farm.
J and D spent a great day at the Edstrom home, and they ate lunch in a railroad car, part of a restaurant in the old train depot. Virginia drove them back out to the RV park, and they all promised to get back together in Saskatoon on the trip back, if possible.
Next day the Coxes drove to Edmonton, Alberta and stayed at the Glowing Embers RV Park, west of the city. On Sunday and Monday, cab drivers shuttled them back and forth between the RV park and the West Edmonton Mall.
Edmonton faded to a memory in the rear-view memory when they headed west on Canada 16, then on Alberta 43, bound for Dawson Creek, BC. Alaskan Highway Mile Zero in Dawson Creek expressed itself in two commemorative monuments: the mile zero sign beside an old grainery and a circle of flags a block away. Photos snapped, H the RV drug his dusty carcass out to the Northern Lights RV Park.
Not only did the motorhome need 3 days of alternating dust and snow and bug peltings washed off, but it needed cleaning to make way for bug and rock shields. A half hour bath came free with the night's stay, and the lady proprietor didn't complain when Havey required 45 minutes.
The bug screen and the thick plastic rock film (for the headlights and top window) had to be fitted in between periods of a hockey game on TV. The Carolina Hurricanes polished off the Toronto Maple Leafs for the Eastern Division crown and a chance at the Stanley Cup. Griff from the motorhome beside the Coxes, a native of Ontario, helped Johnnie install the film and screen, despite the fact that Raleigh pasted Toronto in the game.
All spic and span from its washing but minus the bug screen - which blew off after only 30 miles - Harvey came to rest at Muncho Lake RV Park.
Delphine posed beside Muncho Lake, in which the winter's ice had cracked and begun washing ashore. Johnnie, familiar with pictures of aquamarine glacier-fed lakes, had not expected the color to show up under the thin ice.
From Muncho Lake, a quick 20-mile ride ended at Laird River Hot Springs. A black bear waddled up to the highway, just before the hot springs, but left the roadside before Delphine could get the camera out.
Having flubbed the bear earlier, they were not about to miss the two sheep which regarded the RV from beside the road to Watson Lake. Sadly though, they watched another bear dart from the road to the woods just prior to Watson Lake.
In the town of Watson Lake, a maze of road signs greeted J and D and any tourist who happened by.
After staying in a dusty RV park in Whitehorse and after breakfast at McDonalds and after a stop at the Whitehorse Walmart, they drove south the next day toward Skagway, Alaska. On the way they stopped in Carcross, Yukon.
Just north of Carcross, Emerald Lake offered Johnnie those greenish glacial colors he found fascinating. Glacial flour - or very fine gravel dust, which is itself grayish white - reflects blue-green light.
Of course, once in Carcross, the opportunity presented itself for Johnnie to pose for a ridiculous jailhouse photo. He did so, not so much as a good sport but just to get it over with.
Why not snap him beside the little historic choo-choo? After all, Delphine posed beside the giant painted goldpan display.
At any rate, when they entered Alaska, Johnnie stood for a more dignified portrait beside the state sign.
The interesting thing about Skagway, the reason tourists started coming, was that it looked much as it did during the gold rush days. Paved streets and electric lights notwithstanding, the buildings hadn't changed in 100 years.
The second night in Skagway, they went to a stage show: The Days of 98 with Soapy Smith. It opened with fake gambling in a made-for-the-occasion casino, and offered Robert Service poems and songs. Then the play expounded the final days of one of Skagways colorful villains.
That night Johnnie and Delphine walked the half mile back to the RV park in a light sprinkle of rain. The rain would not stop more than two hours, wherever they happened to be for the next week.
Pumpi rode out the one hour ferry trip in the RV. She didn't see the cruise ship achored at the dock or rain spraying over the bow or the waterfalls passing to left and right in the straight. She didn't hear the lecture on Haines, Alaska, either. Johnnie almost missed that one also, since he spent much of the passage walking outside in the rain.
Because of the rain, and because the next day was Sunday, the Coxes didn't do anything in Haines except sit at the RV park most of the time. Once on Sunday morning they drove through town, but Haines ain't happening on Sunday.
Monday, June 3rd, they drove back through British Columbia (a little bit) and through the Yukon to Alaska. Delphine posed beside the Yukon sign.
Stopping for lunch in Haines Junction, they photographed a goofy-looking tourist mountain with animal figures sticking out of it. Certainly there was someone somewhere who felt the thing was beautiful art.
Kluane (pronounced clu-WA-nee) Lake, another glacial spill body, provided another excuse to stop and take pictures.
Before they reached Tok, a couple of glaciers slid by in the high mountains to the left. With the sun trying to peek through between rain showers, the clouds over the glaicers glowed much brighter than surrounding features.
While in Tok, they ate at the Gateway Restaurant, almost next door to the RV park. Johnnie had the salmon, which was grilled outside. Great meal. The same long milage days that required an occasional feast for J and D caused Harvey to need oil. The Texaco station across the street filled the bill.
The first place they stopped in most cities was the tourist information center, and that was a logical first stop in Anchorage.
A rental car proved to be a necessity in Anchorage, since the RV park was ten miles north of town. The car allowed them to get to the Anchorage Zoo.
Having looked in vain for a moose, they saw their first one at the zoo in Anchorage. The best show there, however, were the bears. A brown bear and a polar bear have been kept together since they were cubs. The polar bear was shy, and the brown bear was dominant. And a big show-off besides.
Delphine kicked around the idea of going out on a day cruise to see a glacier but decided finally she didn't want to risk getting sick. Besides, about the best glacier viewing around was Exit Glacier near Seward, a flow easily reached by walking.
On the 130 mile trip to Seward, they stopped to get a picture near Beluga Point in Cook Inlet.
Near Seward, they took the road to Exit Glacier. (Exit Glacier exit?) A turnout three miles away provided the setup shot.
For the umteenth time, they used their valuable National Park entrance pass and were soon strolling along the tail to the glacier.
Taking the lower trail first, it took only a few minutes to reach the outwash area, where Delphine stood for the camera. The upper path or Overlook Trail was an easy climb that led along the glacier wall.
Hard to find in the picture, the moose at center frame was their first - to paraphrase Emily Klingman - loose moose. Descending the Overlook Trail after seeing the glacier, J and D stopped on a wooden bridge to watch a mother moose and her calf - hidden in the picture.
It was a good thing for Delphine that Johnnie finally saw the two moose, because he could finally quit saying that Mason Williams poem that had driven her crazy since they'd started the Alaskan Highway more than a week earlier.
Regrettably, the wildlife in Denali were too far away and too few to allow for pictures with the web camera. Delphine took a number of shots, but Johnnie did not get any.
They arrived in Fairbanks on Friday, June 14 and stayed there over a week. The Visitors Center was downtown on First Street.
So, on Monday, J and D got up early and met a tour bus in the RV park at 6:00 A.M. The bus took them to the airport, where they borded a 737 bound for Barrow. Click here to read about Barrow.
A rental car, picked up at the airport after seeing Barrow, came in handy for the rest of the week. J and D managed to drive all over the city, see movies, visit the University of Alaska at Fairbanks, and check out the restaurants.
There's a visitors center for the pipeline just outside town, and they stopped by early in the week.
A highlight of the trip was the Midnight Sun Baseball game. The Goldpanners faced the Victory Dons. Johnnie and Delphine stopped by early to take these photos and pick up some hats and such. (Remember, one of their goals was to by a Panners baseball cap for Susan Negrin, whom they'd met in Phoenix back in April.)
Then there was North Pole, the Alaskan town where local folks addressed their remote location with clever marketing. Fun for Delphine, and Johnnie didn't really complain. About 11 miles from Fairbanks, they traveled over there two or three times.
Leaving Fairbanks on Sunday, June 23rd, they headed south on Route 2, following the Tanana River valley. There's some confusion about where the Alaskan Highway ends - in Delta or in Fairbanks. Whether shots have actually been fired between the chambers of commerse in question is not certain. However, J and D took the requisite photos in both towns so there would be no legal repercussions later, should the issue of Alcan Highway completion arise.
Delta or Delta Junction. A lot of towns in Alaska had 'Junction' on some maps but not on others. Delta usually used it; Tok usually didn't. Delta Junction was just a stop on the way to Tok, where they rested before the arduous gravel road journey to Dawson City the next day.
Actually, it wasn't so bad for a North Carolina boy who drove on gravel roads most of his life. Horror stories had abounded in the RV campgrounds, and, at one point, Johnnie was amazed to see a medium-sized class A RV stopped dead in the road ahead. White knuckles clamped fast to the steering wheel, he waited while Johnnie drove around him on a stretch of dirt road as wide as any normal two-lane blacktop.
One part of the road that was messy, that clogged Harvey's wheel wells and pasted his back window with red mud, ran for 15 un-graveled miles around Chicken, Alaska. Johnnie was about to lament that unsavory syllable that would have mad the town's name self descriptive, until they stopped there.
Just to get out of a light, intermittent rain, they pulled up to a tourist store - about all there was in Chicken - and went inside to talk to a young lady who was working her first summer there. She mentioned a few things about the town's past, and encouraged them to buy a book about Anne Hobbs, an amazing local teacher, and suddenly the place took on more meaning.
Very little traffic ventured out of Tok in the direction of the Yukon that day. Plenty of it came the other way, however, from Dawson down toward Tok. That's why they arrived at the Yukon River ferry in Dawson and wound up third in line, certain of making the next trip. That's why, when J and D counted the compact cars, SUVs, light trucks, dump trucks, semi rigs, fifth wheels, travel trailors and motorhomes on the opposite shore, they had to give up at around 50 where the queue turned the corner.
They drove all the way through town to the Bonanza Gold RV Park, two and a half miles onto the Klondike Highway. From there, they were forced to walk back and forth - about 45 minutes each way. Fortunately, there was a fine gravel path all the way, complete with a steel footbridge attachment to the highway bridge across the the Klondike River.
Walking around Dawson City, Y.T was a treat. The authentic old-western town J and D had looked for and missed in Deadwood, South Dakota lay nestled here at the converging waters of the Yukon River, the Klondike River and Bonanza Creek. Only Front Street along the river was paved, hard-packed gravel and clay with mud-puddle edging being the macadam of choice uphill and elsewhere into the town.
The riverboat on Front Street was dry docked inside the levee with the rest of the town. Hotels, saloons, restaurants and the Gaslight Follies plied their trades behind traditional facades with banks, ice cream parlors and tourist shops.
Walking around Dawson on Tuesday morning, June 25, Delphine located the homes of two famous men, both writers of some note. In the afternoon she pointed out to Johnnie the home of Robert Service (above) and Jack London (below.) Jack London's house was moved here from many miles away some years ago.
No stop in Dawson City would have been complete without visiting an old fashioned dance hall, and Diamond Tooth Girty's was the best in town. Girty herself (or the young lady singing her part) came down from the stage and entertained the folks up close and perhaps a little too personally.
Girty's girls worked the crowds as well between can-can dances on stage. Any man on the main floor considered too old to be a worry sat a ready mark for their attention.
Sadly, we see how Johnnie was regarded.
Thursday, June 24, they headed for Whitehorse, Yukon, snapping a photo of Fox Lake just north of there. Lake Leberge, featured in the most famous Robert Service poem was a little off the beaten path for such a rainy day, unfortunately.
In Whitehorse, buildings often sported a wilderness theme. Along with the fighting moose, there were statues, such as the one below.
J and D walked all the way through Whitehorse to the SS Klondike, which, like the Keno in Dawson City, sat on dry land beside the river. Who were these pilots who kept beaching their paddle-wheelers?
Between Whitehorse and Dawson Creek, heading south, they stopped again at Lake Watson to see the Forest of signs.
Surprisingly, there was a sign they'd missed in Dawson Creek on the way up.
After Dawson Creek, they drove past Edmonton to Vegreville, Saskatchewan. That was the sight of the Ukranian Egg. The Ukranians were a large minority in the area, who had a tradition of decorating eggs in intricate patterns. The giant egg here lists a number of mathematical and design firsts on the plaque at its base.
Johnnie discussed the egg with a Ukranian man, Richard Chenewski, in Yorkton, SK a day later.
After that, J and D got their first opportunity to boondock at a Walmart, as the bottom fell out of the sky in Winnipeg, Manatoba. It rained all day and all night, so much that the paper in Winnipeg next day was filled with flood news and motorists stranded by the waters.
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