Canada is a b-i-g country. It’s just shy of 1,500 miles to drive from Revelstoke in British Columbia to Whitehorse in the Yukon Territory. No way we wanted to do that over a weekend, so we took the Friday off to give us a bit of breathing room and braced ourselves for a lorra lorra driving.
Getting a few miles in on Thursday evening gave us a head start. We started with a stunning drive through Glacier and Yoho National Parks and made it just before dark to Banff National Park in heavy rain.
The planned side trip to Lake Louise in the morning was blown out, we figured we wouldn’t see much with the low cloud and the rain in the dark. But as it started to clear, we were reminded that the drive along the Icefields Parkway from Banff to Jasper has to be one of the most stunning routes anywhere.
Driving, driving, driving. With a few coffee and biscuit stops along the way.
My 7,000 steps a day continued to motivate me to get out and about during some breaks. This particular one started as a moose mission and ended by finding an abandoned camper trailer, and getting the hell out of there in case there was a dead body. Oh, and there was no moose.
The sky morphed from moody swirling mist patches into fluffy British clouds and blue sky. I guess it’s fitting as we were at the same longitude as the UK.
600 miles after leaving Revelstoke, we rolled into Dawson Creek on Friday evening.
Dawson Creek is otherwise known as Mile 0, because it’s the start of the AlCan, or Alaska Canada highway. Originally built in 1942 in just eight months, due to wartime emergency, I think it’s come a long way since then. Huge milestone for us as it cemented our ‘destination Alaska’, which we never thought would be an option for us this year.
Day one on the Alcan started with some banal farmland – bales of hay, fields of cows and horses. I think I expected to be immediately thrust into the wilderness. As time passed, the scenery did start to get more rugged, and we went through the tiny town of Wonowon. Took us a while to realize it was so called because it was at Mile 101.
Some awesome scenery as our drive took us past the Northern Rocky Mountains Provincial Park and through Stone Mountain and Muncho Lake Provincial Parks. The scenery kept on giving, although some bits were a tad obscured by the rain spattered windscreen. Hopefully we’ll get to see some of those on the way back.
You’ve got to keep your eyes peeled for wildlife all the time. Light on good pics but we actually did see deer, elk, bighorn sheep, moose and bear.
By late afternoon on Saturday, we rolled into Liard Hot Springs Park campsite and took the last spot. Hot stinky soak in the drizzle, don’t mind if we do!
As always, so nice to get back and cozy in the Basecamp, with a glass of red and a chickpea chorizo stew bubbling on the stove.
Sunday morning, it was barely light as we set off on the road again. We ran straight into a big herd of bison. Including some frisky little ones that got distracted playing and had to run to catch up the ever moving herd.
The next milestone was entering the Yukon. Proper northern Canada now.
And a few more scenic stops along the way:
And then perhaps the most famous milestone on the Alcan – the Sign Post Forest at Watson Lake. Very cool. It was started in 1942 by a homesick GI and has been added to ever since. It now expands over a few acres. I wonder if our backyard tin tacker display is destined for something similar.
So yes, we had our fair share of wet weather as we made our way north through Canada. But the closer we got to Whitehorse, the clearer and bluer the sky became. We rolled into Whitehorse, Yukon, to end our Alcan road trip weekend in such an awesome boondocking spot overlooking Long Lake.
We’ll be doing Whitehorse on the way back as well, so we’ll skip that for now and the next post will jump straight into the next driving leg to get us to Anchorage, ALASKA!!!