Sunday morning and first order of business was to get
RV site reservations for Haines. I had read it was best to have reservations for around July 4th. I was pleasantly surprised it wasn’t an issue to get a
space with flexible dates (needed because we didn't know when we would be leaving). We tried to get on the Haines
to Skagway Ferry, but they don’t make the RV reservations on-line. The 800 number they tell you to call is
an 8-5, business hours only service.
Fortunately, Shirley at the RV park gave us the local telephone number and the hours to call on
the weekend. That information
helped a lot; we now have a ferry reservation for July 5th and will be in Haines July 2nd - 5th.
It is 15 miles from Haines to Skagway over the water, but it
is 359 miles by land. We pay a
premium as a WIDE vehicle. It
would be less expensive to pay for the fuel, but we thought it would be a fun
experience. David figured out how
to move the mirrors in, so we don’t have to pay the EXTRA WIDE vehicle
fee. We are really close to the
maximum, and hope we don’t go over the limit with their measuring devices. I was tempted to just pay the higher
fee, just so we don’t have to move the mirrors.
Filled up with fuel in Tok. This is our 63rd travel day and only our 9th
fuel stop. I so enjoy having a
large tank. We only stopped today
because we are leaving Alaska and the $4.399 a gallon is probably the best fuel
price we will see in awhile.
David has a chronic problem filling the tank without diesel
splashing back. He has tried
filling it extra slow, not filling to the top, all without success. I had been looking for ideas (on rv forums) and suggested to him it
was a venting problem. He decided
to try taking off both fill caps (we have one on each side), thinking that
would vent the tank. The station
had the large nozzle for trucks, which fills faster than standard pumps. He used it and had no diesel
escape. Guess he’ll continue with
this technique until he figures how where the vent is blocked.
We took off with the idea of taking three days to get the
approximately 440 miles to Haines. With their roads, this was a reasonable goal.
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| Gravel ahead! |
We took off with the idea of taking three days to get the
approximately 440 miles to Haines. With their roads, this was a reasonable goal.
We enjoyed a visit to the Tetlin National Wildlife
Refuge. Things are all about
birds. There was a volunteer on
duty, whom was particularly welcoming and friendly.
This area is a major bird migration route. They’ve got a beautiful log constructed
center and large deck/observation point.
The place looks so fresh it is hard to believe it was built 25 years
ago.
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 |
| It even has a sod roof. |
Along the road they seem to have problems keeping the
telephone poles straight.
The border crossing stations are about 20 miles apart. There is a nice place to stop at the
actually border (which comes before the Canada immigration stop). We had some fun standing in different
countries. No fence at this
border.
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| Trees are cut to show the border location. |
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We were a bit stressed about crossing back into Canada. Took some extra time cleaning and
organizing so if they searched again, I would have things we wanted to take out
in easy reach (and with a bag to carry them). This crossing was a piece of cake. No line. They
have you stop at a stop sign and wait, I assume so they can run the plate. On the wave, we move up to the
window. This officer’s questions
made sense, so no thinking involved.
I made a point of switching to regular glasses, so I wasn’t wearing
sunglasses. Last time, when we got
inside they made me take my dark glasses off.
Anyhow, we were on our way quickly, at least as quickly as
you can go on these roads. Some of
the really bad gravel parts we were only doing 12-15 mph. On the better parts I tried to hold it
at 35 mph, but a couple spots were deceptive and caused us to bottom out
something up front. Fortunately we
never dragged the motorcycle rack.
Sometimes it was nice to go slow. I was able to take a couple quick shots of this tundra
swan. At first all I saw was the
white body. I had time to get the
window open and camera out before it raised its head. I think the brown is just from the muck it was digging in.
I saw a couple of bears later, but they were to quick for me to
get their picture. It looked like
a couple young grizzlies frolicking as they came through the vegetation. It was like they suddenly saw the cars
and bolted back through the high plants.
Our goal for Sunday was to make it at least to Beaver Creek. We met another interesting person at
the Beaver Creek Visitor Center. Sid greeted us with a hand shake and welcome. He posed for
me with his 1937 Rollfast bicycle.
His son restored it for his 75th birthday, since they were
both “born” in 1937. It was Sid’s
1950’s Pontiac we parked next to in the lot too. He said they make good conversation starters at the visitor center.
The main attraction in town for us is the little church built from a
salvaged Quonset hut. We had to
walk across the street to the hotel to get a key to enter. The desk clerk just hands it to
us. No sign up sheet or deposit
required. They still hold services
here, but only once a month.
The hotel had some sort of rendezvous show. One of the showgirls was outside
watching the tour bus luggage get unloaded. It looked festive, but didn’t really appeal to us. The RV park in town wasn’t to
attractive either. They had wifi,
but you had to sit at the office area again. I have bites all over and needed a break. I “fed” the mosquitoes in Tok…but felt
the Beaver Creek ones could limit themselves to what they got the short time we
were there. Besides, I had a great audio novel I was listening to and
preferred to get back to it.
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The audio books tend to put David to sleep.
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| This is why he missed the bears. |
It was after 7:00pm when I saw a rest stop at Pickhandle
Lake and decided to take a dinner break.
We were quite surprised when we saw the bicycling couple from
Switzerland (we first met Samuel & Flurina June 10th). They were taking a meal break, but said
they were going to push on because they were concerned about the bears in this
area. We sat and had dinner
together. The first time our
folding chairs had been taken out on this trip.
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| The log part was shaky. David was a bit tentative to go on the ramp with the missing slats. |
I was again entertained watching these other folks taking
the boat out of the water. Do you
see the angle of the trailer? The
lake area was beautiful; terrific place for kayaks.
After visiting awhile with Samuel & Flurina, we invited
them to stay in the motorhome with us for the night. They had their own sleeping bags, towels etc, so it wasn’t too
difficult. We went to bed earlier
than we would have, but it was interesting just spending the night where we
were. No time to work on the blog
with company. No wifi tonight
anyway.
It was fun to visit with them. Lets us remember back when we thought bicycle touring was
fun (*smile*). It must be a good
way to learn the language. Their
English had improved from when we first met them. They tell us our mh wouldn’t fit on the Switzerland
roads. They really enjoyed the
comfort and the break from their tent.
They are heading south the same route we are. It would be funny if we encountered them again. With all the various places to stop
here, it was a real fluke.
They plan to be in San Diego in October, so hopefully they
give us a call. It brings back
memories of when we rode our bicycles from San Francisco to La Mesa. We met a couple of guys on the trip
that were also heading south. They
were doing more sightseeing than we were, but we picked them up in San Diego
and helped box their bikes for shipping home.
We had gotten bike boxes for them from Darwin and we took them and their
bikes to the airport.
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