Alaska Highway Roadtrip 2011
At the beginning of 2011, I received the mother of all "offers you can't refuse". Would I be prepared to do a couple of weeks guiding on a wilderness lake in the Yukon, then drive a luxury 4x4 from Whitehorse in the Yukon to Tisdale in Saskatchewan?! The offer came courtesy of Wes & Michelle Walker, who own and run the lodge on Wolf Lake and live in Tisdale. Georgina, my partner, joined me for the whole trip, so we were able to share the experience of meeting good people and being awestruck at the spectacular scenery and wildlife we saw along the way.
The guiding part of the trip had me heading out in a boat each morning, searching the lake for lake char and the river for arctic grayling, then providing the lodge's guests with locations and tactics around lunchtime, or earlier if I found fish quickly. After dinner, I'd take a guest out in a boat to try for a big lake char during the softer light between 8 and midnight. I now understand why so many of the fishing guides I have met over the years truly enjoy helping a fellow angler catch fish. It's a real buzz to see the happiness on people's faces when they succeed. Of course it doesn't always work out as you would hope - but I can honestly say that the Canadians and Americans with whom I fished never once complained about slow sport, lost fish, the weather (it was cold and wet at times), or anything else. I'd do it again in a heartbeat!
The guiding part of the trip had me heading out in a boat each morning, searching the lake for lake char and the river for arctic grayling, then providing the lodge's guests with locations and tactics around lunchtime, or earlier if I found fish quickly. After dinner, I'd take a guest out in a boat to try for a big lake char during the softer light between 8 and midnight. I now understand why so many of the fishing guides I have met over the years truly enjoy helping a fellow angler catch fish. It's a real buzz to see the happiness on people's faces when they succeed. Of course it doesn't always work out as you would hope - but I can honestly say that the Canadians and Americans with whom I fished never once complained about slow sport, lost fish, the weather (it was cold and wet at times), or anything else. I'd do it again in a heartbeat!
After leaving Wolf Lake and picking up Wes's superb 4x4, we decided to make the detour he had recommended and drive due south from Whitehorse, down the Klondike Highway, to Skagway, Alaska. Navigation is not my strong point, so I contrived to get us lost on the roads around Whitehorse before finding the Klondike Highway. Our first view of this famous road, which runs roughly parallel to the route used by prospectors during the Gold Rush of 1898, was wonderful - a seemingly long, straight, empty road going all the way to Skagway. Of course there were plenty of bends and hills but these only served to emphasise the scenery. We were constantly driving alongside a lake, or through trees, or up & down snow-capped mountains. When we reached Skagway, we checked in at the amusingly named and historic White House and set about exploring. It was evening and our first impressions were of a quiet, slow-paced little town with some interesting old buildings & museums, a disproportionate number of jewellery/fur/craft shops - and some quirky vehicles. Tired from a day's drive, we retired early, planning an early start next morning. Things were pretty quiet until the cruise ships began to arrive. Suddenly, we found ourselves walking the streets with several thousand passengers and for a few hours the place was really crowded - we headed back to the White House for lunch. Later, when things got a little quieter, we chatted to a few of the shopkeepers and discovered that a number of them only live in Skagway during "the cruise ship season".
A heartening footnote to our visit - we were walking back to the truck to continue our road trip when Georgie said that she could not find some expensive jewellery we had bought earlier that day. We got to the truck and found a note from our hosts at the White House attached to the windscreen. They had found the jewellery and realised it belonged to Georgie. They had driven around town hoping to see us but, being unable to find us, had found the truck and left a note. We will return to Skagway for a longer visit someday and we know where we will be staying.
A heartening footnote to our visit - we were walking back to the truck to continue our road trip when Georgie said that she could not find some expensive jewellery we had bought earlier that day. We got to the truck and found a note from our hosts at the White House attached to the windscreen. They had found the jewellery and realised it belonged to Georgie. They had driven around town hoping to see us but, being unable to find us, had found the truck and left a note. We will return to Skagway for a longer visit someday and we know where we will be staying.
We had been lucky enough to see a small black bear as we were heading away from Skagway and Georgie, who had never seen one before, was delighted to get as close as we did. Nothing very clever about it. I spotted the bear, eased the truck to the side of the road and drove very slowly right up to it - the bear ignored us and carried on munching dandelions! We now started to look forward to the wildlife Wes & Michelle had said we would see once we got to the Alaska Highway. Our map suggested that we could save quite a few miles by driving northeast towards Carcross, rather than retrace our route by heading due north towards Whitehorse. Good decision because we saw a bigger black bear, foraging on grasses and dandelions, on the outskirts of Carcross.
We were on the Alaska Highway proper soon after Carcross and reached Teslin Lake late in the day. I had visited Teslin Lake several years ago, flying in on a floatplane to sample the fishing. I remembered it as being extremely long and narrow, an impression gained from fishing its southern end, though not something easily seen from the road, masked as it often is by conifers. We decided to overnight at Dawson Peaks, a lodge situated roughly halfway down the lake. As the image of the lodge suggests, we received a warm welcome; something we noticed time and time again during this road trip. Our cabin was basic but comfortable, the home-cooked meals were excellent and we enjoyed chatting to our host about the history of the lodge and our plans for the next few hundred miles.
We were on the Alaska Highway proper soon after Carcross and reached Teslin Lake late in the day. I had visited Teslin Lake several years ago, flying in on a floatplane to sample the fishing. I remembered it as being extremely long and narrow, an impression gained from fishing its southern end, though not something easily seen from the road, masked as it often is by conifers. We decided to overnight at Dawson Peaks, a lodge situated roughly halfway down the lake. As the image of the lodge suggests, we received a warm welcome; something we noticed time and time again during this road trip. Our cabin was basic but comfortable, the home-cooked meals were excellent and we enjoyed chatting to our host about the history of the lodge and our plans for the next few hundred miles.
We left Dawson Peaks straight after breakfast, hoping to reach the Northern Rockies Lodge, where we had booked a room, by early evening. Our route took us through Watson Lake, situated just inside the Yukon/British Columbia boundary. We stopped off at the "signpost forest" and had an early lunch. It was during the drive from Watson Lake to Muncho Lake and the Northern Rockies Lodge, in British Columbia, that we started to see more wildlife. We saw wood bison and many more black bears, just off the highway, none of them seeming very much concerned at our presence.
We had decided to stay two nights at Muncho Lake so we had a whole day of exploring built into our schedule. We didn't have the best of luck with the weather but even mainly cloudy skies couldn't detract from the spectacular northern Rocky Mountain scenery and wildlife. At times it seemed as though the animals were using the highway more than people. We saw a herd of wood bison, our first view of stone sheep and many more bears. Towards evening, we thought we would take a look at the first part of the next day's drive and, having been told it was only half an hour away, headed for Toad River. More than one hour later, I refused to go any further and turned back towards Muncho Lake. However, Georgie was convinced we should have carried on and persuaded me to turn round and try again. I reluctantly agreed and towards evening we saw a magnificent bull moose. And yes, we did get to Toad River - and I ate humble pie all the way back to Muncho Lake!
Another early morning start as we set out for Toad River. We just had to stop and talk to Banal, who spends several months each year, walking huge distances along the highway, pulling his makeshift cart behind him. The cart contains all he needs to cook, eat and sleep in the open air. Great character! We saw more stone sheep, some caribou and more black bears en route from Toad River to Fort Nelson and some of the scenery would have looked even more spectacular on a brighter day. But the weather was closing in all the time and, though we didn't know it, there was worse to come - much worse!
It was pretty cloudy by the time we got to Fort Nelson but dry enough for us to wander around a vehicle museum and take in some of the interesting cars and trucks on display. From then on, we had rain every day, sometimes all day and it wasn't worth photographing the Rocky Mountain scenery as we travelled through Fort St John and Dawson Creek on our way to Grand Prairie, Alberta. It was raining heavily by the time we got to Grand Prairie and it rained even more as we were leaving after overnighting in a hotel. We were so grateful for Wes's big truck as Alberta experienced some of the worst flooding it had seen and we found ourselves running just ahead of road closures.
In fact, it rained all the way through Alberta to Saskatchewan and we didn't see fine weather until we reached the small town of Spiritwood, just a few miles from Tisdale and the welcoming comfort of Wes and Michelle's home. We could have had better weather as we drove south past the northern Rockies and I did pass up what would have been wonderful scenery and wildlife photographic opportunities on brighter days. But we had such a great time during the early part of the roadtrip that not even the challenge of the Alberta floods could dampen our spirits. The whole thing was a huge adventure. We enjoyed it enormously and hope to do something similar again. Maybe go further north into Alaska at the start of the trip, maybe spend three weeks on the road, maybe hire an RV ........................