Day 43: Fairbanks to Yukon (Somewhere between Beaver Creek and Destruction Bay)

In Which We Begin the Day Out of Season, Retrace Some Steps, and End the Day Completely Dead

The End of the Alaska Highway in Delta Junction, AK
(Our beginning for the trip back home)

And, that is why this post is late.   Because dead means pre-industrial era cabin—No Phone, No Wireless, No TV but there is electricity.  So I can write this, but will have to wait to post it until our first stop for gas in Destruction Bay (where there is a strong phone signal, and thus the ability to post this blog) on our way to Haines, AK—Back in the USA.

We are definitely getting out of Alaska just in time.  This morning we woke to find that M’s windows had frosted over.

Bob Makes the Most of M’s Frost Covered Rear Window

And, when we hit Delta Junction—the official end of the Alaska Highway (Alcan)—we found that the Visitor Center was closed for the season.  

Delta Junction is Closed for the Season—at least the Visitor Center, but I think perhaps the entire town

So, no end of Alcan Highway T-shirt for Bob.  However, we were able to take pictures of everything outside the Visitor Center, including the big Alcan Highway endpoint pole shown in the main picture.

There was also an Alaska Pipeline display here, with which Bob obligingly posed.

Bob with Delta Junction Pipeline Passageway Sign

Pig – you decide whether it is Bob or the big pipe cleaner (Zippy This One is For You)

From Fairbanks to Delta Junction to Tok, AK was new ground for us—and you’ll see that portion of the drive in a video for tomorrow’s post. 

However, we just couldn’t wait for this one snippet—it is now Moose season so they appear to be hanging out on the side of the road where hunters are not permitted to shoot them.  We saw these two little guys with their mother, as well as another mother with her two calves in another spot along the road.

We had driven the Alcan from the Canadian border to Tok on the way over, and we retraced the same ground in the opposite direction today.  However, with autumn in full swing it was a far different drive. Here are a couple of pictures from the Tetlin National Wildlife Preserve Visitor Center—which was our first stop on the Alaska Highway in Alaska and our last stop on the Alaska Highway in Alaska too. (Haines is not on the Alcan.)

Here are some pictures from today:

(Patriotic M—though she prefers the red in red, white, and blue)

View from the observation deck at the Tetlin National Wildlife Reserve Visitor Center in Autumn

See Day 20 for pictures from when we first arrived.

Driving from there south was all loose gravel, bumps, frost heaves, and construction.  Bob took the border crossing this time, and we sailed right through.  He chalks it up to his smooth demeanor while I think it was probably because a U-Haul ripe for a full body search was waiting behind us.

We stopped for the night in the middle of nowhere on the Alcan again—not even in a town.  Just a  French Bakery /motel halfway between Beaver Creek and Destruction Bay.  Clearly we stopped for the bakery and not the location, which as noted earlier is completely dead to the modern world.  But, the owners are truly French so we have high hopes for breakfast in the morning.

--Lisa

MORNING UPDATE

Bob says the breakfast crepe and blueberry tart were excellent, and the free coffee was great too.  We met someone in the parking lot who had stayed in Destruction Bay and wished he had stayed where we did.  So, Bob is vindicated.

This is indeed being posted from the restaurant in Destruction Bay, where we are having a snack and enjoying a strong cell signal—which enables this posting, about half a day late.

Bob is actually letting me drive today, so more from Haines tonight.