Hallelujah.......Tok at last!

We passed through customs back into the US this afternoon and arrived at Tok, “the main street of Alaska” about 4 p.m. (ADT). Everything you have heard about the Alcan Highway is true. We crept along mile after mile with broken to nonexistent pavement, swells, potholes, and frost heaves. Very rarely we would pass, or be passed by, a fellow sufferer.  That is why Tok is such a happy place. Everybody is just so glad to GET here!

In the Yukon and Alaska the roads are so few that they are not referred to by their numbers but by their names. The Cassiar, the road we came up on, is not just a way to get from A to B, it is an experience. Like the Blue Ridge Parkway or Going to the Sun Highway, it is staggeringly beautiful and full of history. The awfulness of the road itself is readily acceptable because it is so scenic. The section of the Alcan that we did had some wonderful views but fewer opportunities to pull off and was more tedious.

We camped at Dease Lake on the Cassiar, mostly a gravel parking lot with RV sites. When we left we filled our extra gas can for the first time. On the Alcan we camped south of Whitehorse on a lake that was so high some of the sites were in the lake.  Last night we were at one of the prettiest campground ever, right on Kluane Lake at Destruction Bay. Our site was about four feet above the water with a fabulous view of Kluane National Park.  Kluane Lake is as beautiful as Tahoe with turquoise water surrounded by mountain peaks.

Tonight we are in a spruce grove in a place much like a state park. We have a very private site and an excellent place to walk Percy. We also have secure internet and cell phone service. The sun will set at 11:43 and will rise at 3 am.

I may sound as if all we do is drive but that isn’t wholly true. We leave whenever we feel like it and stop often. We stop in late afternoon and have long evenings to enjoy our surroundings. We see museums, visitor’s centers and historical markers along the way. The only thing we don’t do is laundry and that is getting to be a problem!  Off to Valdez tomorrow.