Wednesday morning, we stopped by Costco for additional shopping and then left Anchorage and drove 96 miles to Hicks Creek Campground at Milepost A96.6 on the Glenn Highway. We were originally heading for Matanuska Glacier State Recreation Site, but we'd stopped at Hicks Creek for a break and decided to spend the night in their campground. Hicks Creek offers horseback trail riding and pack trips and they had some of their horses tied out -- two of them had foals so we enjoyed watching them while we were eating our ice cream.
Snack & nap time
(the foal in the foreground was only 6 days old)
We left Hicks Creek Thursday morning and drove 92 miles to Northern Nights RV Park in Glennallen, stopping first at Matanuska Glacier.
Matanuska Glacier:
According to The Milepost, "Matanuska Glacier heads in the Chugach Mountains and trends northwest 27 miles. Some 18,000 years ago the glacier reached all the way to the Palmer area (some 59 miles). The glacier's average width is 2 miles; at its terminus it is 4 miles wide. The glacier has remained fairly stable the past 400 years. At the glacier terminus meltwater drains into a stream which flows into the Matanuska River."
We had not originally planned on staying in Glennallen; however, my throat was really sore so we stopped at the Cross Road Medical Center in Glennallen where I saw a doctor and was tested for strep throat. Fortunately, it was not strep throat; unfortunately, they couldn't do anything for me so I ended up just purchasing some stronger throat lozenges and tea especially for the throat (it has licorice and Slippery Elm in it).
Friday morning, we left Glennallen and traveled 93 miles to Blueberry Lake State Recreation Site, about 24 miles north of Valdez. Along the way, we stopped at the Pipeline Interpretive Viewpoint and Worthington Glacier State Recreation Site.
Transalaska Pipeline:
Worthington Glacier:
From The Milepost: "The pipeline runs 800 miles from Prudhoe Bay on the Arctic coast to the ice-free seaport of Valdez on Prince William Sound. Travel time for crude oil from Prudhoe's Pump Station No. 1 to the Valdez terminal is 8.6 days, with more than 9 million barrels of oil in the pipeline at any given time. During this time, the oil crosses 13 bridges, including a box-girder bridge across the Yukon River, 44 roads, and lands owned by federal, state, borough and city governments, private owners and owner companies. It passes through approximately 579 crossings designed to permit access for large animals, chiefly caribou. It winds through 3 major mountain ranges, with its highest point at Atigun Pass (4,739 ft.), in the Endicott Mountains, 170 miles south of Prudhoe Bay."
Saturday morning, we drove into Valdez for breakfast and then did shopping and site seeing, including a tour through the Valdez Museum where they had a wonderful exhibit of local quilts as well as exhibits explaining the impact of the gold rush, the 1964 earthquake, the construction of the pipeline, and the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill cleanup. The trip into Valdez takes one through Keystone Canyon where there are some spectacular waterfalls:
Bridal Veil Falls:
Horsetail Falls:
Keystone Canyon:
On Sunday, we took another trip into Valdez, this time driving out to the pipeline terminus. There is a bronze sculpture commemorating the men and women who built the Trans-Alaska Pipeline. It consists of 5 figures representing various crafts and skills employed in the construction project. We also stopped at a turnout beside the Robe River to watch the spawning salmon and a mother duck with one lone chick.
Unfortunately, although we did see a lot of interesting things in Valdez, the scenery wasn't one of them. While not always raining, the weather was overcast all the time and we never did get a good look at the beautiful mountains surrounding the town. And Blueberry Campground, which is at a higher elevation than Valdez, was shrouded in fog and clouds most of the time.
Bronze sculpture:
Spawning Salmon:
Mama duck & chick:
Loon on Blueberry Lake:
On Monday, July 30, we traveled 111 miles to the Gakona Alaska RV Park in Gakona where we spent a couple of days catching up on laundry. On the way to Gakona, we stopped in Copper Center for lunch and then went out to dinner at Gakona Lodge.
Wednesday morning, we left Gakona and drove 118 miles to the Sourdough Campground in Tok where we'd stayed back in June on our way into Alaska. The day had started out foggy and cloudy again; however, the weather did clear up the farther away we got from Valdez and we were able to catch a glimpse of Mt. Drum in the Wrangell Mountains:
Mt. Drum:
Before we got to Tok, we stopped at a turnout along the Tanana River where we could see the Mentasta Mountains. This mountain range, together with the Nutzotin Mountains, form the eastern end of the Alaska Range.
Tanana River and Mentasta Mountains:
Earl and I stopped and washed our rig before setting up at the Tok campground which, as we later learned, was a big waste of time and money. We were warned that the Alaska Highway east of Tok was undergoing repairs and that the road was really rough (we'd missed this section of the highway earlier because we'd gone up to Dawson City and traveled the Top of the World and Taylor Highways into Tok).
On Friday, August 3, we left Tok and traveled 163 miles to the Lake Creek Yukon Government Campground at Milepost DC1118.8 of the Alaska Highway. This is a very nice campground with spaces big enough for our rigs. There was also split wood provided so we were able to have a nice campfire going.
After crossing the border into Yukon, we stopped in Beaver Creek to see Our Lady of Grace mission, built in 1961 from a salvaged Quonset hut left over from highway construction days:
Our Lady of Grace Mission:
We also caught sight of a moose eating in one of the many ponds:
Saturday morning, we left Lake Creek Yukon Government Campground and headed out for Kathleen Lake Campground in Kluane National Park, a distance of 154 miles.
This is where we ran into the construction we'd been told about. And it was a mess -- the worst we'd run into yet, including during our trip in 1998! Southeast of Kluane Lake, we hit mile after mile of MUDDY roads -- and I don't mean just a little bit of mud -- I mean a WHOLE LOT of mud! We were absolutely filthy by the time we got to the campground, and we had so much mud up underneath the fifth wheel that we weren't able to get the slide out. And the mosquitoes were terrible here! All in all, not a good day!
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