EAAE Days 2-4: Cassiar Highway to Kluane National Park

 On 12 July, we set out in convoy to Meziadin Junction and then north toward the Yukon border.  We had a quick stop at Meziadin to gather our bearings.

Our two vehicles ready to roll!

We stopped to inspect the Bob Quinn Memorial Airport - an unserviced airstrip!

Here is a useful reference that we got from the Yukon Tourist Info Centre in Watson Lake on our return journey - a useful guide to stops along the Cassiar Highway!  Click on the images for a larger version.

And we crossed into Yukon, huzzah!

That night we camped for the night at Big Creek Campground adjacent to the Alaska Highway, then next day we pushed on through Teslin and Whitehorse to Kathleen Lake Campground in Kluane National Park.  The terrain changed noticeably once we reached the Alaska Highway, with a big, wide-open valley compared to the narrower valley along the Cassiar Highway.

At Kluane, we were beside the biggest mountains in Canada.  Mt Logan was just beyond the horizon, but these were the mountains we saw:

Typical resident at Kathleen Lake.

We were pretty close to the westernmost point in Canada (the Alaska-Yukon border).

The next day, as Tim and Matt had a rest day and tried to fit in some fishing, Arthur and I took a trip to Whitehorse.  We had a busy day, with only a few photos.  We started with a stop at the laundromat, then we visited the SS Klondike National Historic Site (unfortunately, the ship itself was closed for renos), the Yukon Tourist Information Centre, and met Teresa for lunch at the Klondike Rib and Salmon before a visit to the McBride Museum.  

Yukon River at Whitehorse:

SS Klondike:

McBride Museum:

They even had a cold room (-10C) to impress us delicate southerners :)

Afterwards, we stopped at the supermarket and Canadian Tire to load up on supplies before returning to Kathleen Lake.

EAAE Day 1: Terrace to Stewart via Kitwanga

 Arthur and I flew into Terrace on Friday the 11th of July.  Aileen met us at the airport and took us to her friend's house, where we set up the tent in the back yard.  We had light rain, which was a good test - the tent passed with flying colours!  Arthur and I took the short 15 walk to see the Terrace Wolves art installation at an overlook over the city.

Here is our tent - a 6-person Outbound tent from Canadian Tire.  We were camping in luxury as there were only two of us using it!  Big enough to stand inside so it was much easier to get dressed.  It kept us dry and protected us from mosquitoes and we could set up or tear down the tent in a few minutes.

After spending Friday and Saturday in Terrace, we set off on the Yellowhead Hwy 16 to Kitwanga, where we turned north onto the Cassiar Highway.  Kitwanga and the nearby community of Gitanyow are both famous for totem poles!

Kitwanga poles

Gitanyow poles

Kitwanga is also home to the Gitwangak battle hill, which is the site of an ancient hill fort.  Arthur was particularly taken by the story of the chieftain Nekt and how he got his men to line the top of the hill with heavy, spiked logs.  When his enemies attacked, the defenders would roll the logs down on the warriors struggling their way up the steep slope.

River at the base of the hill:

View from the top of the hill back to the road.

Berries on top of the hill!

We carried on to Meziadin Junction and turned to the west toward Stewart BC.  There were absolutely amazing glaciers coming down toward the valley, such as the Bear Glacier seen here.

We arrived in Stewart, set up our tent and had a good walk around town.  Stewart is lovely, and well worth a longer visit.

Historic marker commemorating the Anglo-Russian treaty of 1825, which established the basis for the border between British North America (Canada) and Russian Alaska.

Traditional main street with historic buildings.

We explored the boardwalk out over the estuary.

And then a delicious meal at El Tostador, a fantastic Mexican restaurant in the Ripley Creek Inn.

And later, we connected with Tim and Matt at the campground :)  Matt is teaching Arthur how to cast his fishing rod behind Tim in his camp chair.

We could already tell we were getting north, as sunset was later than we were used to!  But nonetheless, it was late so we climbed into our sleeping bags for some needed rest.

Epic Arctic Adventure of Epicness Part 2 - The Big Ugly Beast and driving on the Dempster Highway

 My car is a 2015 Nissan Leaf.  It's great for running around town, but I can only drive about 100 km before I need to charge it for 2 h.  So there was no practical chance of me driving a few thousand km to Yukon. And that's before I even consider the issues about driving on the Dempster Highway!  So the first thing I needed to figure out for the EAAE was what vehicle to obtain.

I reached out to the Terrace office of a car rental company in March, at the start of planning for the trip.  We had a back and forth about what vehicle would be best for driving on the Dempster Highway.  The recommendation was for a 1/2 ton 4WD pickup, such as a Ford F150 or GMC Sierra 1500.  I made the reservation on March 19th.  The rental company turned down my offer to make a deposit to secure the booking.  I asked that the truck be provided with a canopy; the request was acknowledged but the half-hearted response made it clear it wasn't a priority for the company.

I reached out again at the beginning of July to confirm the booking, only to be informed that the company didn't have any 1/2 ton trucks and were replacing it with a 1 ton at the same rental rate.  If I new then what I know now, I would have cancelled the reservation.  The F350 Super Duty that the rental company provided turned out to be a poor choice of vehicle for our trip.  

From northern BC and on through Yukon Territory, all the roads up to the start of the Dempster Highway are paved, good quality, all-weather roads, with the exception of a few areas where the road is under construction.  Caveat for all my comments is that we travelled in July during peak tourist season and with the best weather conditions.  I can't comment on how things might change later or earlier in the season!

The Dempster Highway is an unpaved gravel highway, approximately 740 km from just outside Dawson, Yukon to Inuvik, NWT, plus another 150 km from Inuvik to Tuktoyaktuk on the Inuvik-Tuk highway, which was only completed in 2017.  Road quality varies from decent gravel road to extremely poor gravel road.  There are sections with washboarding, deep potholes, soft shoulders and more.  When driving, use the whole road!  I would traverse around potholes, and pay no attention to the centreline except when there was oncoming traffic.

Yukon tourist information centres were extremely helpful throughout our trip.  Here is a scan of an information sheet they provided for the Dempster Highway, with a mileage/km itinerary so we could track the distance to the next significant point of interest!

Based on actually driving on the Dempster, it's my opinion that the best vehicle for us would have been a 4WD SUV with decent ground clearance and a minimum range of 550 km on a full tank - basically a car like Tim's Jeep Wagoneer.  The 550 km range is important - that's the distance from the start of the Dempster Highway to Fort McPherson.  The gas station at Eagle Plains is 370 km, but there's a chance that they will not have fuel for sale.  Fill up if you can, but be prepared to cover the full distance to McPherson if necessary.  Carry a jerrycan with extra fuel, and also carry a full-sized spare (or two!) in case of puncture.  A smaller sized donut or space-saver spare isn't going to cut it - make certain your spare is full size as you may need to drive a long way on it on a rough road before you find someone who can repair it!.

Here is the truck.

The issues with the F350 included:

- Fuel economy in the 15-18+ L/100 km range is far inferior to the fuel economy of an F150 or equivalent (closer to 10-12 L/100km).  By the time we reached the NWT, fuel costs were up to $2.23/litre.

- I needed to obtain extra weight to stow in the bed of the truck in order to get weight over the rear axle.  Even so, the truck often felt like it was floating on the road, especially when we were on gravel roads.

- Access to the right rear tie-down location was obstructed by the fire extinguisher bracket, which made securing a load in the truck bed more difficult.

- The height of the truck windscreen made cleaning it difficult!

- Lack of a canopy meant that anything stowed in the truck bed was not secure, so all items of value needed to be secured within the cab.  This included items such as food as we were camping in bear country.

Here are the two vehicles at Meziadin Junction, near the start of the trip.

And here they are at Tombstone Territorial Park near the end of the drive on the Dempster.

And the final frustration - when I dropped the F350 back to the rental company, they had a GMC 1500 sitting in the lot!  Look at the size difference.

Arthur and Will's Epic Arctic Adventure of Epicness Part 1 - signposts.

From 11 to 29 July, Arthur and I went on a grand adventure trip to Tuktoyaktuk and back with my friend Tim and his son Matt.  There's more to write than I can comfortably fit into a single blog post, so this is the first of a series.  Check for the Epic Arctic Adventure of Epicness tag to find the other posts in the series!

This first post is an overview of the trip, covering the main stops along the way.

We book-ended our trip with visits to my Aunt Aileen in Terrace.  We flew from Vancouver YVR to Terrace on 11 July - here is Arthur and me with the 'Terrace Wolves' art installation overlooking the town.

On the 13th, we set off to meet Tim and Matt at Stewart, BC, then on the 14th we crossed into Yukon.  Note that Arthur already has his bug repellent to hand!

We carried on to stay two nights at Kathleen Lake in Kluane National Park, with a day trip to Whitehorse in between. 

Next photo op was on the marge of Lake Laberge, which was a must-see due to its reference in Robert Service's poem, The Cremation of Sam McGee.

And then later on that day, we turned on to the Dempster Highway to the Arctic Ocean!

Tombstone Territorial Park is a place I definitely want to visit again!

We crossed the Arctic Circle.

And later crossed into the Northwest Territories (aka NWT).

Two ferry crossings later, we arrived in Inuvik.

The next day we carried on to Tuktoyaktuk.

And then the end of the road, the Arctic Ocean!

We ended up staying one extra day in Inuvik and Tuktoyaktuk, which will be explained in greater detail in a future post.  I had Stan Roger's Northwest Passage living rent-free in my head, and as we had reached the Beaufort Sea, I thought of the line that we had "found there but the road back home again".

We camped at Engineer Creek, so as an engineer, naturally I needed to document this :)

We reached the end of the Dempster Highway, and returned to paved roads again. This was where we parted ways with Tim and Matt, as they proceeded on to Liard Hot Springs and Ft St John on their way back to Victoria, while Arthur and I had a stopover in Dawson City (and for Arthur, a night in a hotel after he had been VERY patient with tenting for so many nights).

Here we are in Dawson, with a stanza from Robert Service's Spell of the Yukon on the wall of the building behind us.

The next night, my friend Teresa and her partner Pam hosted us in Carcross.

Then it was back to Terrace, where we returned our rental truck.  Aileen took us to Prince Rupert.

We had fish and chips at Bob's on the Rocks.

In Prince Rupert, Arthur and I boarded the BC Ferry Northern Expedition to take the Inside Passage to Port Hardy at the northern tip of Vancouver Island.

From Port Hardy, we took the bus to Nanaimo, then BC Ferry to Horseshoe Bay, and then bus and Skytrain home to Burnaby, arriving late on the 29th of July.

Stay tuned for more detailed posts about different aspects of our trip over the next few days!