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From Yukon to Alaska!
First, let me take this update to wish a good 1st August (Swiss National Day) to my Swiss readers. 😉
After three days in Inuvick trying to find a small boat that would take me bird watching in the Mackenzie River delta, I was frustrated: not even a “local” wanted to take me there. “To much bugs actually” they have all said. I must say that it’s true: this place was particularly infested, widening and slowing Mackenzie River forming hundreds marshes perfect for the mosquitos larvae. Without repellent, between 10PM and 9AM, it’s just impossible to stay outside. In three seconds, there are 100 who attack, almost inconceivable for who havn’t lived it..!
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So I hit the “Dempster” South again since it’s the only road linking Inuvick the rest of the world … With some company also since I offered a “ride” to two hitchhikers.
Sebastien, a French guy who travels between Mexico in winter and California or Yukon in summer to earn some money for example by picking the mushrooms that grow the first year after forest fires. I must say that it pays not bad: $300 to $500 per day on average, sometimes with great harvests more than $1,000 for the lucky day!
And Pierre, a Canadian guy from Calgary, perfectly bilingual as having studied in Aix-en-Provence, who paddled down the Mackenzie River in kayak solo from Yellow Knife area; more than 1,500 miles in 18 days for a first solo trip, not bad!
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1. About 22:30 on the Dempster…
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2. VivaLaVida’s color changed a little, isn’t it? 😉
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3. Last night in Yukon, for now at least, up a small pass not far away from “Top of the World Highway”.
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4. Sunset was gorgious et midnight…
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5. The next day, just after crossing the border into Alaska, I stopped maybe a mile after and was welcomed by him: a beautiful red fox, not fearful sinc he past 5 yards away only..!
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6. Short day trip to discover Eagle City, housed in a cove of the Yukon River. It’ss from here that Roald Amundsen sent a telegram to inform that he had managed to cross the famous Northwest Passage, December 6th, 1905 after more than 500 miles with sled dog. It was the closest place from the place where is boat Gjøa was wintering caught in the ice since November!
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7. The city appears out of the past too, really a world away…
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8. Thunderstorm on the trail to Eagle City.
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9. Rivers must have real floods seeing the width of some river beds…
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10. Boondocking on a river bank…
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11. A Barrow goldeneye, quite rare…
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12. Here in central Alaska, there is an incredible amount of large blue dragonflies, even in places that seem rather dry and without lakes…
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VivaLaVida’s vent control haven’t withstood thousands of miles on more or less rhough trails, I explored the area of Fairbanks waiting to get the ordered part…
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13. Tundra : a mixture of lichens and some other colorful plants. They remain only a few inches tall even if most hare more than one hundred years old!
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14. At the boundary between taiga and tundra, other flowers adorn the path.
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15. It is 10:30 PM but the sun still shines on the taiga and its gentle hills…
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16. In the distance, a colorful shower colored by the sun low on the horizon…
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17. Thunderstorm lighted by last sunrays.
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When the part finally arrived five days later, I took the road again but not toward North as planed. The weather forecast were bad for at least the two coming weeks. So I headed South.
I will present it here soon… 😉
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South West Yukon (2)
Continuing the discover of backcountry roads the next day, I arrived into mining areas, some of which are still active today. Guys continue to look for gold…
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1. VivaLaVida on the trail.
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2. They are so many small lakes everywhere…
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3. Over the tree limit, it’s meadows with lots of blueberry trees. Grizzly bears are probably really feasting here at the end of the summer!
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4. VLV brave despite its only two wheel drive.
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5. A mine site operated until three years ago and now closing. The government requires the demolition of buildings, but also the restoration of the landscape, including the filling of extraction areas and site cleanup. A big work which will take several years…
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6. Back to Whitehorse, the Yukon capitol town, where the most popular campground is the local Walmart parking lot, who knows why. Beautiful sunset after midnight.
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7. One of the Twin Lakes along the Klondike Highway.
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8. Back through Carmacks, forced stop to say hello to Shanon and Garry ! 😀
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9. Yukon River at Five Fingers Rapids.
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10. That landscape is mostly formed of mudstone, a kind of petrified mud that contains many boulders. The river carves its bed sometimes making beautiful cliffs.
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11. Camp at Frenchman Lake.
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12. Quite Sunset at 01:30……
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13. In some places, even the mighty river meander…
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14. Detour towards Keno City with a stop at the remote Hansen McQuesten Lake.
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15. In the mountains East of Keno City.
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16. Higher, view of the many lakes in the valley with McQuesten Lake at the right background.
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17. The few backcountry roads were all made by mining industry and remnants remain.
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18. Some are practically unused except by Vivalavida..! 😉
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19. Inaccessible valley to the east. To give you an idea of ​​the low population density here: the area of ​​the Yukon is ~ 482’000 square kilometers – Switzerland is ~ 41,000, or 12 times less – and its population has just reached 37,000 where more than 25,000 inhabitants live in Whitehorse ..! In short, there is room for the bears here! 😉
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20. Not far from the summit of this mountain, the track doesn’t look like really anything…
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21. … end ended by the only tracks of VLV.
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22. I slept there tonight.
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23. There are only a few first flowers on the tundra up there.
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24. And golden plovers which spend the night here!
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25. At summit of Keno Hill, a sign indicating some foreign places; I seems that I’m at about 3,000 miles away from Geneva in a straight..! 😉
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25. Sweetness of the sunset from this splendid point of view…
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Following of VivaLaVida’s trip through the Yukon soon…
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South West Yukon
As anounced, VivaLaVida arrived in Yukon, the most North-West province of Canada. This territory extends till the Arctic Ocean. The South is hilly and covered with a uniform boreal forest, the North is only tundra till out of sight.
1. The famous “Sign Post Forest in Watson Lake. It currently has more than 78,000 signs led by travelers. One wonders how official entrance panels of German villages got there… 🙂
Vivalavida then left the Alaska Highway to sink deeper into the Yukon Territory along the Robert Campbell Highway, a dirt road more than 400 miles connecting Watson Lake to Carmacks.
2. Frances Lake, more than thirty miles long. The mountains in the background is the border with the Northwest Territories.
3. Robert Campbell Highway. Yes, it’s considered as an Highway! But I saw only one car along the 400 miles…
4. Succession of nice small lakes…
5. Another one…
At Ross River, I turned south to travel the South Canol Road, a road built by the U.S. Army during World War II to supply a military base in the Northwest Territories, one of the closest points of Japan by air…
6. Lapie River Canyon.
7. Lapie Lake, wonderfull.
8. a pond along the road…
9. While I stopped along the road to have some lunch, I had the chance to see this spruce grouse, a mother who was quite aggressive to get me away from her progeny.
10. View on Quiet Lake.
11. Anecdote: when I found a nice camp spot for the night, this porcupine came Under Vivalavida and tryed to taste some pipes ..! I had to make it run away from the rear axle with a long stick, the rascal!
Arrival at Carmacks, on the Klondike Highway, Shanon and Garry, who propose good coffe and icecream at the Carmacks post office, indicated me some nice places to visit only know by local.
I take this opportunity to invite all travelers passing through Carmacks to stop at The Barracks. You will be warmly welcomed to drink a good coffee – even a “espresso” if you ask Shanon or Garry for a “Short Coffee” – and can enjoy one of the twenty ice cream flavors offered. Ideal for a quick stopover on the road or to send a post card to your family or friends. 😉
As there is very few backcountry roads in Yukon, I decided to go to the adviced places, starting with the ancient village of Yukon Crossing along the famous Yukon River. The trail leading to it is long disused but confident in the capabilities of Vivalavida, I decided to try to go through. After a few miles, I arrived in front of a big mud hole of a twenty yards long, a real muddy pond. After walking it for recognition, I decided to go for it. I lock the front hubs, switches 4×4 low speed, selects the third gear and locked rear differential and go! But after about 5 yards at most, VLV stops… A little surprised, I locked the front differential, put in reverse but VLV didn’t move a single inch. Strange… Would mud be more slippery here than elsewhere? I go down, find some branches that I put under the wheels, nothing happens, I am indeed stucked! The only way to get out was winching to pull VLV out. I’ll even have to use a pulley system to increase the strength of the winch as the mud really retained my home on wheels … But after three quarters of an hour, VLV has recovered strong ground. I arranged winch and straps, engage reverse and once VLV moves, I heard big Glong Glong Glong ..! Oops, something wass wrong there … Looking under VLV, what a surprise: the front driveshaft was laying on the gearbox cross-member! Exactly the same problems that VLV encountered at Steele Pass with the rear axle: bolts were gone. I then understand why Vivalavida was miserably stuck in that mud; it was only two-wheel drive at the time…
It will take me down back to Whitehorse the next day, 110 miles south, the only place where I could likely find some metric bolts to make the same modification I made to the rear and then solve the problem once for all …
12. Winching VivaLaVida stucked till the axles…
13. Here he is out!!
14. I still continued the exploration of the area in two-wheel drive, discovering this “Magic Bus” lost in the middle of nowhere. Probably a hunting camp…
15. Log cabin dating from the gold rush at the beginning of the last century.
16. Some more recent remains…
17. I even found an prospecting site where drill cores remain.
18. Aligned in cases.
19. Although abandoned, it’s evidence that the site is more recent, some prospectors still continuing research in the area.
20. I found a nice bonndocking spot not far away … The salmon is cooking in my summer kitchen..! 😉
21. Over the tree limit at about 4,000 feet elevation, I enjoyed nice sky at sunset…
22. At midnight, it’s still daylight..!
More to come soon… 😀
Banff NP & Icefield Parkway
These Canadian Rockies are gorgeous. I continued to explore those looping south of Banff, a grouse mountain station 1:30 away from Calgary. I’m then past in Alberta.
1. Castle Mountain, only some miles North of Banff.
2. A male sheep that I managed to get close to.
3. An elk.
4. Small detour to the so much photographed Moraine Lake in late afternnon.
5. Last sunrays…
6. The first porcupine I saw. A real punk haircut! 😀 It was almost night, thank high ISO of Sony A99!
I then drove the Icefield Parkway to Jasper.
7. At about 7,000 feet elevation, lakes are still frozen.
8. Wild Mistaya Canyon under rain.
9. These mountains are really wild…
10. On the way back of my hike, encounter with a plantigrade who ate dandelions! Surprising to see this brown bear grazing like an herbivorous!
11. Further along the Icefield Parkway, the Sunwapta Upper Falls.
12. Still some miles further, the very wellknown and touristic Athabasca Falls.
13. Athabasca Canyon cliffs in a timid sunshine ray.
14. Small incursion into a side valley to discover the Moab Lake.
15. This mountain lake is removed, I was there completely alone after more than three hours walking.
16. Back in the main valley at the confluence of two rivers.
17. His insistent cries made ​​me realize that I was in its territory. Sorry for the intrusion..! 😉
18. Impressive north face of Edith Cavell with Angel Glacier Mountain. You see the angel’s wings ..? 😀 Several avalanches descended while I was walking to reach this point of view.
19. My camp for this night at abot 7,000 feet elevation, with the same mountain in background.
20. Sunset on Tonkin Valley, on the other side…
The next update will show you some image of Jasper National Park in a couple of days…
Thank you for your loyalty to follow this blog:-D
From Montana to Canada
From Butte I continue my way North visiting Glacier National Park. More than some small glacier that still subsist – but for how long? – it’s a land of mountains and lakes.
1. Allong the road, a funny oldtimer hitch!
2. Kintla Lake, retired and wild. I paddled it ti the and, 4 hours round trip…
3. General Store at Polebridge. The pastries were top! 😉
4. Tumultuous McDonald River.
5. South Fork Flathead River.
6. Thunderstorm on Two Medicine Upper Lake.
7. Totally other atmosphere the next morning at 5:30 then it freezes..!
8. Lower Two Medicine Lake, an artificial reservoir.
9. Another large lake, the St-Mary Lake. Logan Pass was still in winter closure, so I didn’t get to go…
10. From the mountain bike single track.
11. From the trail to Grinnell Glacier where I was also stopped by snow.
Then I crossed the canadian border and headed to Banff National Park, in the Canadian Rockies.
12. Kootenay River.
14. Highway like in tourism advertising..!
15. Numa Falls.
16. Sunset from my camp.
17. Discovery of ocher deposits in the Kootenay Valley, more precisely a source rich in iron which deposits ocher. This material was used as a dye by the Indians, pounded before cooked, then re-pounded to get an orange powder. Mixed with melted fat, it was one of the colors used for petrographs, some of which are still visible several thousand years later.
18. Wolf tracks, the first I saw there. They are big as my hand..!
19. Ascent to the source…
20. … here it is.
Following of my discovery of the Canadian Rocky to come soon… 😀