Dempster @en
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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..!
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!
1. About 22:30 on the Dempster…
2. VivaLaVida’s color changed a little, isn’t it? 😉
3. Last night in Yukon, for now at least, up a small pass not far away from “Top of the World Highway”.
4. Sunset was gorgious et midnight…
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..!
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!
7. The city appears out of the past too, really a world away…
8. Thunderstorm on the trail to Eagle City.
9. Rivers must have real floods seeing the width of some river beds…
10. Boondocking on a river bank…
11. A Barrow goldeneye, quite rare…
12. Here in central Alaska, there is an incredible amount of large blue dragonflies, even in places that seem rather dry and without lakes…
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…
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!
14. At the boundary between taiga and tundra, other flowers adorn the path.
15. It is 10:30 PM but the sun still shines on the taiga and its gentle hills…
16. In the distance, a colorful shower colored by the sun low on the horizon…
17. Thunderstorm lighted by last sunrays.
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… 😉
Dempster (2) : Yukon & Northwest Territories
1. VivaLaVida hit the Demster toward North again, still further north…
2. Chapmann Lake
3. While Tumbstone Mountains are granite, the rest of the road passes through limestone hills.
4. Entry in Eagle Plains, an immense plateau of boreal forest and tundra depending on altitude.
5. I stop at a viewpoint and I have a neighbor! 😉
6. The weather turns bad…
7. The next day, its in the rain that I take the road again.
8. Here’s boreal forest. Here she wears the nickname “Drunken forest” because growing on the permafrost, the roots can not go more than two feet deep and winds make lean / fall these small conifers.
9. Mandatory photo stop at the passage of the Arctic Circle!
10. Showers again…
11. … making nice ambiances.
12.Difficult to show the vastness of the tundra…
13. “Riding the Dempster”! 😀
14. The snow has disappeared only two weeks earlier and flowers are blooming the tundra.
15. Clouds pursuing VivaLaVida !
16. New photo stop entering the province of the Northwest Territories.
17. Going down in the “low lands”, there are two ferries to cross the Peel River first here, then the Mackenzie River, the second longest river in North America after the Missouri/Mississippi.
18. Small village of Tsiigehtchic on the bank of the Mackenzie River.
19. Arrival at Inuvick, the terminus of the road, in the Mackenzie River Delta.
20. Inuvick icon, the “Igloo Church”.
21. Construction all made of wood by a French Compagnon carpenter without drawings and without freezing underground system to keep the permafrost frozen ..! The design is pretty awesome with a natural ventilation system to replace it.
22. The plates of the Northwest Territories are cool, isn’t it? 😉
To be followed soon by my arrival in Alaska!
D5 Creation