Toad River, BCSep 19, 2009
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Bison on Alaska Hwy, BC
Buffalo on Road sign
Black bear along Alaska Hwy
| It’s Saturday so that means pancakes and eggs for breakfast. It rained hard overnight and we left the front ceiling vent open so the floor was wet this morning. Who with an RV hasn’t done that? My mind goes back to camping in a tent in New England and I count my blessings. The heat’s on, the water’s hot and we’re dry. The Alaska Highway is 1,390 miles long from Dawson Creek, British Columbia to Delta Junction, Alaska. We’ve traveled 980 miles of it so far, 410 miles to go. The fall colors really pop out when it’s sunny. Whether sunny or not the camera doesn’t do this landscape justice. It’s just too big to take in in a snapshot. I’ve done my best to capture what I’ve seen and my photos will remind me of the whole picture. We passed a sign saying, “Buffalo on the Road”. (We know they’re really bison, not buffalo.) When I had given up seeing buffalo, there by the side of the road were three, two adults and a young one. No chance to stop and I wasn’t ready with my camera. So I put the telephoto lens on the camera and kept it on my lap at the ready. Sure enough, some distance down the road there were two buffalo. Jim slowed down and I got two decent photos of the two adults. Thrilled, I sat at the ready. A smaller brown spot down the road became a young black bear who turned and ran into the woods when we slowed down, but I got one picture before it disappeared. Then another buffalo beside the road. Later we came upon a small group of stone sheep, another buffalo and then two caribou. Wow! All that time traveling around the Yukon and Alaska and we didn’t see much along the way until we were on our way home. We’re in the Canadian Rockies now. We stopped briefly at Liard Hot Springs, then passed by Muncho Lake, a gorgeous turquoise color. Muncho means “big lake” in the Kaska language. As we traveled beside the Toad River, also turquoise blue, a roadside sign explained the “Folded Mountain” on the other side of the river. The Rockies were the flat bottom of a sea 175 million years ago. As the North American continent began to move over the Pacific plate the sea layer slowly buckled into folds and became the Rocky Mountains. As big as they are now, they are only a small fraction of their original size. We’re staying the night at historic Toad River Lodge & RV Park, British Columbia. It’s first mentioned in the Milepost in the 1950 edition. Its claim to fame is the hat collection, over 6,800 in all! We overlook Reflection Lake. There are horses in a green pasture at the far end. A cold-weather garden with cabbage, onions, beets, carrots and potatoes is next to the laundromat. Today’s miles: 203 Total miles: 5,037 |
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