Last days of Canada

June 13, Friday

  Safe travels today for us, got to the Continental divide as our first stop.  Water draining west from here forms the Swift River, draining to the Yukon River and continuing northwest 2300 miles to the Bering Sea.  Water draining east forms the Rancheria River, onto the Liard and Mackenzie Rivers, flowing north emptying into the Artic Ocean, 2650 miles away. 

Driving into Teslin, Yukon and stopped to see a few museums to learn some of the history of the Tlingit Natives. George Johnston Museum, he took thousands of pics of the Tlinglits so they would be immortalized in history and their history not lost.  Pretty interesting how the natives here were treated very similar to the Indians in US, not well!! 

Didn't get any pics of wildlife today...whine...saw a golden eagle and one black bear, but they were too quick, no time to focus or click.  

Lin and Perry are enjoying the antique tractors at the museum. 

Onto Whitehorse to stay at the Pioneer RV park tonight. 

We made a stop at the Visitor Center, to learn about the town.  I made a quick detour out the side door to check out the close Quilt shop.  Know you are surprised to hear that!!  Nothing I needed to buy, but did enjoy looking over their bear and moose materials. 

 Had a great dinner of salmon at a local restaurant in town.  Will do more exploring of the town tomorrow after resting.  These late nights of the midnight sun are getting long!!  

June 14, Saturday

What a day!  Slow start to moving as we decided to stay in Whitehorse a few days to see the sites, as this is the last large town before the Alaska border.  It’s the capital of the Yukon Province and the book says there are so many things to see.  BUT!.... our heater stopped working.  You would think this would be a crazy thing to worry about, it is June 14!! Summer!!  No, we have been waking up to 25-45 degrees in the am, and wearing at least a jacket, long sleeves every day.  So we spent the day, working (and by “we”, I mean, Lin!) on the furnace.  We have electric heat, but a lot of our nights we are dry camping.  Finally got it working, $225 later for a new circuit board.  We are thinking of a new name for the word RV, “revolving Vault”.  

   So the afternoon was spent, quickly running about town getting last minute groceries and any items needed for the last few days before we go into Alaska.  Still may have a few more days of dry camping.  I did get on the Internet while the guys were working on the furnace and was able to get some of the blog uploaded with the pics, up to day June 6^th so far uploaded.  This evening we are all tired and just wanted to rest after night instead of sitting outside with a fire.  But I do have marshmallows and am waiting to toast them!!

  The only pic we got was this Weather vane they made out of a C- plane, pretty amazing to watch.  I made a short video, but not sure it will upload. 

June 15, Sunday, Father’s Day

  For Father’s Day, Lin gets to drive another 200 miles today!!  Heading out of Whitehorse this am and driving towards Haines Junction, about 120 miles west.  Another day of no wildlife pics, not sure what is going on with the bears, moose, elk and sheep. Even drove thru an area of Dali sheep, but none would stick heads out for pics.

   The Mountain pics will have to suffice for today.  They are again, amazing!!  We didn’t even realize that this area of Canada had some of the tallest peaks in North America in the Kluane NP.  The second Tallest peak, Mt Logan is pic here, only second to Mt McKinley in Denali NP.  

The Da Ku Cultural centre features the Aishihik First Nations exhibits and we learned some other interesting facts on the people that inhabited this land before Europeans invaded.

   The St Elias Mountains are amazing along the road and we had to pull over several times to take pics until we found a spot on the side of the road to spend the night.  We love stopping early in the day, about 3 or 4pm to stop, get our fires going and have dinner by the fire.  We wanted to stop by the Kluane River, but none of the camping sites really were of our quality, which is “free” and with no other campers. Can you imagine going to bed with this as your view, and waking up to this?