On our second day in Hyder, AK, we drove 10 miles from the campground to take the self-guided auto tour of Salmon Glacier which is just on the Canadian side of the border. The glacier is notable for its major potential as a natural hazard. Summit Lake is located at the northern end of the glacier and every year around mid-July the lake breaks an ice-dam and then flows under the Salmon Glacier into the Salmon River. This causes the river to rise approximately 4-5 ft for several days.
There were many scenic pullouts on the road providing opportunities to take in the beautiful scenery. Unfortunately, pictures hardly ever capture the real beauty of nature. Here are pictures from our drive...
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| Dusty, winding road |
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| Narrow, up and down |
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| View of road we just drove on |
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| First peek of Salmon Glacier |
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| Back on winding road. No guardrails, with steep drop-offs! |
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| The blue of the ice is beautiful! |
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| We made it! |
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| Spectacular! |
We continued driving past the glacier to an abandoned mine. We didn't go past the mine because this section of road was considerably worse than the glacier road. It was filled with potholes and was very bumpy.
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| Many waterfalls along the way |
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| The entrance to the mine--very dark and spooky in there! |
On Day 49 we drove 211 miles to Smithers, BC.
After setting up for the night, we took some time to visit Smithers' alpine-themed downtown. They had shops offering everything from skis to fashion. The had a few restaurants too. We decided to have dinner and a cold beer at Alpenhorn Bistro. It was a nice place to stretch our legs after our drive.
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| The food was delicious... |
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| and the beer was cold! |
Friday, August 10, was Day 50 of the tour. We drove 232 miles to Prince George, BC. Most of the drive was hazy from forest fire smoke.
That evening the tour hosted dinner at a local restaurant where we took turns talking about our favorite memories of the trip. We all hugged goodbye after dinner but when we returned to the RV park we all sat in a large circle one last time enjoying the company of our fellow travelers.
We had a wonderful time on the tour. We travelled approximately 5,200 miles and saw things that 3 years ago we never thought we'd see--beautiful mountains, rivers, streams and lakes, glaciers, bears, bison, elk, whales, porpoises, sea lions and more. And I still can't believe we flew on a 6-passenger plane all the way up to Barrow, Alaska and I'll never forget walking on Matanuska Glacier!
A couple of interesting of interesting things about Canada and Alaska...
British Columbia has a fire season during the summer. 2017 was a record breaking year for forest fires in BC but 2018 now holds the record. As of August 20, 2018 had a total of 1,925 fires that had burned 1,512,590 acres. Almost all forest fires are started by lightening and there are still many that are not under control. Driving through smoke was a new experience for us. As we continue on our travels from Canada to Washington we hope the fires stay away from the roads.
The tour took us over 90% of Alaskan roads and 80% of Yukon roads. I lost my notes so I'm going on memory for the percentages but I think they're close. This included paved roads and the dusty, gravely roads. Many of them are dusty, rocky and rough. In Yukon they alert you to extra rough road sections by placing orange flags on the side of the road. The roughest patches are caused by frost in the frigid winters warping the pavement.
We met a lot of nice people on the tour and made many new friends. We hope our paths cross often on our travels.
Now, back to "normal" life...
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