Alaska adventure, Mid – Late September, 2019 – Juneau AK to Albuquerque, NM

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Juneau, AK

It rains most of the night.  Our alarm wakes us at 330 for 515 check-in for our 36 hour ferry ride to Prince Rupert, BC.  Low clouds and drizzle surround us while we wait to board.

This time we are one of the first ones to board.  Once on board we wander through the ship looking for the purser’s office to get the key for our berth.  Our room has two bunk beds, a window allowing us to  watch Alaska pass by and a bathroom with shower.

Once settled in the room, we use our experience from past trips making our way through the ship finding a comfortable spot to work from.  Nicida working on photos and I on this blog; writing and photos.  Locating AC outlets is good; our arrival in Prince Rupert BC is in 36 hours.  My only concern is having to turn off the propane in the camper so the refrigerator will not be on for the next 36 hours.  We loaded up the refrigerator and freezer with containers of water and ice to hold the cold.

Heavy low clouds surround us the entire day.  Our seating on the observation deck provides views of where we are going.  Tops of the mountains disappear in the clouds.  We come across a few small islands where the clouds are so low the tops of the trees disappear.  Returning from our room with cameras we head out to shoot the scenes, we don’t get these views in NM.  A few minutes after we step out on to the deck numerous other people come out to shoot the same otherworldly views.

As we continue our trip we notice small clouds of mist intermittently rising from the water – exhaling humpback whales.  Many of us head out on the deck working to get as close as we can hoping for a breech.  The next 30 minutes we are surrounded by mist clouds.  We don’t know where to point our cameras.  We see breeches off in the distance, but never where our cameras are pointing.  One of the passengers has a video camera pointing and recording where a humpback breeches.  Everyone who saw the video was excited.  I conclude to catch spectacular images or videos one has to be lucky.  It’s best to just enjoy the scenes, remembering them.

Rain continues on and off throughout the day.  We make brief stops at small towns; people and vehicles disembark to be replaced by others.  We have dinner on the ship, enjoy the evening as darkness moves in, then retire to our room for the night.  We can tell slight course changes by slight changes in the tilt of the floor.  We feel the constant low pitch of the engines turning the propeller.  Changes in pitch tell us the ship is changing its speed.  I wake to total quiet, the propeller has stopped rotating, a quick view out the window confirms we are docked.

Prince Rupert

Early the next morning we stop in Ketchikan, where we flew from just two days before.  The port for the Alaska ferry system is outside of town so we don’t stop at the same port as the cruise ships we had seen earlier in the week.  The water starts getting choppier as we approach open water.  Low clouds and rain still accompanies us.  A few hours later we are approaching Prince Rupert.  The rain becomes heavier.  Nervous motion overtakes the passengers.  We have to pack our bags and empty our room.  We fill the aisles with the other passengers waiting for the announcement allowing us to go down to the car deck.

Canada

The relaxing portion of our trip concludes as we disembark heading to the customs station a few hundred yards away.  The refrigerator fares well.  The items in the freezer are not frozen hard, just a bit soft, otherwise good.  We pick up visitor and camping information on British Columbia since we have several days of driving before entering the US.  We stop in the Prudhomme Lake Provincial Park for the night with the rain finally stopping around 6.

Next morning wake to the alarm at 7.  British Columbia between Prince Rupert and Prince George, about 400 miles east is very remote.  Water tumbles off the mountain side from the previous day’s rain.  We follow the Skena river valley surrounded by forest for the first few hours of our drive.  Fall color starts reappearing as we leave the temperate climate near the ocean.  The parks and visitor centers are preparing to close for the season.  If we had come through two days later everything would be closed.

Passing Prince George the landscape turns from wilderness to rural with occasional farms.  We even see corn fields and pastures with cattle.  Huge lumber mills appear with acres of felled trees in all stages of processing.  The area is still scenic, dotted with forest.  Continuing south of Prince George we stop in Clinton where the terrain south of town drops 1500’ in elevation.  We are reminded of the southwestern US; dry, fewer, smaller trees and familiar NM shrubs.  We can’t help notice a few hoodoos among the rock formations.  The road to Okanagan Lake is like a long roller coaster ride starting at 1,700’ climbing to 5,000’ then back down again.  We arrive at Okanagan Lake Provincial Park staying for a brief respite the next two days.  The campground is nice, some sites having spectacular views of the 25+ mile long lake.  Even this late in the year, mid-September, the campground is full.

The area on the west side of Okanagan Lake, near Penticton there are literally miles of vineyards, orchards and farms growing; grapes, apples, peaches, pears, cherries along with other fruits.  Many fruit stands line the road selling pies, jellies, jams, syrups and other locally grown or made products.  They all look good; we have to be selective, we don’t have room to try one of everything.

Palouse, WA

We visit several towns along the lake including Penticton and Summerland.  They are set up for visitors with a number of resorts and hotels but there seems to be a limited number of tourist shops.  We are not certain if they are closed because we are here out of season.

The road south along Okanagan Lake becomes wilder, with rougher, though smaller mountains and smaller towns.

Approaching the US/Canada border we make one last stop at Tim Hortons a coffee/donut shop.  We unload our pockets of Canadian money before crossing back into the US.

The Lower 48

Lewiston, ID

Crossing back into the US is no problem, we experience a traffic jam of three vehicles when crossing.  The area becomes wild again with occasional homes tucked along the stream beds.  Mountains are covered in green, no fall colors - yet.  The road east towards Spokane follows along river valleys and over mountain passes.  Approaching Spokane the roads become crowded while at the same time it narrows to a two to three lane city street.  It takes us over an hour to pass through.

Emerging from Spokane eastern Washington and western Idaho opens to rolling hills, the Palouse.  We drive for miles among wheat fields planted along the contours of the hills.  We see remains of the wheat stalks during much of the drive.  We can only imagine what is looks like prior to harvest.  We camp in a county park just east of Moscow, Idaho.  There are only six sites here, but there are still three sites after we set up.  We walk along one of the county roads enjoying a close-up view of the golden wheat fields as the sun sets.

The next morning we wake early; our destination Boise, Idaho.  We follow river valleys most of the way.  The rivers fluctuate between raging torrents rushing down boulder strewn river beads and calm pools. 

Idaho

At some point south of Boise we join the route we took to Alaska 10+ weeks earlier.  Approaching Ogden we see a small but intense storm crossing the road in front of us.  Slowing down we see multiple vehicles off the road.  There were no collisions; the road is covered with ice.  For about a quarter mile the road has ice, or piles of hail on the shoulders.  We creep through the calamity emerging on the other side. The mountains east of Ogden are covered with snow.  It is cloudy and cool in the RV park.  With ominous clouds passing around us we decide to pass on our evening walk.

Mountains over Salt Lake City

The morning starts well, but we are not looking forward to the next hour’s drive through the greater Salt Lake metroplex.  South of Salt Lake we turn east again through the mountains.  Fall color has disappeared.  We find a park in Green River, Utah squeezing into a small site with our camper.  There is a melon fest this weekend celebrating the watermelon.  Many people attend the festival eating southwestern foods  accompanied with watermelon.  We notice a distinct change in the native American art from native Alaskan art.

At Cortez, CO we depart from the route we took to Alaska instead heading towards Durango, CO.  A few miles east of Cortez we pass the entrance to Mesa Verde National Park.  We note that this is an easy day’s drive from Albuquerque.  The valley opens with high mountains surrounding us.  Our goal this evening is Pagosa Springs with a soak in the springs tomorrow.  We find a dispersed campsite on the side of a mountain overlooking a wide valley; Pagosa Springs five miles distant.  We come upon a family of deer that don’t know what to make of us.  We stare each other down for a few minutes before they take off down the steep slope.  Cold breezes keep us from enjoying a fire this evening.

Campsite near
Pagosa Springs, CO 

The next morning we head into town set to enjoy a warm soak in the hot springs of Pagosa.  This is our third hot spring this trip.  It is very developed in comparison to the others we have enjoyed this trip.  We see and hear the San Juan River flowing beside the spa.  There are 18 pools ranging from 95 – 108 degrees, they are named; Serendipity, Twilight, Clouds in my Coffee, finishing up with the Lobster Pot.  I think you can guess which one is the hottest.  I go in the Lobster Pot to my knees before exiting in a sweat.  After a few hours of relaxing we decide to spend the last night of our trip camping at Heron Lake State Park.  The weather turned cloudy and rainy for the night but we enjoyed our time there waking to a foggy morning over the lake.

Heron Lake, New Mexico

The last day’s drive is uneventful.  Traffic keeps building as we approach Santa Fe then Albuquerque, but we enjoy our ride.  We are too busy reminiscing about our adventure.

We had a spectacular time on our Alaska adventure.  In all we drove just over 9,800 miles over 12 weeks.  We shot thousands of images, ate seafood every time we went to a restaurant, learned about the native cultures, Alaska’s natural history and how man has moved in to  take from the land; furs, lumber, gold or oil.  We saw grizzly and black bears, elk, caribou, moose, buffalo, bald eagles, salmon, glaciers, the aurora borealis and endless stunning scenery.  We are very fortunate to have been able to experience Alaska under these circumstances.  We hope we have inspired you to see Alaska, even just a piece of it.

Thank you for stopping by,

Mark