Leaving Valdez

We weren’t in any hurry to get on the road this morning, so it was almost noon before we pulled out of the Bear Paw RV Park in Valdez. I kind of hated to leave as we really liked it here in Valdez and the park was comfortable and well-located. Oh well, it was time to get back on the road again.

We don’t have to be anywhere particular until next Friday (July 29) when we start the inside passage ferry portion of our Alaska trip. So, we’ve got almost one week to get to Haines.

After lunch at the Fu Kung Chinese restaurant and picking up some groceries at the Safeway, we started back up the Richardson highway into the interior of Alaska. The scenery of the Keystone Canyon and Thompson Pass was even nicer than on our trip into Valdez since it was mostly sunny today.

This is a picture of the Keystone Canyon. Horsetail Falls is visible on the left. (Just ignore the dead bug smear on the windshield.)

This picture is the view from the top looking down into the valley.

These show the rugged summit of Thompson Pass.

We stopped at a couple places we missed on the way down. First, we stopped at a Trans-Alaska Pipeline access point where we got right up close to the pipeline. They have put up some signboards there which explain some of the features. E.g. It is high up so wildlife can pass underneath undisturbed. There are cooling wands built into the supports to make sure the warmth created by the pipeline is dissipated and the permafrost doesn’t melt. It zig-zags to allow for movement, expansion, etc. without fracturing the pipeline. It is almost 800 miles long and more than half of it is above ground. They did have to blast through the rock in Thompson Pass so they could bury it to avoid the heavy snowfall and avalanches potentially damaging the pipeline. And, if they ever quit using it, everything has to be removed and the ground restored!

Our other stop of note was at the 13.2 million acre Wrangell-St. Elias National Park (America’s largest National Park). We looked at the exhibits and watched a film at the visitor centre but the park itself is really not accessible to ordinary mortals. It has nine of the thirteen highest mountain peaks in North America and one of its icefields is as big as Rhode Island. The entire park is the same size as Connecticut! Gorgeous looking place and it’s great they are preserving this piece of wilderness. I cooked supper there then we started driving north again.

We didn’t go much further and stopped for the night at the Dry Creek State Recreation Area just north of Glenallen. It’s a nice, treed, campsite and would be great to have a fire, but there is no firewood here. Guess you’re supposed to bring your own.

There are only a few travelers (like us) in this campground. The salmon are running in the Kenai Peninsula so that must be where all the Alaskans are. We heard on the news that there are so people trying to fish there that fistfights are breaking out in campgrounds and on the rivers. They call it ‘combat fishing’! I’m glad we’re not there now. They have had some serious accidents on the Seward Highway, even closed it for a while on Thursday (three people were killed). This is the same highway we took to and from Homer a week or so ago.

For the next few days, my internet access will be a little hit and miss. E.g. here the cellphone signal isn’t strong enough to use my Verizon air card. And, once we’re in Canada (likely by the end of today), I won’t be able to use it at all. But I’ll get the blog caught up when I can.