Monday, July 1, 2009 – Day 62 – Two Months on the Road – Happy Canada Day!
We left Watson Lake this morning at 08:10 AM, one of our earliest starts yet. The Caravan that had almost taken over the campground last night had mostly left; just a few RV’s and the rear guard. The temperature was 10C and it was very foggy, reducing visibility to a few hundred meters. The fog stayed with us for about 60 km, sometimes thinner, sometimes thicker. We really had a mixed bag of weather during the day, bright sunny skies with temperatures in the 20’s followed by a thunderstorm with pea-size hail. According to one highway flag woman, we just missed snow in Summit Lake by one day…although we did have lots of mud on that section of road. I had to use 4 wheel drive and I was still sliding.
As we drove along, we saw all kinds of scat (the gentler name for animal poop) beside the highway. Janet has become quite adept at identifying scat. She told me that the piles we were seeing were likely from Bison. I didn’t think that they had Bison this far north, until we saw them grazing at the side of the road. As we headed south east we saw several more groups of bison. And when we saw bison we usually saw a black bear just before or just after. It seems that they co-exist in the grassy margins beside the roadway. We saw 13 black bears today plus 2 cubs. We also saw two kits (baby foxes). They were pushing each other out of a small culvert right beside the road. That was another missed shot as we were travelling too fast with the loaded trailer in tow, to make a safe stop. During the rest of the day we saw 1 deer, 2 caribou and very near the end of the day we got some footage for our “Spot the Moose” feature. 
Although it doesn’t seem to have the “official designation” of a Scenic Highway. This portion of the Alaska Highway (BC 97) is probably one of the prettiest, most scenic highways that we’ve driven on this trip. Mountains shrouded in fog, gently rolling valleys, roaring rivers and emerald green lakes. We really were happy that we saw this section of the Alaska Highway, while it was in full leaf to get the full benefit of it. However, everything wasn’t perfect…while we were in Alaska we had read on the internet news about the forest fires that were blazing through the Liard River, Coal River and Fireside areas of BC. The fires threatened several indian reservations and caused a number of evacuations. They also destroyed thousands of acres of beautiful forest. The fire was brought under control with the help of Mother Nature’s rains in the last week and the highway was fully open. We could see smouldering areas they were still watching and the air was still acrid with the smell of the burnt forest. In our travels we had seen one particular forest fire that occurred in 1959; 50 years ago and it is just now starting to look fully recovered. I won’t live long enough to see this forest recover. 
We arrived in Dawson Creek, BC at about 16:30. We are staying at the West End Campground. I won’t complain about the Wi-Fi signal in this post. It was free or Zero Dollars and that is just about what it’s worth.
One other thing…they don’t celebrate Canada Day with fireworks here…it doesn’t get dark enough. Funny. They do have fireworks for Halloween.
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