Day 25 - Reaching Alaska and Fairbanks

Travel   From: Dawson City, YT   To: Fairbanks, AK   Distance: 404 mi (650 km)   Travel time w/brks: 16 hr 14   Distance since start: 6,385 mi (10,267 km)

Saturday 7/15/2006

We got up around 4am so that we could cross the river ahead of any large RV caravans. We had already learned that RVs had one of the lowest priorities for getting onto the Yukon river crossing ferry. We arrived at the ferry, at the edge of town, at 4:30am. It was waiting by the shore and there was no line. In ten minutes we rolled off the ferry on the other side. It is worth pointing out that since this is a temporary arrangement before a real bridge is put up, there is no real dock for the ferry to "attach" to. Instead, the ferry just rams the moraine/sand shore and keeps the motor(s) running to prevent it from drifting downstream while cars and trucks get off. It would seem like they are using some sort of heavy machinery to patch the ram-area from time to time. This arrangement made it a bit hard for us to take the Airstream off the ferry because it is so low in the rear. I was certain that we'd see some sort of bind and, sure enough, we got caught with the front of the trailer as I tried to avoid getting caught with the rear.. but we were able to reverse back onto the ferry and try again. It did not appear to leave any permanent damage on the trailer so we suspect the hitch assembly was what hit the boat ramp.

Early morning just after we crossed the Yukon River with a ferry -- Dawson City in the background

Once on the other side we were now on the Top of the World highway. We had already driven over it yesterday, on our way to Clinton Creek, so we knew what we were up against in terms of road quality. The road is not all that great. It is a mix of pavement and gravel. We counted 24 changes from pavement over to gravel from the river crossing to the Canada/US border. Even if you try, it is hard to drive faster than 35 mph. The pavement is full of deep dips that are nasty when you tow a long trailer. The oscillating double dips are especially nasty -- as the truck bounces from the first dip it dives right into a second one, amplifying the previous dip even more. Like so many roads up here, summer is when you do road work. We ran into at least one active road construction, but there were several sections where the gravel was fresh. They basically count on cars and trucks to pack down gravel on the road. If you hit it when it is fresh, you do not have the best of steering controls.

Sunrise over Top of the World highway

The road itself has spectacular views. You can see mountain ranges all around you, near and afar. The border crossing is only open from 9AM to 9PM (Yukon Time). We knew that but we preferred to wait at the border rather than at the ferry. We arrived at the border, aka the Poker Pass, about 2 1/2 hours before opening. This is the northernmost US border crossing. We used this time to eat breakfast and clean up a bit in the trailer. Someone (who shall remain anonymous) put our large box of detergent powder just inside the closet door and subsequently forgot to tie a bungee cord around the door handles. The large box of detergent had, of course, tumbled out of the closet and left plenty of stuff on the floor. This had to be hand-swept since we did not have any 120V electricity. What was also amusing was to find clothes on the floor from another closet, who's doors were closed. In other words, the bumping and swinging had caused the closet to open its door, spit out some clothes and the close the door again. We were first in line to cross the border. Here the time changed one more hour to Alaska time.

Waiting for the Poker Pass to open

Isabella cleans up from the detergent box that tumbled out of the closet

We had heard that the road would be bad over to the US side, but so far it had not been that bad. Granted, the Canadian side was full of pot holes and a few things had gotten thrown around in the trailer. But it was not that bad as long as you stayed below 35 mph. We expected the road to look the same way on the US side. Not so. The US side is nothing more than a narrow dirt road. Not a speck of pavement anywhere. For a while it was not too bad. Then the rain started. We even had some hail. The road got very slippery and we had to slow down to a crawl. There were a few sharp turns as well.

The road to Chicken turn slippery in the rain

Dirty, we finally reach the first US village in Alaska: Chicken

We took a break as we arrived in Chicken. The trailer was dirty from all the mud. The local shop had a bumper sticker that read: Where the hell is Chicken? I got a good laugh out of that one. Exactly. Who'd want to go here? But here we were. After some souvenir shopping and free coffee we hit the road again. It turns out that I had made a slight error in calculating the distance of today's drive. I though it was about 280 miles or so from Dawson City to Fairbanks. It was more like 400. That does make a difference when the roads are not that great. The pavement resumed about 3 miles outside of Chicken. That was nice. Shortly after we left Chicken we went through a fresh forest fire. It was still smoldering and it had probably been put out by the rain.

This is what is left of a fast moving forest fire: it cleans out all dry branches on the pine trees and then moves on

We could see that the area, in general, had been quite affected by forest fires in general. The one we drove through was just one of many that appeared to have swept through in recent years. Shortly before we got to Tok, I was so tired he wanted to take a break. We ate a bit of food and I then took a nap in the back of the trailer. The kids read, slept and whatever. When I woke up from the powernap we were ready to hit the road again. The kids had amused themselves by listening to the wind. They claimed they kept hearing a faint sound of a flute playing scales in the wind. I could barely hear it but was fairly certain it was nothing more than wind. But it did sound odd. Isabella thought it was the trees that made the noise.

We kept going towards Fairbanks. We drove through Delta Junction as well. After Tok the road was quite flat. That was such a nice relief after all the pot holes we had been through. As we got closer and closer to Fairbanks it was clear that we were not going to get in as early as I had hoped. And then, to top it off, the Smartire alarm went off. Perhaps it was just a fluke? We pulled over and checked it out. Sure enough. One of the camper tires was losing air. We continued for another 1/2 mile to safe turn off area and replaced it with a spare. The tire appears to have ruptured structurally. It was no longer round.

Flat tire #1 -- spare goes on the trailer with the help of a "bridge"

It did not take long until we were back on the road again. Only problem was that we were now down by one spare for the trailer. Since the original plan called for a one night stop-over in Fairbanks before heading up the Dalton Highway, I really wanted to get us back to two spares before heading out. But this was Saturday. We tried to call from the road, but it was not easy to locate a place when the only connectivity we had was the satellite phone. Meanwhile, we had to keep driving so that we at least had a small chance to find a dealer. As we got closer to Fairbanks we were low enough on fuel that we had to get some more. We used that opportunity to stop at the tourist information for North Pole, the city just south of Fairbanks.

We looked for help with a spare tire and diesel at the North Pole

We got some pointers but soon realized that we were not going to get a tire today nor tomorrow. We were now basically obliged to stay two nights in Fairbanks if we did not want to expose ourselves too much to being stuck on the Dalton Highway. Could be worse. The weather was not that great when we arrived in Fairbanks. The city itself is not that large. Perhaps we had expected it to be bigger. I had talked with Rich Kushman, back in Dawson City, regarding a place to stay, and had been recommended a place called Chena Marina. And that is where we drove. It turned out to be a nice campground, located besides a long river-fed pond used to get pontoon airplanes up and down. We were tired and we just crashed right there. After dinner, Isabella tried to catch fish in the airplane pond just outside. She caught a Northern Pike but threw it back in again.

Campground   Name: Chena Marina RV Park, Fairbanks, AK   Our hookups: 30 amp, Water, Cable, Sewer   WiFi: Yes   GSM service: Yes   TV Channels: Yes   Cost: $39.10/night   Reservation mode: Phone

[Next day] [Previous Day] [Main] [Summary]

All Pictures (c) 2006 Hamnqvist, Background features the Yukon Sky.