June 30, 2012 – Caribou RV Park, Whitehorse, Yukon Ter. Canada

We have officially traveled all of the Alcan Highway. If you recall, when we were headed up to Alaska, we went to Dawson City from Whitehorse and then across the Top of the World Highway to Tok. This morning we left Tok at 8 and planned on stopping about 400 miles later at Whitehorse for the night. 10 hours later we checked into the Caribou RV Park. When we were discussing going to Dawson City on the way up, or waiting for the trip back, I talked to a couple people at Watson Lake who make the trip every year. They told me that Dawson City and the TOW would be a smoother journey then going north for Whitehorse to Tok. After taking the TOW, we both could not understand how the ALCAN north of Whitehorse could be worse than the unpaved end of the TOW. WELL, we can now say that they were absolutely right. Leaving Tok this morning, the first part was good road until just south of where the TOW joined the Alcan south of Tok. Then we started hitting some road damage from frost heaves.

Most of the Alcan of Whitehorse is built on top of Perma Frost. The Perma Frost will thaw from the road heat and liquefy the soil. The road sinks into the soil and you now have a roller coaster roadway. During the winter the soil freezes and will heave up or split the road and cause it to move sideways. When we were in Fairbanks the tour guide told us that when they went to redo a road there, they found 12ft of asphalt that had been used to fill one area of the road that kept sinking in the Perma Frost. Now you are driving on a road that has sudden dips and also cracks that run length wise in the road to cause only one side to dip. To repair the road, they asphalt over the dip/cracks or they break it up and pile a mixture of rock and dirt on it which is then smoothed and compacted. The repairs can go on for miles at a time. Since we woke up to rain, and it rained through most of the drive, when we hit the areas of rock and dirt repair the road was a muddy mess that was now full of water filled potholes. Almost the whole trip today required us to drive between 25 and 45 mph. Even at 5 or 10 mph, the RV shook enough to move the couch away from the wall, against the chairs and move anything around that was not fastened down.

What the rock/dirt repaired road looked like today.

Did I say that we hit 38 degrees at one point in the drive and saw fresh snow on top of the mountains? When we got here the temperature was back up to 58 degrees. Had a great supper of pork roast, mashed potatoes, corn, and strawberry rhubarb pie with ice cream for desert. Now I will post this and just set for what is left of the evening. The truck and RV need to be sprayed off, but I decided to wait until tomorrow morning to see if it is raining again before tackling that project.

I think it needs a bath.