Ocean Sail Issue 24 - Sunday, August 06, 2000

Location: Captain Cook Inlet – Waiting for Low Tide.

It’s 9:30am and the Hummer is poised on a slight bank at the top of ramp that leads to the beach. We are overlooking Captain Cook Inlet. To our right is a small beach shack painted pale blue with fishing nets stretched out on a rack  behind it. The gravel beach stretches out for many miles to the right, 3 that we know of. To the left the beach stretches out for 3 miles and our blocked exit. This is the sea equivalent of running aground. But we and the Hummer are safe from the sea and the only thing to do is wait for the tide to reverse.

To get here from Prince Rupert, where we left the ferry, we crossed back east through British Columbia to Dawson Creek and the start of the Alaskan Highway – or AlCan Highway. But really it should be called Canadian Highway because the greatest length of it is in Canada, over 1000 miles of it’s 1400 mile length. The legend of the highway proceeds it itself as many road guides suggest that you should take two extra spare tires, and extra fuel too. And these sort of  claims are not a true refection of the modern highway that it is. For almost it’s entire length it is a sealed or hard surface road. The only place you will find gravel is in the parking lots and construction zones, of which there are many. Services are well located with no more then 100 miles between fuel stops. I would compare driving the Alaskan Highway to driving to Nebraska from the west coast on the highway US 50. It’s a well graded two lane highway with a lot great scenery.

The scenery is a different mater all together. From Dawson Creek to Watson Lake you travel on the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountain. It’s an odd combination of tall timber and muskeg swamps where the stunted trees grow no higher then a few meters. The stunted trees look like forlorn Charlie Brown Christmas trees. From Watson lake you pass over the northern edge of Rocky Mountains. From here north it’s a geologically different range called the Mackenzie Mountains. Though they follow the same arc through the continent. There are no majestic mountains tops clad in white caps scraping the sky, just broad open vistas with smaller hills and mountains to set a back drop. That is until you pass Whitehorse and Haynes Junction and enter the Kuane National Park (Canada). Here the Saint Elias Mountains soar before you with tongues of glacial ice pour out of the valleys. It is the largest single glacial ice formation in a non-polar region – or as they proclaim more then all the surface (non-frozen) fresh water in North America.

From Haynes Junction the highway turns Northwest in almost a strait line save for a little jog at the boarder to Delta Junction or Fairbanks. Both Delta Junction and Fairbanks claim to be the end of the Alaska Highway, though Delta Junction plays it up a bit more with an end of Highway marker for the tourist to take pictures of – us included.

In 1978 major improvements were made to the Alaskan Highway, and at every turn and corner we would look for the “original” road, and in a few places we were able to drive it. When we did we were nostalgic for a time when the road would have been a quainter, but slower road. A road where the trees, brush, stream and hills were closer to you and maybe the route was not so even and well graded. It would have been harder for the mob of fifth-wheel trailers and motor homes, but that is a compromise that I was willing to make. This straightening of the highway has also reeked havoc with the mile markers, since they have taken hundreds of miles out of the historical highway. But to compensate they have placed historical mile markers and information boards at key locations throughout the way. 

It was an interesting drive, and one that ranks up with things that one does because they are there but I am not sure that I would do it gain. Not because it too difficult but because it was not difficult enough. On the way back we will take more obscure routes like the “Top of the World” highway to Dawson City and Robert Campbell Highway back to Watson Lake then back track on the Cassiar Highway to Prince Rupert. But we still have to make to Prudhoe Bay, which is far north as you can drive a vehicle.

In Fairbanks we ambush a friend and colleague from work, Eric Nace and he let us have access to his cable modem and high speed Internet connection. We have been  on the road for more then a week and the back log of mail and deferred life duties is surprising. Much of it has to do with the boat, as we are little over a month and half till it is ready and the last details are being ironed out. We take a historic riverboat cruise on a stern wheeler for the afternoon and it’ high class affair with good information and a well coordinated shore side visit to a reproduction native village with native tour guides. At $40 dollar each it’s a real bargain up here. Diner and a show at the Malamute Saloon with him and his parents is an unexpected treat. We know some real Alaskans.

From Fairbanks we head south intending to visit in Denali National Park, but the weather is really unsettled, and is raining hard. Also the camping is booked in the park for a couple of days, so we continue southward toward Anchorage. On the way we find an almost Hummer class road across a long cut to Anchorage. Not being able to deny the temptation we take the over the pass dirt road and find the most amazing scenery. We are driving up a velvet green glacial valley with a stream running down the center. Small gold mines dot the edge of the valley. They make tempting destinations, but all the mine roads have long been overgrown or blocked with gates with “Keep out – This means you” signs.  We crest the pass and make camp Hummer style a mile or so below the summit. In the distance we can see glaciers in the next range.

The next day the weather has cleared and we head down to Anchorage intending to get a major service done on the Hummer. The only Hummer dealer in Alaska is in Anchorage and this is major service interval requiring replacement of all fluids: engine, transmission, transfer case, differential, and coolant. The dealer is a busy  but agrees to take us if we can leave it overnight. So we find a hotel, unpack the vehicle and drop the Hummer off by 10 am on Thursday with a promise to have the work done by Friday afternoon. However an ominous feeling sweeps over me when the service advisor asks me if it is a “V8” engine.

We have our bikes and we take really our first long ride down and around the water front bike path which is a 20 mile return trip. The high light of the ride is seeing three moose (or meese), a mother, baby then later presumably the father. Our butts are sore from the hard seats, which we correct the next day with a visit to REI .

Friday rolls in wet and rainy and we hang in the hotel room hooked to the net. We make a couple calls to the service advisor, but only get voice mail. At noon we extend our hotel room till 3pm after the service dispatcher tills us that he hasn’t gotten to the Hummer yet. Also he does not have a free lift that can raise the Hummer. We head out on the now dry roads on bikes for lunch and hope for the best. Upon our return we find out that they could not change the oil in the differentials because they don’t have the right gaskets or seals. We can pick Hummer at 4pm – with only the oil changed – something we could have done at Jiffy Lube in 20 minutes, instead of 30 hours.

Finally we have the Hummer back and headed south gain. This time toward Seward, Whittier and Homer. Along the way we stop by the Turnagain Arm and wait for the tidal bore to come it. It’s a two hour wait but quite a sight seeing a wall of water 2 to 4 feet high coming down the inlet at the coming of high tide.  Concluding that waiting game, we head up in the hills to an old preserved mining camp were stay for the night.  After a brief tour about the mining camp which consist of  a number of old cute frame building leaning in various directions we head south to Seward. On the way we pass through more amazing scenery of lush green mountains with glaciers oozing out  their high “U” shaped valleys. The city of Seward contains more RVs and motor homes that we have ever seen, they are lined side by each in along the shore line city provided camping ground It is also the start of the Historical Ididerod Trail. Since the whole town was destroyed in the 1964 “Good Friday” earthquake there is not much historical here. But again the backdrop is simply amazing – Seward sits on a long sloop that edges into the fiord. On both sides of the fiord the sheer vertical sides of the glacial cut mountains that plunge in the milky aqua blue waters.

From Seward we continue south and leave the land of glaciers and enter the land of big timer and glacier rivers. We are headed toward Homer, the end of the road, but side trip to the west for the night at Captain Cook Inlet regional park. It sits high on a bluff overlooking the entrance to Turnagain inlet, were we watched the tide bore the night before. The road ends at the beach with an ominous sign waning us that vehicles should not be driven on the beach because soft sand and fast rising high tides. We camp the night on the bluff in the organized campground. The next morning we can’t resist the temptation to visit the beach again. So we drive the Hummer down on the beach and head north noting the state of the tide and attempting to remember the tide chart posted on the camp bulletin board. It is nice driving over the mostly round river rock beach. To our right is a 50 foot bluff that dips down every now an then for a creek or stream.   Nestled in these hollows is small camping and fishing huts, were the only apparent access is from the beach at something less then high tide. We drive down the beach several miles when we notice the tide is seeming to come up instead of down. Turning around and heading back down the beach our tracks in some places have been covered by the incoming tide.

We pass the pale blue beach house with a ramp to higher ground on the way back and then come to the first set of obstacles that block our way. A boulder field from the bluff extends to the rising sea where we had passed just 15 minutes before. We drive through a foot of water to clear the first one, but the next field is wider and under more water. Hummer can drive in over 3 feet of water, but we are not sure that there is not a third block ahead that would have us caught without sure escape from the tide. Time is on our side so we double back to the pale blue beach house gives us safety from the tide and a chance to catch up on our reading and writing.

Kim and Kim on the Road