Driving to Skagway, Alaska, at -20 degrees
I’m always watching the weather for good road-trip days. The longer I’ve been off the road, though, the more accepting I am of what I might at other times consider a mediocre day, and yesterday was one of those.
With some sun and a high of -22°C (-8°F) forecast for Whitehorse…
… and some sun and a high of +19°F (-7°C) in Skagway, it had the potential for some Kodak moments 🙂
I pulled out of the driveway a minute before 9:00 am at -29°C (-20°F). Sunrise was 51 minutes away, but the dawn light starts much earlier here due to the shallow angle the sun is at.
By the time I fueled up, and came back home to fire up the compressor to fill a low tire, it was almost sunrise. This was shot about 10 miles down the South Klondike Highway at 09:46.
I love this view of Gray Ridge.
An interesting tower of light just north of Carcross at 10:03.
At Carcross, a colorful sundog was visible.
Even at -27°, work goes on at the “retail village” in downtown Carcross.
Tutshi Lake still has lots of open water, so is creating lots of “steam”. Fully covered by snow, this is what the road reports call “normal winter driving conditions”. My 2001 Subaru Outback has 254,000km on it, and with its all-wheel-drive is so perfect for these roads that I just never get very far when I think about replacing it. In the winter, I’m running Toyo Studless tires, which grip well.
The mist from the lake coats the trees along the beach thickly with frost.
I had the fur-kids with me, so we made our usual stop at Tutshi Lake, though their run was much shorter than it is in the summer 🙂 The sign for boaters is funny now, but even in the summer, it’s rare to see a boat on any of these lakes.
The open water is quickly freezing over – when I stopped here again 4 hours later, most of this water had a thin layer of ice on it.
Up in the White Pass at 11:14, the air was thick with ice crystals, enough to cause the camera problems with focussing.
At the lower right, the well-protected “Welcome to Alaska” sign is disappearing under snow.
Here’s a 3-minute video I shot to show you a few miles of the highway from the William Moore Bridge towards Skagway.
The White Pass & Yukon Route railway (WP&YR) is on a major equipment upgrading program – these old passenger cars (not very old – built in 1969 and 1976) will be put on a barge to go to Seattle for rebuilding.
I didn’t stay in Skagway very long – the increasing wind made me nervous that the pass could close because of blizzard/whiteout conditions. That would be no big deal if I was by myself, but with the dogs along it would be problematic. I made a quick stop at the post office to pick up an addition to my large collection of Alaska Highway books (“Highway to Alaska” by Herbert C. Lanks, 1944) and pointed the car north again.
This view looking south across Summit Lake was shot at 12:39 pm.
There hadn’t been anywhere near as much sun as I’d expected, but it looked brighter for the drive home.
The rock bluff is known as Ptarmigan Point on the railway, which is buried beneath the snow at the base of the bluff.
I shot this at Log Cabin. At this point, I’d seen some Highways Dep’t vehicles, 3 transport trucks and no private vehicles from Carcross to Skagway and back again – some 90 miles.
Wow – this is why I make this drive again and again and again – and again… 🙂
The sundogs were brilliant but behind me as I drove north, and I stopped a few times to get out and enjoy them.
Back at Tutshi Lake, but in the sunshine.
As I was taking photos on the beach at Tutshi Lake, a heard a snowplow coming, and got a few photos as it went by on the highway above.
The snowplow that I’d taken the photos of was at the main Tutshi Lake viewing area when I stopped to get this photo, and the driver walked back to chat. It was great meeting you, Charlotte 🙂
Hour after hour of sundogs!
Looking up – waaay up – to the 1906 Venus silver mine.
I was home by 3:15 with 120 photos after editing, a couple of videos and an excellent addition to my historical library – a fine day!
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