Frosty day exploring west of Whitehorse
It is soooo beautiful right now – the temperature is still not bad, hanging around -20°C (-4°F), and the sunshine and thick frost are distractingly pretty. Yesterday I went exploring for a bit. I had to meet a Web site client out to the west just before sunrise, and the pastels of the morning light made it difficult to not stop along the way.
Although it was clear on the Alaska Highway up on the bench above the Yukon River, the fog in the valley where downtown Whitehorse is located was very thick, and I heard the radio announcer say that he couldn’t see much of anything out the window. That’s the #1 reason that most of the new housing built in the past 20 years is up on the bench or on the hills even higher – to keep out of that fog, which can last for many days, even weeks when it gets really cold. Although the radio guy called the current fog “ice fog,” it isn’t really. Ice fog forms at temperatures of about -40°C and lower – this stuff is just caused by the cold air hitting the relative warmth of the open water on the Yukon River and some lakes.
After my meeting I drove a bit further west, but didn’t seen anything too inspiring – this is one of the few photos I took. Although it looks like very early morning, this was shot at 11:10.
Elk are common off to the west of town, and I met a group of 4 bulls grazing alongside the highway.
About half a mile from the elk, this sign at the Drury ranch made me chuckle – it says “Yukon Elk Meat”. They have their own herd of elk 🙂 I must try elk some day…
The view below is looking back to the west along the Alaska Highway.
A frosty irrigation system at one of the farms.
A detour along the “Old Alaska Highway” (the Historic Mile 929-934 section) produced this photo, which is the view towards Whitehorse.
This photo taken on the Alaska Highway shows the valley fog clearly – yuch!
I spent a few hours at the cruise office, then took a few photos at the airport and Transportation Museum on the way home about half an hour after sunset. The woolly mammoth looks right at home, doesn’t he? 🙂 This would have been a better photo if I had shot it from 20 feet or so to the right, but I didn’t have my snow-wading boots with me.
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