Starting 2012 off right with a drive to Skagway
Wow, it’s the 7th of January already! Times does fly when you’re having fun 🙂
We had a very quiet New Year’s Eve as usual. The City put on an excellent fireworks display at 9:00 pm, and I made it to 11:50 before going to bed. Cathy says that the next-door neighbour put on a good fireworks show at midnight, despite it being illegal. The photo below is from the City’s show, not the neighbour’s!
The weather on average is still well above the norm, but I haven’t heard a single person complaining about it. I’ve been working at the travel agency a lot lately, and it’s so nice to be able to go for a walk at lunch without wearing even a hat or gloves.
On Tuesday I took a day off from the many jobs I should be doing, and drove to Skagway. I was on the road just before 10:00 am, and took this photo at 10:05, a minute before official sunrise.
Spirit Lake Lodge is still open, though I noticed that most of the motel rooms have plywood over the windows now, so it may not be for long.
I stopped for a few minutes at the Carcross Desert to run the fur-kids.
I made a loop around Carcross and let the dogs out again for a run on the beach. This view is about as close as I get to my cabin anymore – it’s probably time to sell it and move on…
The snowplow was out on Bennett Avenue in Carcross cleaning up the overnight fall of about 3-4 inches.
I passed this snowplow down by Tutshi Lake, then pulled over at a viewpoint to get this shot.
Tutshi Lake was mostly still open, but a skim of ice was forming.
The overnight snow hadn’t been cleared from the access road into our normal stop on Tutshi Lake, so I continued on.
This classic view at Km 48 often stops me, in any season.
Another of the always-impressive views, at the Alaska border.
Skagway got a few inches of snow overnight as well, but crews already had Broadway pretty well cleaned up.
The final bit of snow clearing on Broadway being done, in front of the National Park Service headquarters.
The White Pass & Yukon Route shops.
Some of the wind gusts were very strong! Brrr!
I made the detour to the viewpoint on the Dyea Road, just to see the snowy, very quiet harbor.
I love watching rotary snowplows/snowblowers of any size, but the bigger the better!
The wind reduced visibility quite a bit at the summit, to the point that the video camera was having a hard time keeping focus.
The lack of snow at this point along Tutshi Lake was odd, and I can’t figure out whether it was warm weather or high winds that did it.
The ice on Windy Arm was incredibly smooth and snowfree for a couple of weeks, and there are several good videos on YouTube showing people skating on it.
Almost home, at 3:49 pm. This is the Alaska Highway at the boundary of the City of Whitehorse. Though you see very few buildings for the next 10 miles or so, so there are hundreds of homes on acreages off to the side out of sight.
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