Yukon RVing: Back to Kluane Lake
For me and my family, Kluane Lake is an amazingly calming place, so last Friday, I got the RV loaded, and when Cathy got off work, I met her at the first rest area north of Whitehorse. In a few minutes, we had her Tracker hooked up to the rig and we were headed west on the Alaska Highway again.
By 6:30, we were well west of Haines Junction, and spotted fresh snow on some of the peaks! Snow in July? Come on, Mother Nature, that’s just not funny! The weather forecast for the weekend was good, though – there should be no sign on Winter at lake level.
Once we reached Kluane Lake, Monty realized where we were and got very excited. He was right up front in lead dog mode, and the closer we got to Congdon Creek Campground, the more excited he got – driving down into the campground a few minutes after 7, he could hardly contain himself. It feels so good to be able to make him so happy.
A new bear activity sign had been posted at the registration kiosk, so we’d be on extra alert for the weekend. As expected, all of the lakefront sites were taken, so we got set up in one of the large pull-through sites in the forest.
Just after we arrived, a 5th wheel rig from Wisconsin arrived and set up directly across the road from us. Shortly after that, he fired up a very loud generator. The generator was still running when I went to bed about 10:00 pm – Cathy said that he didn’t shut it down until around 11. And at 08:00 Saturday morning, it was fired up again. The ignorance of some people just leaves me shaking my head. So much for our amazingly calming place.
By 10:00 am, though, a couple of lakefront sites had been vacated, so we moved down to one. From there we could barely hear the generator. Even Friday night, we did take the dogs for a long walk and a couple of shorter ones between some fairly heavy rain showers.
We got on the road for a bit of a wander after an early lunch. The first stop was the main trailhead at Sheep Mountain, from where the Slim’s River West, Sheep Creek and Bullion Plateau trails start. I was quite taken aback by the crowd – I’ve never see anywhere close to this many vehicles here (about 30).
The coolest rig in the parking was certainly this Mitsubishi Fuso FG 4×4 that had been shipped over from Germany. I often wonder where these people are going that they think they need a rig like this.
The main reason for coming back to Sheep Mountain, though, was to hike a short section of the original 1942 route of the Alaska Highway that I’d never been on. It used to connect with the Soldiers Summit trail, but a rock slide has cut that connection. In this photo you can see 3 of the 4 routes that exist – the oldest one is just a bulldozer track higher up the slope, that never became an actual road.
Part of the reason for hiking it was to see if anything remains from the construction era. All I found was this piece of the Canol pipeline sticking out of the bank (lower right in the photo). Down on the Slim’s River flats, a couple more sections of it can be seen from the highway.
Kluane Lake was as calm as I’ve ever seen it, so the beach would be the main focus of the rest of the day. We first went to the parking are at Km 1642.1, where there’s a large beach to play on.
Getting Bella to swim was great fun! She really got into it, and I wish that we had much more access to warm water so we could have more days like this.
Monty tires quite quickly, but he puts on some wonderful bursts of speed to keep the little one on her toes 🙂
Saturday night was incredibly beautiful, and we took the dogs for another long walk along the beach at the campground. This photo was just a few minutes before 8:00 pm.
Looking the other direction a couple of minutes later.
Monty and Bella continued their water play – they’d certainly sleep well tonight 🙂
The pie master at work. Cooked over the campfire, what a yummy dessert!
The girls enjoying life – while Bella watches a squirrel, Molly just soaks up all the great smells.
Cathy and I keep pinching ourselves – we love this new life 🙂
It’s now August 1st – the RV is all packed, and in about 3 hours we and good friends who have rented an RV to join us are heading up the Alaska Highway for a 16-day wander through Alaska, going as far as Denali and Seward. This will be our longest RV trip yet, and will take all the others into territory they haven’t seen before.
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