July 18th to 20th - Copper Canyon, Beaver Creek, Whitehorse

July 18th – Wed – to Copper Canyon
We had a wonderful lazy day today. Our 8 o’clock departure was delayed a bit when Dave discovered that one of the motor home tires that he checked last night was pretty squishy when he put his jacks up this morning. So he hooked up his little air pump which takes a while to inflate a MH tire. Then we were on our way under high clouds.
We soon drove out of the clouds into blue skies again for the rest of our long 108 mile drive through amazing scenery as usual. We got dry camping sites right on the Klutinia River, made lunch and got down to the serious business of watching people fish. The water is very fast and fishing is done mostly from the banks or wading into the river a few feet. We met a guy from Germany who was there with his family so Terry & Dave gave him tips on fishing when he got to Valdez. They gave him a couple of lures so he reciprocated by giving them individual bottles of a special liqueur.
We went for a drive to see the rest of the area and ended up at a Princess Cruise Line lodge. It was not super impressive initially but we walked around the building to an awesome view & patios and then inside to a very nice facility. We went to the bar where the bartender recommended the national drink of Brazil which turned out to be a great lime & rum concoction. We sipped our drinks in the sunshine on the patio with the marvelous view.
Back at the RV park & fishing lodge, we perfected our people watching techniques aided in a bit by a couple of drinks for happy hour. After dinner when it cooled off (9:00) we went inside and Dave & Margo taught us to play Uno. Let me see – their game and Dave won the first game and Margo won the second!!

July 19th – Thurs – to Beaver Creek
We left at 7:30 for a longer drive today. We stopped for fuel at Glenallen and then turned on the Tok Cutoff road to Tok. The road was quite bumpy and we had to slow down a lot. We were stopped at one construction site for about 20 minutes while load after load of gravel was dumped, leveled and watered before the stretch was open to one way traffic. We thought we were going to have to go all way to Tok to find somewhere for breakfast/lunch but we saw a little café and pulled in. We were just ordering when a guy came in and asked if we were driving the motor home out front (we were the only people in the café) and we all thought it was blocking a driveway or propane tank. Turns out Dave’s bicycle rack had broken and he was dragging the bikes. We all went out to see, get the bikes off, throw away the mangled front tire from Margo’s bike and find a spot to put the bikes. One went in our back seat and the one without the front tire fit in their tow car. We went back in for a good breakfast and continued on our way.
In Tok we went to a service station for fuel and we thought they might have a welder to fix the bike rack. They directed Dave down the road a short ways and he was able to unhook his car, pull his hitch and get it welded. Once again, back on the road and on our way.
The road from Tok to the Yukon border is pretty bumpy & wavy – and then it gets worse! Actually, it is all about the same. According to the Milepost, “there are improved stretches mixed with good highways going bad”. We are staying at the Westwind RV park which has only a few other campers. We really enjoyed our happy hour drinks today! I thawed spaghetti sauce for an easy shared dinner, and then Margo & I did a couple loads of laundry since it is right here in the park. The sun just set at 10:45.

July 20th – Fri – to Whitehorse
Another longer driving day so we left at 7:00! I put my foot down at a suggestion that we leave at 6! The road continued to be a challenge but it was very nice for the first couple of hours to have very little traffic so we could use whichever side of the road that looked the best. We stopped at the Kluane Museum of Natural History at Burwash Landing, then just down the road at Destruction Bay for lunch and at Haines Junction for fuel.
When we got to Whitehorse, we stopped at Kal Tire to get a new tire mounted on the spare since we used the good one when we left Wasilla. We joined D&M at WalMart and then Dave figured he better go to the tire shop as his front tire was low again and he thought he better get a new stem. By the time he & Terry got back it was time for a much deserved rest & happy hour.
Margo made 2 styles of halibut for dinner and I made salad & potatoes. We do eat well! After dinner we went to WalMart but it is not a supercenter so has very little fresh produce which is what we needed. We bought a few items, dropped them off and walked to the Superstore which ended up being closed. We didn’t bother changing our clocks to PDT as we are going back to Alaska tomorrow so it was an hour earlier to us. A bit of TV and lights out!