Near Tok, Alaska August 7, 2013

This morning we left the campground at Valdez and headed toward Tok. We both noticed as we left Valdez that there are many glaciers on the mountains surrounding Valdez. There is a lot of water flowing into the ocean from them.

The climb out of Valdez to Thomson Pass is quite steep for a ways, but we made it OK. The road is mostly good with the exception of about 10 miles which is full of frost heaves. The further we got from Valdez, the warmer it got.

We decided to take the road to Copper Center and saw some of the old buildings. Cindy especially liked an old church made from logs. I don’t know how old it is, but Cindy wanted to take pictures of it.

When we got to Glennallen it was about 75 degrees. This is quite a bit warmer than the 55 degrees we had in Valdez.

We wanted to take the Tok Cutoff road. So far it has been in bad condition with a very few smooth places. We are presently parked at a rest area at mile 75. On the way here we had to wait for a flag car to take us about 2 miles that the Alaska Highway Department is working on. This rest area has a very large paved and gravel space that is almost next to the river. We will spend the night here.

Tonight we had some of the salmon I caught in the Prince William Sound at Valdez. It was very good. We still have 50 miles to Tok and don’t know where we will stay tomorrow night, but I think somewhere in Canada. To be fair the last 20 miles the road going into Tok was excellent.

From where we are it is still 450 miles to Whitehorse so I know we are not going to try to go that far tomorrow. We drove almost 225 miles today and with the roads in the shape they are, that was almost too far. I have heard that the road from the Canadian border toward Whitehorse is in really rough shape, with lots of frost heaves.

We did see lots of beautiful scenery on the way here, and some that was pretty ordinary. The pretty parts far outnumber the plain parts. There seem to be lots of little lakes along the way.

The river by us is pretty muddy, so I suppose it is another glacier fed river. Looking back at the Wrangell Mountains there are many glaciers on the high peaks, so I guess that is where the rivers start.

We drove into Tok and the gift shop has free wi-fi. The internet is so slow that I will have to wait to post the pictures when we get to Whitehorse. That is where I will be able to post again.

Thanks for visiting.