Alaska Trip - Day 14

We made it to Alaska!!!

Woop Woop!!!

Today we left Whitehorse, Yukon and headed for the town of Tok, Alaska. It was about a 10 hour drive and let me tell you...we felt all of the ten hours. Between being anxious about just getting to Alaska and being tired of being in the car, we just wanted to get there. It was a long day.

We left Whitehorse at about 10:30 in the morning and we got to Alaska at 8:30 at night (PST); we entered into the Alaska Time Zone, 1 hour behind Pacific, so it was actually 7:30pm. Most of the drive consisted of the Yukon, boring old Yukon!


We stopped every few hours or so to let the dogs out and stretch our legs. Well, as we followed the road through a curve the valley opened up and there was this huge, extremely blue lake. It was a beautiful shade of this sea blue color...the same color we saw in Tahiti. it was a glacier lake created by the runoff of a nearby glacier. It was beautiful! We pulled over to get out and take a picture. The shores were a black sand...we haven't seen any sand along the shores of any waterway - so this was just amazing! As we all got out the dogs quickly ran across the shoreline. We took in the view and Tracy had to attempt to skip at least one rock along this perfectly blue, calm lake. Without even noticing, or paying attention, she geared up to throw the rock...and the minute she let it go toward the water...so went Chloe!!! Right into the Glacier Water!! Yep...she thought we were in San Diego again and playing catch with her in the ocean. Without even thinking twice, Chloe went dodging into the frigid water!! Instantly we started screaming at her, and cracking up at the same time...it was hysterically funny!! We dried her off the best we could and left the scenic beach with a wet dog...and a new wet dog smell.

We approached the last 100 miles or so of the trip (before the U.S. Border) and the Alaska Highway turned to crap! They obviously don't take care of that road! There were so many potholes and the road just kept going up and down, up and down (I call them woopdees). We finally got to the U.S. Border and as we pulled up we were nervous that they would give us a hard time...we had it so easy getting into Canada, we thought for sure we would get searched coming into the U.S....Nope! They asked us a few questions and sent us on our way! Damn! All that work for nothing! Oh well, we should be thankful that it was easy.


We had finally made it to Alaska, yet we still had another couple hours of driving to do before we got to Tok. The part of Alaska that borders the Yukon, no shock to anyone, looks just like the Yukon...crappy. So, we weren't impressed. As the drive went on, the views got much better and we were happy with its scenery...and the roads were much better too!


We finally drove into the city of Tok, quickly finding the cabins we were staying in. This place, Caribou Cabins, was amazing! We drove down this gravel road to a driveway, turned into it and nestled in the forest were 4 cabins. There was a large cabin in the back where the family that owns the place lives, it was also the office. We threw the dogs in the cabin, disconnected the Jeep and ran out to get some laundry done before they closed. We ended up using a laundromat at an RV park...how ghetto! Oh well, it worked. We went to get some food then went back to the cabin. Now, by this time, its already 11pm, our time. We didn't even get to enjoy this place!! We did a quick webcam with Grandma Lauri, Emily was tired so she wasn't in a good mood though. Then, and this is the funny part, I took Chloe outside to play ball for 15 mins or so. Yes, it was still light enough outside, it was almost midnight. Shortly after that we all went to bed and Em actually slept throughout the night in her crib! Welcome to Alaska!