Wednesday, June 29, 2022 – We started the day in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, and departed at 8:30 am for Tok, in Alaska. Before we left the Pioneer RV Park, we decided to dump our tanks and their dump site. There were a whole host of RVs parked near the dump site that were part of a caravan to Alaska. They were parked very close together and had nearly no room between each unit after pushing out their slides. We were able to dump our tanks though and we moved out onto the Alaska Highway heading towards Alaska. 

After about two hours of driving, we were approaching a place called Otter Creek that has a small store with one gas pump. We drove past the store and thought that we would pull off at the bridge just a short distance away where there were restrooms and a chance to look at the scenic bridge. Just before we arrived at the pull out, we noticed clouds of smoke on the right side of the RV trailer. From our experience, we knew immediately that this meant we had another broken shackle and that two of our tires were rubbing together. That turned out to be true. We stopped the rig and, sure enough, the right rear shackle had broken completely away from the frame. The question now was, “What do you do to get it fixed when you are way out in the wilderness?” 

We disconnected the RV and left it at the rest stop while we drove back to the store to see if there were any services nearby.  The store proprietor did not know of any services and thought that we would have to drive it back to Whitehorse (two-hour drive) or have someone from Whitehouse come out to help us. He then pointed out a man sitting in a truck just outside the door. The proprietor said that he was a “local” and might be able to help. We went outside and met Jim the Mechanic. Jim is a super nice guy and began calling places in Haines Junction to see who could help. He knew that several people were out of town, but then he thought of a guy named Vladd, who might be available. He contacted Vladd and Vladd said that he would prefer that we head into town where he could fix it. We said that we were reluctant to drive the RV, so Vladd agreed to come to our rescue. He would be there in about an hour and the drive was about 20 miles one way. 

When Vladd arrived, he had a huge truck the size of a semi-truck tractor with diesel generators for welding and torches for cutting metal. He even had a hydraulic hoist that could be used to lift heavy equipment onto his truck. He saw our situation and analyzed what he had to do and then went about fixing our RV. He cut out new steel, drilled holes for the wet-bolts that hold the springs in place and added more reinforcement steel to make the unit stronger. It took him quite a while to do the job, but he wanted to make sure that it would not give us problems in the future. After four hours of work, he had it back together again. We did not have enough cash to pay him, so we followed him into Haines Junction to find an ATM. He charged us one hour for driving time both ways with his huge truck and then four hours of labor. So, five hours at $100 CAD per hour or $500. We were very happy with this fee. It was quite reasonable and worked out to just under $400 in US dollars. Vladd was a very nice guy and really wanted to help us out. Jim went way out of his way to find the right person to help us. Another guy named Martin and his wife Karen stopped by and helped us jack up the rig and pull off the tire. Everyone who stopped by was super nice and helpful. 

At around 5:00pm we were in Haines Junction and another nice guy mentioned a nice bakery just around the corner that served pastries and sandwiches. Lisa had a sandwich and I had a large Chcken Pot Pie that was great. I also bought a large loaf of jalepeno cheese bread. Now were ready to drive a little farther down the road.

We drove to Kluane Lake (pronounced: Klu-aan-ee) and found a parking pullout right on the shore of the lake with huge mountains all around. The view was spectacular, and we did not even disconnect the truck. We just leveled the RV side-to-side a little and that was it. We pushed out the pushouts and then lowered our side deck so that we could enjoy the view from the deck. I will add some photos of the lake in the photo gallery. In fact, I am typing this text while enjoying the beautiful views all around us. Another great feature is that we used some mosquito spray around the RV and we are using the Thermacell Mosquito Repeller that Will gave us before we started our journey on the deck. It works great!! So, even though there are a zillion mosquitoes in the area. We can enjoy our RV and the deck without a single “bugger” bugging us. We basically have lost a day due to the shackle breakdown, but we will be off to Alaska in the morning. We have 104 miles to the Alaska border at Beaver Crossing. 

Note: My impressions so far about the quality of the Alaska Highway. It is an excellent road. Yes, there have been a few places where construction is taking place, but they are not that long. There are areas with “chip seal gravel” to cross over, but we have gone slow with no damage to our RV. As far as time goes, these delays have not been significant at all. There have been a few potholes in the road (some fairly large and deep) but I have been able to dodge them with relative ease. We are not to Alaska yet, so we will see tomorrow how the conditions are there. Thus far, the trip has been an excellent experience. We have seen tremendously beautiful country and many wild animals. We say a large black bear just before we arrive at our camping spot this evening. I would recommend this trip to anyone, although it does require quite a bit of time to get the most out of the journey. The Alaska Highway is amazing.  

Revised Note: After we left Kluane Lake, we began to run into some of the bad roads that we had heard about. There were repairs being made and sections with lots of frost heaves that cause the road to have ripples that can move you around from side to side or bounce you up and down. We also ran across sections of road with rather large potholes. After we crossed the border into Alaska, the overall surface of the road improve, but the number of large potholes increased. I was spending a lot of time going a round large holes in the road. Luckily, the traffic was light so I could use the entire road to avoid the holes. The road from Destruction Bay (appropriately named) to Fairbanks was a pretty bad section of road that placed a lot of wear and tear on the tires and suspension.

Thursday, June 30, 2022 - After camping alongside the highway at Kluane Lake, we continued our drive to Tok, Alaska (pronounced Toke). This was one of the first times that we camped alongside the road and it was fun. We did not disconnect the trailer and we did not even level it. We parked it so that it was pretty close to level and then we pushed out the slides. We also used the generator to push out the slides and to make coffee in the morning. Other than that, we did not need the generator. The setting was absolutely beautiful and it did not cost us a penny.

Friday, July 1, 2022 - We drove the Alaska Highway from Tok, Alaska where we had planned to stay for two day so that we could drive the "Top of the World" road to Dawson City in the Yukon. We then found that the "Top of the World" was in terrible shape. Almost all gravel, the turns were sharp an the drop-offs were pretty steep. We decided not to put the truck through it and just head on over to Fairbanks on the next morning.

Saturday, July 2, 2022 - We departed from Tok for Fairbanks. The roads are filled with potholes that I have to dodge on a pretty constant basis.