Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Southeast Alaska and British Columbia 2009

This was the last tent trip we made before ordering out ATC Bobcat. We had been using a tent trailer for 2 years but didn't want to haul it all around for this trip.

After a couple days on the road we arrived at Victoria, BC and camped at Goldstream CG outside Victoria before driving up the island to catch the Northern Expedition from Port Hardy to Prince Rupert. There we switched to the Alaska Marine ferry to Ketchikan,Ak.

We made a side trip here to Prince of Wales Island ,for two nights at a nice spot on one of the many lakes there. We were the only campers there.

Our next stop was Juneau for two nights than on to Haynes and our last port Skagway. From there we would drive in a week back to Prince Rupert to catch the ferry south to Port Hardy.

We drove the Cassiar and camped in several lake campgrounds along the way.

After getting back to Port Hardy we spent some time at Telegraph Cove to take a killer whale tour.

                                          Mt. Shasta,not a bad snow cover this year.

                                          Some interesting banana slugs.
                                          This is the Northern Expedition. It replaced the Queen of the North
                                           That hit a reef and sank after leaving Prince Rupert in 2006

                                          Sunset about 11pm.
                                         All the ferries have these areas where you can sleep and on the small
                                          ones you can set up a tent.
                                         Our camping equipment.
                                          In Juneau we took a trip to the Seward glacier.This is some of the ice we
                                          started to see as we entered the inlet headed to the glacier.

                                          Lots of animals make their home on the ice.
                                          The face of Seward Glacier,one of the few salt water ending glaciers.
                                          We were there to see it calf.Lots of noise and spray.


                                          Mendenhall  glacier. The ice still on the retreat!
                                          Mosquito Lake about 12 miles out of Haynes Ak. A nice small place to
                                          view eagles,bears maybe a moose or two.

                                          Speaking of, a female along the Cassiar Hwy,BC 



                                                    Thers were at our camp site on a nice lake site along the Cassiar.
                                           The road into Stewart BC had some views. This black bear was munching
                                           on the clover on the other side of the road from u
Bear Glacier. This one has also receded. It was almost  to the road in 1990.


                                        
                                          One of the lighthouses on the inside passage.
                                          A male Okra. At Telegraph Cove.
                                         And a humpback.
                                          This was the whole pod of the killers.Just off the cove area.
We were gone from June 21 through July 19. It's nice to have the time and be able to do this kind of trip. We had a great time and were able to use the canoe in many places. It was worth carrying it along.

The side trips we took I would highly recommend taking if you have the chance. They were well worth the time. We saw things that most people don't get to see.