While we were loading up this morning, Ed struck up a conversation with an 85-years-young fellow who was watering the flower beds in front of the hotel. Apparently, the guy gets up every morning and starts his day around 6:00 a.m. working around the hotel, including watering flowers during the spring and summer months. After their talk, Ed knows the two men have very different goals in life. Ed would like to still be able to be working at age 85, and the elderly fellow would like to have a new Harley-Davidson motorcycle to ride.
After making a run by the local Harley-Davidson shop, we checked out of the hotel and hit the road. Several folks from Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, and elsewhere had told us the highway from Whitehorse to Skagway would be special, but we were starting to get skeptical after the first 30 miles. However, the next 80 miles were quite different and did not disappoint.
As the kids today like to say and text: OMG! The magnificent views all started at a lake where a certain type of coral, growing up toward the sunlight, made the water color very distinctive. It only got better as the miles went by. Our route took us through Carcross, a small town formerly known as Caribou Crossing along Tagish Lake, where we stopped for a short break. This small town had an interesting history, and was a stopping off point during the gold rush. Not too far from Carcross, the highway began running alongside Tagish Lake (in the Yukon Territory) and Tutshi Lake (after we had crossed into British Columbia). Upon every turn/curve in the road, it seemed the scenery kept getting better and better.
After leaving the lakes behind, we came upon an area like we’d never seen before (off to the left/east initially, then riding right through parts of it). Millions of years ago, a huge glacier had covered this land, smoothing rocks, stones, and boulders and scratching out shallow lakes as it moved ever so slowly. In the past few years, it appeared numerous people from places unknown, used some of the smaller stones as a way to express themselves, using the rocks/stones as building blocks in a variety of designs.
This area also contained a number of waterfalls. How plain old water, affected by a little thing called gravity, can become such a marvelous sight continues to amaze.
We arrived in Skagway, Alaska, early afternoon, and stopped at the Bonanza Bar & Grill for a late lunch. Afterwards, we went to the dock and got our tickets for tomorrow’s ferry ride to Juneau. We took a few pictures while there, and then went to the hotel and checked in. The remainder of the afternoon was filled with walks around town, doing a little laundry, catching up on some work (Mark), doing a little light reading (Ed), and making a few telephone calls. We had dinner tonight at a pizzeria (which doubles as a Mexican restaurant).
In the morning, we’re to be back at the dock to load our bikes onto the ferry about 5:30 a.m. for a departure at around seven o’clock. We’re all looking forward to the ferry ride, and hope we’re able to see some things we’ve never seen before and will probably never see again.