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Why would we want to drive up an extra 65 miles along a gravel road, around blind corners, with soft shoulders and where our speed likely wouldn’t exceed 35 km/hr.? To take a trip to a small community of Eagle, population of 86, of course!

Once again, we had a nice day. The weather the past week or so has run in the low-mid 20’s and mostly sunny. We had notes in our itinerary that this wasn’t a trip to make if there had been a lot of rain. However, rain is one thing they don’t seem to be getting a lot of this year thus far. This road was definitely more narrow and not for trailers. Joyce commented the initial 10 miles were actually very tame and certainly no worse than the Top of the Road Highway. We saw a number of places where we could have pulled the trailer to and then unhooked it and camped for the night instead of at the mosquito-laden campground we chose. However, not having been there, we had no idea how the road conditions would be. As we drove further along, the road narrowed and the hair bend curves increased. We did see a female moose and her two calves as we came around one corner, but that was the extent of the big wildlife.

Arriving in Eagle, we parked the truck at the shore of the Yukon River and ate our lunch. It was a lovely spot but hard to think of people living here year-round. There is no cell reception here, but the residents do have internet access at the library that is broadcast all the time – whether the library is open or not, since it is run by volunteers. We observed a number of people pulling up to the library, taking 5 minutes where we suspect they were accessing their email and then leaving again. While we were there, we also saw a small airplane land on the grass runway in the village.

Tomorrow, first it was Eagle, now Chicken – what funny names for villages….

This morning we got up to a sunny morning to head out to what we expect to be a highlight – the “Top of the World” Highway. It will be a slow drive over – it’s gravel a lot of the way and up and down mountain roads. It’s a road that is only open for a few months of the year – sometime late April to the end of September or early October. However, we also expect some nice scenery and the weather is cooperating nicely. We saw some nice mountain ranges in the distance – still too far off for our liking though. We both figure we’ll have to wait until closer to Denali or the St. Elias Range to see the “real” mountains up close.

It was a disappointing day for wildlife again. Our net summary of wildlife is pretty low at this stage of the trip. Paul keeps joking that the guy in charge of opening the cages in the morning must be slacking on the job! However, the day was uneventful for travelling and we reached the “Top of the World” at an elevation of just over 4500′.

Just past the peak of the highway, we crossed the border into the US, leaving the Yukon behind. We are now officially in ALASKA, nearly 4 weeks after leaving New Hamburg. It is such a small border crossing, the most northerly land border crossing in the US.

We drove a short bit and then pulled into a state run park just before the town of Chicken. We decided to make the stop here since tomorrow is a trip to Eagle, AK and we’ll have a wee bit of back-tracking to do. However, once again, we are in mosquito-ville and no campfire tonight.

Next a side trip to Eagle….