A Visit From Mom: Part 1

We had our first snowfall on September 22 this year. It was pretty brief and didn't stick around all that long as temperatures quickly moved above freezing.


This was all well and good because my mother was coming for a visit, and I figured snow probably wasn't the first thing she wanted to see as her flight descended into Fairbanks. Instead, after a well-deserved night of sleep, she was greeted by a beautiful sunrise.


Our first day was spent running around town doing errands and such before we left on a little road trip to Whitehorse, Canada, and it ended with a phone call from my friend Dianna to let us know the Northern Lights were out! It was cold outside, but we went out on the porch to watch and heard an owl hooting from a nearby tree.

Day two brought another brilliant sunrise, and we were ready to hit the road.


We weren't sure what our destination was that night, but we were shooting for the Kluane Lake area. We figured we would play it by ear and see whatever there was to see along the way, pulling over to take in the scenery and take pictures of whatever we saw. After cruising through North Pole, Alaska, we were greeted by fighter jets taking off from Eielson Air Force base that attacked our ear drums and nearly blew the car off the road.

We ended up at the Knotty Shop, which was closed, but we still walked around the frozen grass to see the burl logs and animals on the grounds.





We continued to follow the Tanana River down the Alaska Highway during a beautiful sunny day with gorgeous views that were never ending. It seemed every five minutes one of us was saying, "Oh look! Isn't that pretty?"


It didn't take long to get to the USA/Canada border at Beaver Creek, Yukon.


In Beaver Creek we saw our first Quonset hut church of the trip, Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church.


The Milepost says that it was built in 1961 from a salvaged hut that was used during the construction of the Alaska Highway.

A little further down the road, at the base of the St. Elias Mountains we saw a beautiful half-frozen pond inhabited with swans migrating south. It was so gorgeous, and they were honking so loudly, we had to stop and take in the view for a while.


Soon enough the sun was almost down, and it was time to stop for the night in Destruction Bay, but just a few miles before the Talbot Arm Motel, we took in the World's Largest Gold Pan! How many people can say that?