Whitehorse to Watson Lake ~ A Better Road

Standing in front of the Famous Forest!

Just a few of the 55,000 signs!

The sun was shining in Whitehorse this morning as we left this modern city in relative wilderness surroundings. We are now on the Alaskan Highway all the way to Dawson Creek, British Columbia. That is about a nine hundred mile stretch of good paved road. We plan on doing about 300 miles a day. The first night is in Watson Lake. This place is famous for its Sign Forest. In 1942 (working on the Alaska Highway), a soldier was homesick and put up a sign which said something like Boston, MA 3,600 miles with an arrow pointing to that direction. People ever since have been adding their own signs, license plates and everything in between. There are thousands of them. They keep erecting posts and people keep adding there signs. I think ninety percent must be stolen street signs from all over the world. I will add pictures of this since the ride down here was pretty uneventful. We only sited two Bald Eagles, and one Black Bear.

Russian Crews in Watson Lake ~WWII

Tonight we are parked on the Watson Lake Airport grounds next to a lake. The reason I mention this is that this airfield was essential to the World War II effort. Watson Lake had an airfield before it had a road to the town. This time, I am not referencing the possible invasion from Japan. I am talking about our alliance with Russia against Germany. The airport has a building filled with photos of airplanes…American made with Russian Red Stars. I never realized that there were Russian pilots here and in Fairbanks, Alaska and Watson Lake Yukon picking up aircraft and flying them over to Russia. The name of that game was called “Lend-Lease Act” There are a bunch of black and white photos that are unusual and neat. I captured a lot of them with my little point & shoot Nikon.

The lady at the visitor center said we could dry camp out here on the lake. The sun is still warm and the view is stunning!

That is what we did and saw