Below are two maps - the first is from Alaska Geographic map.
The second is a picture from the Apple Maps on Irene's Cell Phone of
the "Satellite View" of the Glenn Highway-Tok Cutoff Route.
Over the first 35 miles we came to the conclusion that what they "cutoff" of the "Tok Cutoff" must have been the shoulders on the road. It was a N-A-R-R-O-W two lane road and on both sides there were some very precipitous drop-offs (as in 100 feet down into the Matanuska River) with NO, NADA, ZILCH, NEGATIVE BUPKIS in the way of guardrails on either side. It was easily the worst road we took our RV on in Alaska. The Milepost book has it spot on when it describes it as "A patchwork of good highway going bad."
Below is a picture of the narrow Glenn highway with minimal shoulders on both sides.
Trust me when I say it would NOT be a pretty site to see an RV go
over one of these shoulders. Also, notice NO guardrails.
Above: A picture of the raging Matanuska River with only a sloped
rocky sand berm between it and us.
As I mentioned much of the Southern portion lacked shoulders. In the northern portion what good will it gains by having shoulders it uterly destroys by having miles of "frost heaves" that make you feel like you are trying to ride a bucking bronch or rodeo bull to the 8 second mark!
Below: Two pictures of the frost heaved road. You can REALLY see it if you look at the white lines along the edge of the road. Do you see how the don't look straight but look like they are going "up, down, up, down, up, down." Each one of those indicates a place where the RV is GOING to bounce up and down. "YEEEE-HAAA ride 'em cowboy!"
About 50 miles south of Tok the road widened out, got shoulders and for Alaska became a pretty good highway. But that was just in time to have an 8 mile - NO asphalt, bumpy, pilot-car-led construction zone.
Above: Two pictures of the road construction right before arriving in Tok, Alaska.
The scenery along the road all the way from Palmer to Tok made all of this bad road "worth the price of admission," however. It was breathtaking. For the shoulderless portion you are following the Matanuska River through a beautiful Alpen valley.
Below: Four Pictures of Lovely Scenery along the Glenn Highway on the way to Gakona
Rivers have "headwaters" - A place where they begin. Typically its a lake (Lake Victoria for the Nile for instance). As we were driving up the Matanuska River we realized that the origin, the "headwater" for the Matanuska River is the Matanuska Glacier. It is a magnificent looking glacier.
Below: Six pictures of the Matanuska Glacier as seen from the Glenn Highway
on the way to Gakona for the night and Tok the next day.
After passing the Matanuska Glacier we began to see the mountains of the Wrangell-St Elias National Park beginning to come into view toward the north. What an amazing site. This range of mountains (which straddles the border with Canada) is home to the 2nd highest peak in North America - Mt. Logan. It is also generally regarded at the largest mountain (by VOLUME, not height) in the world. The Canadian Portion of the range is in Kluane National Park and Reserve of Canada.
Mt. Wrangell is the largest active volcano in Alaska. It last erupted in 1900. Mt. Saint Elias is 18,002 feet tall (and yet it STILL can't dunk a basketball).
We stopped for the night in Gakona, Alaska and stayed at the Gakona RV park about 20 miles north of Glenallen. Still, no DirecTV of course, in fact we were much farther north of Homer now. Irene began taking pictures at night to show that we were now in the perpetual twilight area of Alaska. The sun did "SET" for 4 hours at night, but we were so far north that it never got far enough below the horizon that it would get dark. You could read books outside at night at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning. Gakona is famed in Alaska History for its lodge.
Below: Four Pictures highlighting the Gakona Roadhouse Lodge.
Glenallen is where the Tok cutoff officially begins. Up to that point Highway 1 is called the Glenn Highway.
The next morning we set out for Tok, the Canadian Border and WiFi hell. We would spend the night in Beaver Creek Yukon Discovery Lodging in British Columbia, Canada. We followed the Wrangell-St Elias Mountains now to the right of us to Tok. The last "town" in Alaska before we would get to Canada.
Along the Tok Cutoff you are passing through a huge area of permafrost with its grotesquely stunted often"drunken" trees (many are leaning at a 30-60 degree angle because they have been "frost heaved" out of place). This area of permafrost is home to the Trumpeter and Tundra Swans which became a common sight for us on many of the ponds. These ponds are the result of snow melt that can not penetrate the soil because it is frozen (i.e. - permafrost). These are called Thermokarst Lakes.
Above: Notice the trees. Many are at angles. You can see one in the first "row" with its top bent down toward the ground. They look spindly and most are only a foot or 2 across. This is due to the lack of available nutrients in the frozen ground. Since the tree's roots can't penetrate the frozen ground the roots don't grow very deep which make them very prone to tipping as the ground heaves around them.
Above: see all the tiny thermokarst "lakes" in the picture. This is the result of the water
unable to be absorbed into the frozen ground beneath them.
At ABSOLUTELY NO additional expense to you, below are just 5 other random pictures to show you some of the beauty that made the trip on this road MORE than worth all the tales of "horror" documented in this post:
