North to Alaska…northern British Columbia
Without fail, one 50-mile stretch of the Alaska Highway has produced more animal sightings than all of the rest of the road combined in our 36 trips up and down the road…and that’s saying quite a lot.
About 400 miles from where the road begins in Dawson Creek, BC, it crosses the Rocky Mountains. Starting just before you get to the summit and extending down the other side toward Muncho Lake, we’ve seen countless caribou and Stone sheep over the years, along with many black bears, a grizzly bear that surprised me one evening when I was out for a walk, and a host of smaller critters. This trip was no exception. Really the only large northern animal we’ve never seen along here is a moose. We see those often at lower elevations.
This young ram, that I photographed without ever leaving my seat behind the steering wheel, had his nose buried in the gravel alongside the road licking up salts and other minerals. This part of the road is actually just a couple of miles north of the summit alongside an exposed cliff that is often literally alive with Stone sheep. Caribou are often see near the top of the cliff and the bottom.
A Stone sheep is similar to a western bighorm in coloration but not nearly as heavyset. It’s body is more delicate like the all-white Dall sheep found in Yukon and Alaska mountain ranges.
Order a copy of Ron’s book, A Guide to the Alaska Highway, by contacting him at rdcomm@gci.net.
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The best time to view wildlife on the Alaska Highway is between mid April and mid May. You’ll see a lot a wildlife coming out to the highway to eat the grass and dandelions off the highway.