We have not written much about the roads in northern British Columbia, Yukon and Alaska. The roads up here are not first class roads, but for the most part, they are relatively easy to travel on. They are either paved or have gravel treated with oil and rolled to a hard surface. The oiled gravel roads frequently have loose gravel on them. Even the best of the roads have patches on them which may be loose or oiled gravel. Other roads, like the Top of the World Highway are gravel. There are horror stories about the loose gravel taking out windshields and these stories are confirmed by the number of glass repair shops in some of the towns you pass through. We spoke to one traveler who got bad cracks in both his motorhome and the vehicle he was towing on the same stretch of road. Until today, we had taken two small hits on the windshield which caused "bulls eye" cracks. These are easily repairable and didn't concern us much.

Today's journey took us on the Alaska Highway for half the trip and then on to the Cassiar Highway. The Alaska Highway portion was relatively easy with the exception of two bridge repair sites so we made good time. We had read that the Cassiar is not paved for about 100 miles of its length. We had also heard horror stories from travelers, one of whom turned back rather than drive on the unpaved section. The first 100 miles of the road were oiled gravel and were not in terrible condition. We then hit a 15 mile stretch of loose gravel which probably turns to mud when it rains. We were on the unpaved section for less than a mile when a passing truck threw a rock which put a big crack in our windshield. We are now one of the many victims of the northern highways.

The Cassiar Highway is one of the loneliest roads we have traveled. In the 150 miles we drove today, Dease Lake, our destination, is the only town of any size. There are one or two others that only have a couple of houses and no services. Speaking of services, you don't enter the Cassiar Highway without a full tank of gas. There is only one gas station between the northern end of the highway and Dease Lake and it was out of gas. Most drivers fill up at a gas station at the intersection of the Alaska and Cassiar highways and it was also out of gas. We drove an extra 26 miles to ensure that we entered the highway with a full tank.

One of the stops every tourist driving the Cassiar makes is Jade City. There are jade mines in the area and Jade City has two gift shops selling chunks of jade as well as carvings and jewelry. Of course, we stopped, looked and bought nothing. The other attraction is the wildlife. The guide books tells us that because the highway is undeveloped it has a lot of wildlife. We saw two small flocks of Stone Sheep. Our luck in spotting the animals on and off the road has not been very good.
Stone Sheep spotted right on the road. They didn't seem concerned with our presence until we got between the adults and the kids.
Jade being cut from boulders and sold as slabs, blocks or custom cuts