Laird Hot Springs

Since we reached Whitehorse there was little wildlife to view all the way to Watson Lake, home of the Sign Post Forest. Leaving our campsite fairly early for us we arrived at Watson Lake where we fueled up.

After leaving Watson Lake, we started seeing wildlife, first Snowshoe Hare, then Wood Bison, along with several Black Bears.

We arrived at Laird Hot Springs to find there was room at the campground, so we ended our travel day around 10:30 am. The afternoon saw us spending a few hours at the hot springs. The entire campground is surrounded with an electric fence to keep bears and moose out. The Park does not have the fence on the quarter mile long boardwalk so one is on the lookout mostly for moose. We enjoyed the relaxing soak along with pleasant conversations with various people there. After a while we were the texture of prunes, so it was time to head back to the campsite. In getting dressed I started chatting with an older guy who was using a cane. He had balance issues and I even thought he would have difficulties in walking the quarter mile boardwalk back to the parking lot and campground. Something about him was familiar. Anyway, as we chatted more he explained he was walking from the Alaska/Yukon border at Beaver Creek the entire length of the of the Alaska Highway and continuing south to the British Columbia/Washington State border. I am not sure how many miles that is, but it is well over 1,000 miles and possibly close to 2,000 miles. The reason he was familiar was that we saw him walking along the highway pushing a cart more than a month ago. This man who could hardly walk well was on a journey. He explained to me that he just put one foot in front of the other.