Liard River to the Yukon! (Day 18)

A full hot breakfast at the nearby Lodger (thanks for the tip Jaret) was the perfect start to today. Did I mention that I love breakfast?

Not on the road more than 5min, we were back to the buffalo. I can't get over how big and shaggy they are, lazing around (although I guess I'd swagger like I owned the place if I had car-bashers on my head too).

We even spotted a few moms and babies- they look like little brown cow calves.

The wind today is almost gale force, making driving a little nervy at times as Gus gets bucked all over the road. The wind sweeps straight off the mountains into the Liard River valley.

Around km900 near Contact River, we had a brief pop into the Yukon (I love this sign- complete function over fashion...)

then a few more kilometres of BC before we officially hit the full Yukon border: yay the territories!

Our drive today is nice and short, stopping after only 2.5hrs in the car at Watson Lake YK (woohoo YK). The ladies at the Visitor's Centre are lovely and padded us down with tonnes of Yukon and Whitehorse brochures (so much for limiting our paper accumulation). The visitor's centre is also home to Watson Lake's tacky but memorable sign post forest:

Too bad we didn't come prepared to contribute. The crazy wind was whipping the gravel and sand around like a desert sandstorm, so after a stop at the library for some free (legitimate) internet time, we made our way out of town to Watson Lake Provincial Park.

Things were still pretty quiet here, but there were a few little trails that we could explore. We also met back up with a few of the Aussie RV calvary. In the park, the tall lodgepole pines protected us from most of the wind, so it turned out to be a really pleasant evening. We wandered around a few of the trails and were able to get down to see the still-ice covered Watson Lake.

It feels a little colder tonight, so hopefully we'll be warm enough in our tent.