I guess I should clarify – we almost made it to Alaska WITHOUT a problem. We woke up Saturday ready and eager to get to our BIG destination. We got on the road about 9am, an hour later than normal because we were going to cross another time zone as we entered Alaska. Teslin was a quiet little town in the Yukon but we had 5 days of fun planned in Skagway. We passed a sign that said “Extreme Dusty Conditions” about 40 minutes into our drive. This wasn’t the first time that we saw gravel dumped out on the paved roads for some reason, maybe to fill potholes? But there didn’t appear to be any potholes.
As we were driving for a couple miles over gravel, a loud bang came from the back driver’s side window and it was followed by a crunching sound as the pieces of our window fell inside the truck. We couldn’t believe what had just happened. It must have been a rock from the road that flew up as another vehicle passed in the opposite direction.
We immediately alerted dad that we needed to pull over as soon as possible since it was 44 degrees and raining. About 5 miles down the road, we found a rest area. Darin put on some gloves and started cleaning up the tiny pieces of glass.
It is not unusual to encounter a broken windshield when taking the Alaska Highway, but we think it is weird that our side window was blown out. Luckily Darin had a heavy plastic contractor bag in his tool area and we had just bought a roll of gorilla tape in Bismarck after my dad made the recommendation. He said they use it all the time so we bought some on sale at Menards. We got the window covered and got back on the road.
At this point I am concerned how the Customs Officer is going to react as we cross the border. Maybe he sees this all the time or maybe he thinks we stole the truck or something. As we got closer to the border, we climbed higher and higher into the mountains. We were above the clouds again and we couldn’t see anything. We passed a lot of tour buses going the opposite direction. I am sure they were filled with people from the 2 cruise ships that were docked in the port.
Crossing the Canadian border and back across the US border were both easy while driving an RV. We had to pull into the truck lane which was empty both ways. After we answered a couple questions, the officers just let us go on. I wish airports were that simple!
Once we were set up at the campground and it stopped raining, we used up the entire roll of gorilla tape! I made an appointment to get a new window installed when we arrive in Anchorage on the 29th. Until then, we are not leaving any valuables or anything in the truck and hope it warms up.
Feel a little lucky. It was our drivers side window that got blown out a couple weeks ago south of Watson Lake. It was like a rifle shot and when my eyes focused there was a hole in the side window the size of a basket ball about 18 inches from my face. Luckily in WatsonLake we found an 80 year old retired, ex hardware store owner, that had a piece of plexiglass stored in his shed. He helped us out and cut out a side window which I Gorilla taped in place. It may take weeks to get the glass window in, it has to come from Winnebago. I feel lucky it wasn’t our windshield, that would have been a show stopper.