We drove to a spectacular park in the southwest Yukon today called Kluane (Kloo-WA-nee). It contains Canada’s highest and the world’s largest non-polar alpine ice field in the world. Kluane is also part of a chain of parks in Alaska, Yukon, and B.C. that make up the world’s single largest internationally protected area.
In the park, we camped on Kathleen Lake;
and hiked to the summit of King’s Throne, which had views of the glaciers and peaks in the interior of the park.
The ridge leading up to the final sumitt approach is a crazy steep path that gains 2,500 feet in one mile.
From the top we could see the back side of Kathleen Lake and Mt. Logan, the highest point in Canada at 19, 551 feet!
Mt. Logan is also the northern hemisphere’s pole of cold with temperatures recorded as low as -107.5 degrees F.
Here is Carmen taking a break on the knee busting route down the summit.
and another shot of the way down!
We performed our first gig of the tour today at the Atlin Arts and Music Festival, a multi-disciplinary festival that presents music, dance, art, storytelling, poetry and film in the northern most town in British Columbia. Our venue, Kershaws, was an old hardware store converted into a coffee shop. It had a view out the windows behind the stage of the Swiss Alps looking mountains along Atlin lake.
Our performance included dance demos, original tango compositions and a jam/workshop for musicians.
To get to the festival we had to drive into the Yukon and down into British Columbia on a road that was partially gravel. We are fitting in now with all the Yukon plate cars.
Previous to the festival, we camped four nights in a row–once in Alberta, twice in B.C. and last night in the Yukon. The bugs and rain were suprisingly minimal.
Our best find so far was the Liard River Hot Springs, one of the most amazing that we have ever seen. It is a double fed pool; hot and cold spring water simultaneously feed in from the bottom making for a perfect bath.
We just completed 2 days of driving through Minnesota, North Dakota, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and western Alberta. Some 1300 miles in all.
Andy navigated us through a minor Bison snag today in Elk Island National Park.
On the eating end of things, we had a fantastic lunch in the car yesterday while we drove through Lloydminster, a town on the border of Saskatchewan and Alberta.
I knew we had sourdough rolls, a tomato, a salametti, and some homemade mozzarella I was saving for something special. Then it dawned on me…salad stuffed bread!!
Salametti, Tomato, Mozzarella Stuffed Rolls
1 tomato
1 salametti
8 oz fresh mozzarella
4 sourdough rolls
1/2 tsp salt
2 TBS olive oil
1 tsp dried oregano
3 tsp fresh diced fennel bulb, optional (we had it, so I threw it in)
1 tsp Spanish paprika
1. Chop the tomato, salametti and mozzarella. Add salt, olive oil, oregano, paprika and diced fennel.
2. Scoop out and chop the bread centers of the rolls, add to salad.
3. Toss everything well and spoon the salad into the middle of the each side of the roll.
We ate these with salt and pepper kettle chips and some fresh sliced cucumber.
It’s the first day of our Alaska tour and we’re in St. Cloud, Minnesota. Me and Tom Dad offered many thanks to Andy who made 6, shoe size empanadas to get us through our last night of packing and our first day of driving. Not only did these serve the functional purpose of cleaning out all our leftover produce in the fridge but they provided us with some sturdy road food.
Andy’s Treasure Box Empanadas
Filling:
4 medium fingerlings, diced
4 carrots, diced
1 candy striped beet, diced
whole head of garlic, diced
1 bunch kale, chopped
1 bunch dandelion greens, chopped
1/2 head of Napa cabbage
1 pound fresh fava beans, shelled
1 bunch fresh sage, chopped
1 bunch fresh oregano, chopped
3 TBS cup olive oil
2 TBS soy sauce
1 TBS Worcestershire sauce
4 TBS blue cheese
1 cup fresh made ricotta (Carmen had to use up the rest of our raw milk)
1/2 cup parmesan
1 esp salt
pepper to taste
Dough (all with locally milled flour):
2 cups spring wheat
1 cup buckwheat
1 cup milk
6 TBS butter
2 1/4 teaspoon yeast
1/2 teaspoon brown sugar
1. Preheat oven 400 degrees.
2. Make the dough and let rise 1 hour while preparing the filling. Andy uses a food processor to mix and then he kneeded it by hand.
3. Saute the root vegetables 5-10 min, add garlic and fava beans saute 2 min, add greens soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce and 1/4 cup water. Cover and steam until greens are tender.
4. Combine vegetables with cheeses, salt, pepper, and herbs. Let cool.
5. Divide the dough into 6 portions. Cover and let rise 20 min.
6. Roll out the dough pieces into a oblong shape. Put one cup filling on 1/2, then fold over and seal.
7. Bake for 30 min or until golden brown.
The smell of these empanadas baking was as heavenly as the taste.
We ate them in the car with cucumber, tomato olive oil salad.
We’ve had a crazy couple of weeks getting ready for the upcoming Alaska tour. Here is what we’ll be doing the whole month of July as we drive our way to Fairbanks and back!
Tour Stop 1: Atlin Arts and Music Festival, British Columbia
We’ll be giving a tango workshop and performance at the Festival in Atlin, the northern most town in British Columbia!
Tour Stop 2: Whitehorse, Yukon Arts in the Park
We’ll be performing outside in Whitehorse, which is the capital of the Yukon–population around 20,000. Which by the way is 60% of the total population of the entire Yukon!
Tour Stop 3: Kluane National Park, Yukon
We’ll be backpacking here four nights! Kluane National Park t is part of a system of 24.3 million acres between the U.S and Canada that together contain the largest internationally protected land-based ecosystem on the planet. Check out this cool map.
Tour Stop 4: Village Bakery in Haines Junction
Just outside of the Kluane we’ll be playing a gig at The Village Bakery in Haines Junction.
Tour Stop 5: House Concert in Tok, Alaksa
Luckily we’ll be playing a concert and giving tango lessons here during the summer. Tok Alaska is notorious for its extreme temperatures, easily -44 degrees F in the winter.
Tour Stop 6: Denali National Park and Preserve
We’ll be hiking and camping for three nights at Wonder Lake which has potential views of Denali–highest peak in North America. 
Tour Stop 7: Denali Park Salmon Bake
We’ll be playing Friday at Prospectors and Saturday night at “The Bake”. Woo hoo, tango and salmon!
Tour Stop 8: Tango Course at Fairbanks Summer Arts Festival
We’ll be at the University of Fairbanks for the Summer Arts Festival for three days teaching a course we designed called Tango From a Musical Perspective. We’ll also be performing our own tango compositions with some fantastic musicians on a world music concert.
Tour Stop 9: Westmark Hotel in Fairbanks
A fellow tanguero in Fairbanks was gracious enough to help organize an evening event that will bring us together with Caitlin Warbelow–resident violinist at the Fairbanks Festival.
Tour Stop 10: Driving…..
According to Google it takes six, 8 hour days to get from Fairbanks to the U.S. border.
Tour Stop 11: Lois Donnay Tango Studio in Minneapolis
Minneapolis is our last stop of the tour. We’ll be playing for Lois Donnay’s Tuesday Milonga and staying with Bob Barnes–fellow tango bandleader of Mandragora.
