Kluane Lake is the biggest lake in the Yukon, a long cold sheet of water in the shadow of the Kluane Ranges, and its colour is a milky turquoise from glacial silt carried down by streams from the big ice fields to the west. It lies on the Alaska Highway, with the little settlements of Destruction Bay and Burwash Landing strung along its shore, and with the St Elias Mountains rising behind to heights that include Mount Logan, the highest peak in Canada at nearly six thousand metres, hidden behind other peaks and rarely visible from the road.
The name Destruction Bay comes from the storms that blow down the lake and wrecked the original road-building camp in the 1940s. The Alaska Highway was pushed through here in 1942 by the US Army in a matter of months, in response to the Japanese threat after Pearl Harbor, and the road has been rebuilt many times since, but permafrost still heaves and cracks the asphalt, and frost heaves and patches are marked with small flags. Ride with attention, as a bump in the surface can come on suddenly, and gravel patches are common where roadworks continue.
The lake is full of lake trout and grayling, and the country around is boreal forest and tundra, with Dall sheep on the hills above the road, grizzly bears in the valleys, and moose in the willows. Bring bear spray if you intend to walk, and keep a sensible distance from any animal. Wind is the other thing: it funnels down the lake in the afternoon, and in autumn can be hard to ride in.
For fuel, the settlements of Destruction Bay and Burwash Landing have small stations and cafés, but their hours can be short and stocks limited, and the next larger places are Haines Junction to the east and Beaver Creek to the north-west, so it pays to fill up when you can. Summer brings nearly endless daylight, and the long evenings invite a late stop on the shore. Mosquitoes, especially in June and July, are fierce.