|
Day 0, Thursday, May 23 Seattle, WA to Tsawassen, B.C. After getting off work at around 5:00 pm, finishing our packing, preparing the house for the house sitter, and doing some more planting in the garden, we finally left Seattle at around 9:45 p.m. Eric was riding a '92 R100 GS/PD, and I was riding an '81 R80 G/S. Before the trip started, Eric has done major tune-ups on both bikes, and we both had new tires. I bought a big BMW PD gas tank for the R80 a few months ago, so we both had 300+ mile range on our bikes. As we were getting ready to leave Seattle, we were also wondering if we really would need all the stuff that we brought. In addition to our camping gear and clothes, we had brought a lot of food so we wouldn't have to buy that much stuff in the expensive groceries in Alaska. I had regular BMW saddlebags (we had a brace put on the mounting rack to make it more stable), and Eric had big DARR bags he bought relatively cheaply last year. We also had a couple of dry bags, and must have looked really loaded down.We quickly made it up to the U.S. Canadian border at Blaine, and for the first time ever (for us), they actually asked us to step into the office before continuing. They claimed that they always do that to people who are going to Alaska. Luckily no searches, however, so we continued to the ferry landing at Tsawassen. Got there around 12:30 a.m., and had to figure out some place to wait for the 5:30 a.m. ferry we were hoping to catch to Nanaimo. Since it was getting pretty chilly, we were happy to find an arrival hall for foot passengers open, so we rolled out our Thermarests and got at least a couple of hours of sleep.
Day 1, Friday, May 24 Got on the 5:30 a.m. ferry to Nanaimo on Vancouver Island, and took a nap on board until we arrived around 7:30 a.m. It looked like it was going to be a really nice day. We quickly got on the road north towards Port Hardy, but got really tired after an hour or so since we hadn't had much sleep during the night. We stopped at a beach and rested for a while. Vancouver Island was beautiful, but there was a lot of traffic until we passed Campbell River. The most exciting thing happening during the ride was an elk that almost jumped straight in front of us, but at the last second decided the forest was a better place. Also got stopped by police officers for the first and only time during the entire trip. Fortunately, they were only interested in checking our license endorsements since they were distracted by a woman in a minivan who had just passed us at pretty high speed. Arrived at Port Hardy around 3 p.m., and set up camp at the Quatse River Campground. Much nicer than the other campgrounds in the area, but with a lot of mosquitoes. Total of 260 leisurely miles.
Day 2, Saturday, May 25
Got up early to make it to the ferry landing and catch our ferry to Prince
Rupert, which was supposed to leave at 7:30 a.m. We got a surprise when
we got there since the ferry, "The Queen of Prince Rupert," was much
smaller than the one that normally is used for that route ("The Queen of
the North"). The main disadvantage of being on the smaller ferry turned
out to be that it was also a much slower boat. Instead of 14 hours, the
Total of about 5 miles on the bikes.
Day 3, Sunday, May 26
The Alaska Ferry, "The Matanuska," turned out to be a really nice boat;
almost a cruise ship compared to the one we had been on the day before.
First thing we did after loading was to use their nice, free showers. We
did not get a stateroom, but were perfectly happy to spend most of the day
on the back deck and on the front observation deck. Motorcycles mileage: 3 miles.
Day 4, Monday, May 27
Mileage: approximately 500 miles.
Day 5, Tuesday, May 28
Woke up to some cloudy skies, but just as the day before it cleared up
later in the day to become nice and sunny. We soon ran into our first
stretch of major construction. Huge machinery basically building a new
road, with a pilot car guiding people past them. It was mostly just very
dusty in the construction areas, despite the fact that we were allowed to
get in front of all the other traffic on our bikes, or a bit muddy where
water trucks had just sprayed the road. I was very happy that it wasn't
worse, however, since I'm sure some heavy rain could have made it really
miserable. The construction continued off and on until Beaver Creek,
where we stopped to rest for a while before we would cross into Alaska,
and the section where we had heard construction was REALLY bad. Just as
we had been told, construction started only a couple of hundred feet after
we got past the Alaska border, but contrary to the rumors, the
construction there was not that bad. It must have dried out pretty well
since more than one person had told us this section of road would be
terrible. We decided not to listen to any more rumors about road
conditions, since they obviously could change really quickly. We also
tried to scoot past the line of RV's just as we had gotten used to doing
in Canada, but were promptly told by the flagger to return to the back of
the line. Welcome back to the USA!
Day 6, Wednesday, May 29 Yet another incredibly nice day. We hung out in Valdez and took a bicycle trip around town in the morning, and then took a boat trip down Valdez port to the Columbia Glacier in the afternoon. Nice boat trip (albeit a bit overpriced) with more beautiful scenery, and wildlife. Saw more eagles, sea lions, harbor seals, and an orca really close to the boat. Also saw the spot where the Exxon Valdez hit the ground. The glacier was impressive despite the fact that we couldn't get that close (the glacier was actually 6 miles away, but looked much closer than that) due to all the icebergs in the bay. It was neat to travel between some pretty big icebergs on the boat however. And we learned that little icebergs are actually called bergy bits. Back in Valdez we had noticed that there were very few cats and dogs running around outside in Valdez, by the way. Apparently the eagles catch and eat cats and small dogs! Nice relaxing day.Mileage: 0.
Day 7, Thursday, May 30
Another beautiful day, and we decided to just take a day trip around
Valdez after doing laundry in the morning. As we were leaving town to
head up to Thompson Pass again, two BMW's came up behind us and,
incredibly, it was the Minnesota brothers! We didn't think we would see
them again. They were on their way out of town, but were going to take a
look at the pipeline terminal first. We continued past Thompson Pass and
hiked up along the terminal moraine on the side of the Worthington
Glacier. Mileage: approximately 70 miles
Day 8, Friday, May 31
Packed up and said goodbye to our Valdez friends in the morning. It was
yet another beautiful day, and I think it turned out to be the warmest day
of the entire trip. It was downright hot in the afternoon. Since we had
two days to get to Denali, we decided to take a side trip to McCarthy and
the Kennicott copper mine. This is one of only two roads that lead into
the Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, and there are high peaks all around
as you travel in there. To get there, we first had to go through the
little town of Chitina, and pass the Copper River (famous for its salmon
runs). Then we got onto a very narrow dirt road which was built on top of
the old railroad bed (there are warning signs to look out for railroad
spikes) for 60 miles. It took us about 2 hours to travel the entire
distance, and we were told by locals that the road was in pretty good
condition right now. The highlights of the ride was to pass over a deep
canyon on a bridge that up until just a few years ago had no railings (I
don't think I would have dared to ride across it without that), and a
short section that had the entire road covered in one-foot deep water. Mileage: 240 miles (120 of those on poor dirt road)
Day 9. Saturday, June 1 After breakfast, we got on Highway 4 heading north to Glenallen and got gas before continuing towards Paxson, where we took the turnoff for the Old Denali Highway. The road quickly took us above the treeline, and after about 20 miles or so it turned to dirt for the next 110 miles. This road seemed almost like a highway after the poor road we had been on the day before, except for a few short sections with newly laid gravel. There was a lot of snow in some areas next to the road, but since the weather was just as nice and sunny as the previous day, it also warmed up pretty quickly after a chilly morning. Saw lots and lots of the Arctic Ground Squirrels. When they weren't sitting in the middle of the road on their hind legs scanning the horizon for predators, they were darting across the road on what seemed like suicide missions. Luckily we managed to avoid all of them. Also managed to get really close to a bald eagle sitting in one of the few trees along the road. At the end of the Denali Highway, we got on the Parks Highway and quickly headed to Denali National Park. Got checked in after the normal minor hassles you have to deal with in popular parks, and set up camp at the Savage River Campground 13 miles into the park. Nice spot except for that they hadn't bothered to turn on the water yet, so we had to haul water back with us after we had showers at the little store close to the park entrance. Saw two grizzlies about 1/2 mile from our campground as we returned from our showers, but luckily they stayed out of the campground that day. Mileage: 333 miles (110 on good dirt road)
Day 10, Sunday, June 2
Mileage: 30 miles two-up
Day 11, Monday, June 3.
Woke up to the drone of generators from the RV's in the campsite. Boy,
those people are really roughing it. It had rained pretty heavily over
night and we thought this was the end of our weather luck. Amazingly
things started to clear up again in the morning (but there was fresh snow
on the mountains, so it was pretty chilly) and it was hot again by the
afternoon! Left Denali after breakfast and some "Texas"-size coffee from
our campground neighbors (an old guy who used to do a lot of riding
himself) and did a straight shot to Fairbanks. The road was fast with
nice sweeping curves. Nice ride.
After leaving Trails End around 4:00 p.m., we just wanted to get out of
Fairbanks, and headed north to Fox and got the cheapest gas we ever saw in
Alaska at "the last service station for 113 miles." We were trying to
decide what hot springs to go to when a local advised us that if we
decided to go to Manley Hot Springs, we should ask for the Dart's to see
if we could sit in their hot springs. That was enough to make us decide
on Manley. The first 20 miles were paved, and after that we had another
30 miles of really nice gravel until the Dalton Highway split off from the
road. The road to Manley then narrowed, but was still in pretty good
condition and we headed another 80 miles into the hills. The road winded
itself up to the top of a series of ridges with great views in all
directions. A really nice ride since it also was a nice warm evening with
clear skies. Mileage: 340 miles (about 110 dirt)
Day 12. Tuesday, June 4
We had breakfast at the Manley Roadhouse after packing the bikes in an
ever-present cloud of mosquitoes. The waitress was also our cook and bus
person. She and another local told us some good stories about life in
Manley. Interesting place with lots of character. Left Manley shortly
thereafter to go back the same way we came. About 20 miles outside
Manley, I came around a corner, and there was black bear standing in the
middle of the road about 100-150 yards in front of us. I quickly came to
a stop, and the bear just stood there and looked at us for about 10
seconds before he decided to turn around and run into the woods. Not sure
what I would have done if he had decided to charge us...
Day 13. Wednesday, June 5 Quickly got on the road for Tok after breakfast. We thought it would warm up quickly since it was really sunny outside, so I didn't bother plugging my electric jacket liner in, but it turned out to get colder and colder as we got closer to Tok. When we finally got there, we were both freezing, and decided to stop and warm up for a while at Fast Eddy's, where we also had an early lunch. There we found out that it had gotten down to 20F overnight in Tok. No wonder we were cold! After finally getting warm again, we took off for Tetlin Junction and the Taylor/Top of the World Highway to Dawson City. Road construction started immediately as we turned on to the Taylor Highway. We had to wait quite a while before the pilot car came to take us through the first part of the construction. They were definitely doing some serious work in this area, and after a couple of more waits for pilot cars, we finally got through the 23 mile long construction zone 1 1/2 hours later. Most of that time was spent waiting, but we also had to take it pretty slow through the machinery and the section where they had just dumped large size sharp rocks on the road (a van going the other direction was driving on a flat when he reached us). Again, we were lucky that it hadn't rained recently. Could have been very muddy. The rest of this road was much nicer, and most of it was pretty fast. Stopped in downtown Chicken. What a tourist trap. Found a business card in the tavern from someone we know in Seattle-it's a small world. As we left Chicken, the road got more narrow and winding, and there were obvious signs of gold dredging. In one spot there was even an old dredge that we had to stop and take a look at. As we got closer to the Canadian border, the road was winding on top of treeless ridges with incredible views in all directions, and it just got more and more spectacular the higher up we got. We wanted to stop and take a photo, but we knew that our cameras, even with 28 mm lenses would never be able to capture the view up there. Stopped to top off our gas tanks at the last gas station (in Last Chance) before the border. The owner's dog took our money in his mouth and walked it into the cash register in the cafe. Nice trick. The border crossing consisted of a small building on each side of the border on top of the ridges. Must be one of the most remote border crossings in North America. The Canadian officer seemed quite happy to be working there for the summer. After getting into Canada, it was a pretty quick ride to Dawson City. We camped on the West side of the Yukon River, in the provincial campground, and had to take the little ferry across the Yukon to get into town for showers and some laundry. We camped next to a German couple on an R100 GS and a Honda Transalp. They had traveled through the US and Canada for the last three months. I wish we had as much time and money to travel as many Germans seem to have! Mileage: 295 miles (approximately 170 miles dirt)
Day 14. Thursday, June 6
We quickly packed up our stuff in the morning and took the little ferry
over to Dawson City for breakfast at Klondike Kate's. After leaving town,
we stopped at the gas station by the intersection to the Dempster Highway
to fill up our tanks and to make sure we were ready for the trip up to
Inuvik. Finally left for Inuvik around 11 a.m. The road turned out to be
in much better shape than I had feared, and after getting used to the
surface, we ended up cruising at around 50-60 mph almost the entire time.
The scenery was beautiful and kept changing from different mountain ranges
to wide vistas. We didn't see many animals, but the scenery itself was
just wonderful. The only annoyance was a number of large trucks that
threw up a LOT of dust (I was in front most of the time, so Eric was
continually covered with dust from me as well). around a corner to face a huge truck careening down a hill towards us,
taking up virtually the entire road, at what seemed like an incredible
speed, giving us only a fraction of a second to pull over towards the
side, while simultaneously trying to stay up in the soft gravel on the
shoulder, and not seeing anything in the dust-out that followed. I was
waiting for Eric to run in to me from the rear at any moment since I knew
that he had been right behind me. Mileage: 500 miles (470 miles of dirt)
Day 15, Friday, June 7
We slept in until around 10:30 am. Partly because we must have been
really tired, and partly because it was raining pretty hard during the
early morning hours, and there didn't seem to be any real reason to get up
early. After the rain stopped, we got up and went into town. Took a look
at the visitors center, and got our certificates for crossing the Arctic
Circle. We decided that we should splurge a bit since we had made it all
the way here, and signed up for an afternoon flight to Tuktoyaktuk (Tuk),
on the Arctic Ocean. Mileage: 81 miles
Day 16. Saturday, June 8 Caught the first ferry across the river at 9:00 a.m., but had to wait about 45 minutes at the second ferry at the Peel River since it was receding so fast that they had to do work on the ferry landing on the other side. The dirt was very soft on both sides as we got on, and while we made it OK, the pick-up behind us almost got stuck. My dirt riding skills really improved during this trip... The ride from the Peel River to Eagle Plains was very windy, and it was pretty exciting to be leaning over by maybe 15 degrees while riding on a gravel road... It was also quite a bit colder than when we came the other way, and I was happy to have my electric's again. By the time we got to Eagle Plains, we really needed a rest, and decided to have lunch at their restaurant instead of just eating some snacks. Nice break from the weather. We had also skirted some rain showers almost the whole day, but luckily only got a few sprinkles on us. The showers had, however, taken care of a lot of the dust problems, which was nice. As we stopped to rest later in the day, we ran into a Washington couple we had seen a couple of times before during the last two days. They had 5 flats in two days! I guess we were lucky since we had no such problems. Their dog "Killer" was helping them fish-he literally was looking for fish in the river and would chase them when he could. Arrived at Dawson City around 8 pm and decided to stay at the Youth Hostel instead of camping. Still had to go across the river to town to take showers, and for some beer. The next day it would be time to really start heading South again. Mileage: about 420 miles
Day 17. Sunday, June 9 We had a leisurely morning and stopped in Dawson for a few hours before we started heading out of town. Checked out the visitors center and the museum. Very interesting to learn more about all the mining history. Also had a huge ice cream. GOOD. Finally left Dawson around 1 pm to head towards Whitehorse. Uneventful ride for the most part, except for getting caught in a few minor showers. The most exciting thing was to see a black bear sow and two year old cubs right next to the road. They were really close, and I would have loved to stop, but we realized that probably would not be a good idea on our bikes.
Mileage: 331 miles
Day 18. Monday, June 10 Woke up when the noisy Germans packed up their camp. We quickly did the same and rode into Whitehorse for breakfast at the Talisman Cafe (2nd & Main). Good food, but fairly slow service, so it was 11 am before we had finished our meal and filled up our bikes to finally get out of town. The road between Whitehorse and Watson Lake was very nice and very fast, and there seemingly are no cops worrying about speeding in the Yukon. Stopped to buy some smoked salmon for dinner at a small smokehouse next to the road. We averaged 70-75 mph, except for where we ran into some very dark skies, rain and poor visibility as we crossed the Cassiar Mountains at the only section on this road where they were doing construction. Time for full rain gear. It was pretty muddy and not fun to have a huge semi right behind us. We continued on to Watson Lake to look at the signpost forest. This must be one of the weirder tourist attractions around. I guess there are somewhere around 30,000 signs from all over the world there. I'm surprised cities around the country don't write them and demand to get their signs back! After getting gas, we turned around and rode back a few miles to the intersection with the Cassiar Highway. The Cassiar was a nice road to start with that immediately took us into some really nice scenery despite the fact that we were going to have to cross the Cassiar Mountains again, and those same dark clouds were looming here as well. The road is about 1 1/2 lanes wide with no center stripe. Leaves you wondering what is going to be around the next corner. We stopped to help a nice California couple going to their cabin in Atlin, whom were repairing their RV trailer. Eric helped to get the axle back on. Nice people, and I figure it's good for our karma to help people, even those with RVs. It rained on and off for the next 100 miles or so to Dease Lake. Not too bad, except for the muddy gravel sections we had to go through. Camped a few miles south of Dease Lake by a river. Luckily the rain let up just about at the time we were setting up our tent, so we could also start a fire and cook some dinner. It was pretty chilly out and Eric had gotten pretty cold (I really liked the electrics this day!), and we were both hungry and tired after dealing with the rain. Really nice to go to sleep after what turned out to be the worst weather day of our trip (and it really wasn't that bad). Mileage: 472 miles
Day 19, Tuesday, June 11
Got back on the road a little after 8 am. It was pretty cold in the
morning and I was happy to have my electric gear again. Despite some
cloud covered mountains, the road had great scenery, and it was a really
nice ride with some gravel stretches until we had gone about 125 miles for
the day. All of a sudden my bike started to make a most horrific noise,
so we pulled over. Mileage: 469 miles
Day 20, Wednesday, June 12 Had breakfast in Houston, about 30 miles from our campsite. Another cold morning. The rest of the trip to Prince George was pretty uneventful. Nice road, but many small towns where we had to slow down, and some construction zones. Took us longer than we had anticipated to get to Prince George. Finally starting heading south proper on Highway 97 at Prince George, and stopped at a rest stop for some lunch. Met a guy from Tacoma who was heading north and was hoping to go up the Dempster as well on his Honda Nighthawk. Hope he made it. Again, the road south from Prince George was slower than we had anticipated due to the many towns, and the increase in traffic. It finally had gotten warm again around lunch. Nice after a couple of cool days. Decided to stop early for the night since I had a headache and was getting pretty tired. Found a campground at Lac La Hache South of Williams Lake, and had a relaxing evening with a nature walk, despite the throngs of mosquitoes. Mileage: 409 miles
Day 21. Thursday, June 13 Had breakfast at the campsite, and left around 9:00 am. It was nice and warm even in the morning. Quickly rode to Clinton, where we turned off 97 on to a back road towards Pavilion and eventually Lillooet. It turned out to be a very narrow and steep gravel road going over a mountain. Pretty neat. At one point in a hair pin turn, a deer was running into the forest right in front of us. He must have gotten pretty surprised by our appearance. The road to Lillooet from Pavilion was as nice as I remembered it, and at one point there were several mountain goats scrambling up a hill in a cloud of dust. Passed all the ginseng plantations. I really enjoy this part of BC. After passing Lillooet, we got on to the Duffy Lake road heading toward Whistler and eventually Vancouver. The Duffy Lake road is really a wonderful motorcycling road, and seemed even twistier than I remembered it. Only drawback was more traffic than I had remembered in the past. We got an explanation for the increase in traffic as we entered the reservation on the south end of the road. It had finally gotten paved! The natives had been in a long dispute with the BC government over this, and I guess they finally must have resolved the issues. About half way between Whistler and Squamish, we came upon the huge rock slide that had happened there about a month earlier. It really was huge, and there was a line-up of at least 100 cars waiting to get through. We went to the front of the line, which turned out to be a very good move since we found out that they only opened the road for 15 minutes each hour, and they were going to open in about 5 minutes. Since we were first in line, we then had the road to ourselves almost all the way to Squamish. Quite enjoyable to know that there won't be any cars in front of you! Decided to go through downtown Vancouver, and of course got stuck in traffic. Slow and painful after riding in no traffic for so long. The border crossing at Blaine was a breeze. Stopped in Bellingham to get something to eat at Archer's Ale House. Very disappointing since they were closed for some unknown reason, but found a decent place close by instead. Took Chuckanut Drive south from Bellingham, and then jumped on I-5 for the last 60 miles or so. Got home to Seattle around 8:30 p.m. Our cats were very happy to see us, and we were very happy to be home and sleeping in our own bed after three wonderful weeks on the road. Mileage: 419 miles
|
--end of this Alaska trip, next stop Baja California, Mexico--
last updated August 15, 1999 E. Nachmanson
Email -- Eva and/or Eric