Bow Tie Tour

We slept in until it stopped raining and being the lazy lads that we are decided to take some R&R after our 900 mile ride the day before. So we headed out and ate a nice big American breakfast at Dennys then headed to the theatre to watch “Taledega Nights”

Then we rode south towards Mt. Denali. On the way it started to drizzle. Then it started to rain. Then it started to deluge so we tried to find shelter for the night. The one hotel within many miles was completely full. So we begged and pleaded and they gave us a room that was “under construction”. While we were unloading two brothers from Wisconsin, also on motorcycles, rode in. Being kind hearted we invited them to stay in our, already cramped living quarters.

While I stayed up in the room and got some sleep. Eric and Jason wandered downstairs and spent the evening chatting and hanging out with none other than Sean Penn! The reason the little hotel was full was because Sean Penn was in the middle of filming “Into the Wild”

It comes out on sept 21 so check it out.

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I got up early and headed out to get my tire changed. It took some doing because apparently they don’t stock sport bike tires in the middle of the Yukon who would have thought? I eventually found one and we were off. It was a great day and we made good time.

Along the road we saw mamma grizzly and her cub, we stayed out distance and watched as they ripped rotten logs to shreds.

And then there it was. Alaska! As Jason said, “The only state still wild and free” and to back up his statement he proceeded to ride accross the border “Wild and free” wearing only his helmet. It was a sight to behold.

Here we are at the entrance to the last remaining frontier. ALASKA!

The sun was slowly going down but up in Alaska that can take several hours so we decided to push through to Fairbanks.
Stopping of course to see the sights, such as…

as well as the North pole, Santa’s workshop and a Pizza Hut.

The North Pole (home of St. Nick)

We spent the night with Jason in his tent. Incidentally he had lost his first tent the day before we met him which is why he stayed at the Air Force lodge and why he rode ahead to Whitehorse, so he could get another one.

It rained during the night and that was just a foreshadowing of the deluge to come.

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We woke up to a beautiful day and decided to make it to Whitehorse, capitol of the Yukon territory, as I needed to get a new rear tire put on. Before leaving Watson’s Lake we stopped in at the “Sign Forest”

“The forest was started in 1942 by a homesick U.S. Army G.I., Carl K. Lindley of Danville, Il., Company D, 341st Engineers. While working on the Alaska Highway, he erected a sign here pointing the way and stating the mileage to his hometown. Others followed his lead and are still doing so to this day.”

Quotation Source

(picture by Jason)

If you ever drive by you make be able to find a small motorcycle license plate with our names written on it Good luck though their are over 45,000 signs, and counting.
It was a good day of riding and we continued to see some breathtaking views.

We had exchanged cell #s with Jason so we could find him when we got to Whitehorse. But unfortunately when we arrived there was no cell service. But thankfully we “happened” to run into him. We took a look around town, saw the salmon spawning then found a hotel for the night. Three to a room makes things cheaper. Jason invited a guy he had met on the street and we spent the evening eating pizza, enjoying Canadian beer and talking about life. Good times were had by all

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We awoke early…
Our plans were to cover over 500 miles of the Alaskan Highway before nightfall.

We rode about 20 minutes out of Dawsons Creek before we made a quick pitstop to throw on another layer or two, it was chilly!

I grabbed this shot of Ethan as we prepared to get back on the road.

Before I put the camera up, I surveyed another recent addition to my tail bag… A sticker from one of our block party friends.

A few miles later, we noticed a gas station off to the left, where a lone motorcyclist was parked… He saw us wave and jumped up with two thumbs up, and a giant smile on his face. Ethan and I were stoked, there is such an awesome brotherhood of the road up there, especially between bikers.

It didn’t seem very strange, when we were forced to stop, less than an hour later, to throw on all of our rain gear… In fact, after all the rain we’d experienced thus far, it seemed to be hardly more than routine.
“Stop the Rain!”

We’d stopped just before the rain, and as we got our gear ready we watched as the rain made it’s way down the road, towards us. Finally splashing down around us, as we got back on the bikes and pressed on into the storm.

15 minutes later, we were on the other side of the cell, and riding in blue skies.
The winds were extremely heavy, leaving us slightly deaf, and really fatigued… Then, as the winds died down, we came to our next adventure…

Gravel.

Over 20 miles of it!
At first, I’ll admit that I was scared to death of the stuff, but by the end of this stretch, I had a fairly good idea of how the bike felt on the slippery surface.

At the beginning of the gravel patch, we met a man named Ian, who was riding a Harley up from Southern California. He rode with us for a while after the construction zone, until we stopped in a rare, populated town’s A&W for a bite to eat.

Ian is quite the character… A Harley Riding, Adventure Seeking, Ice Skating Coach.

“Ian”

After our lunch, we decided to take off at our own seperate pace, since Ethan and I were able to ride faster, a lot more comfortably.

Throughout the day though, it became obvious that the tale of the Tortoise and the Hare was very, very true… Ethan and I stopped often, for pictures or to stretch, and thus we’d end up seeing Ian on the road a half a dozen times between fuel stops, it was pretty crazy!
About 5 hours ride from where we left, we came to a gorgeous mountain road… The pavement wasn’t perfect, but I succeeded in safely getting my knees down for the first time, in British Columbia. At the end of the pass, we stopped, overwhelmed by the beauty that lay before us.

Storm clouds were across the entire horizon, patches of rain fell here and there, and the quality of light, refracting off of wet fir trees was incredible.

Looking back towards the mountain we’d just crossed, you can see where the road way was carved into the hillside near the top.

I even caught Ethan trying to work out a kink.

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With refreshed spirits and sore butts, we got back on the road
and headed West towards the Yukon. After crossing through some
beautiful wooded valleys, and traversing some wicked gravel patches,
our next stop was at a small lodge/ RV park for fuel.

This place is so far out in the bush that all of their electricity seemed
to be slar generated… Too cool!

And yet, the oddest thing happened.
As we filled our bikes, we struck up a conversation with a
lady and her daughter… They were from Oklahoma, and
somehow they’d heard about Ethan and my journey, from
a fellow traveller.

They were really excited to have met us!
(And we enjoyed our 3.5 minutes of fame lol)

A few miles further down the road, a car passed us going the other direction and flashing their headlights wildly. We immediately slowed to a crawl as we crested the next hill and were greeted by the sight of some “natives” a few hundred yards away.

I waved Ethan to a stop, jumped off the bike and grabbed my camera out of the tail bag. As we rode by, I started snapping pictures…
The “Locals”

The View Through My Lens:

Of course, now that I had my camera out I decided to play the odds and try my hand at riding the Alaskan highway… With just one hand of course, while I snapped nearly 200 pictures in less than a half an hour.

Obviously, I can’t post them all, but here are a few of the highlights.

Today we passed the coolest person in the world, her name is Rosie and though we didn’t know it at the time she is running around the world! Now I thought riding my motorcycle to Alaska made me cool but she wins hands down. She started on her 50th birthday and is currently (sept 07) almost through Canada.

Here she is (pic from her website)

She is going to write a book but in the meantime check out her website.

Evening at the Air Force Lodge

After riding all day the and seeing an awesome sunset. It started to rain, so we stopped for the night at the Air Force Lodge. While I was unpacking my motorcycle another bike rolled into the parking lot. I asked the newcomer where he was headed and where he was from. He replied that he was from Pennsylvania headed to Alaska. Talk about coincidence His name is Jason and he joined us for the rest of our trip through Alaska.

The Air Force lodge was definitely a cool place to stay.

Originally built at the Watson Lake Airport 1942 as a barracks for the pilots flying during Second World War, it was later moved to the town where it stood empty for many years. Then in 1999 the present owners completely and thoroughly refurbished the interior while leaving the exterior structure in its original form

If you are ever in the Watson’s lake area in the Yukon, stop in

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Of Seedy Hotels, Heathen Canadians, and God’s Love…

Though the ride wasn’t as spectacular as the previous days, Day 18 will go down in history as one of the most amazing days of the trip…

When we awoke, we carefully slid out of our sleeping bags, trying not to touch the comforter with any limbs… I cautiously slid my sweater off of the pillow case and gingerly walked to the bathroom, where we refused to use the water.

That’s right, we were in a SEEDY motel.

You’d never know it from our view, but we were in the seediest of the seedy… You KNEW they used to charge by the hour, and you hoped above all hopes that your carpet had been cleaned since… Yeeeha!

What an experience…

Our Morning View… Mountains to the South!

A shot of the terror that was our hotel room (And Ethan ):

Needless to say, no showers were taken:

We spent the day riding… The countryside resembled Colorada, and Nebraska at different times… Lovely, but not insanely gorgeous the way that the glaciers had been.

As the afternoon turned to evening, we rolled into Dawsons Creek, BC accompanied by heavy winds that seemed determined to push us off the road.

This Dawsons Creek isn’t the one that you watched on TV… The only thing it’s truly famous for today, is a sign… A sign that states “Mile Zero of the Alaskan Highway”.

As we rode across the well used parking lot toward the sign, Ethan and I were both beaming we were finally DOING IT!!! We hopped off the bike, and had a couple take our picture by the infamous sign.

(Just in case you were wondering, this IS how your hair looks after 8-10 hours inside a helmet )

I got one for Ethan’s scrapbook:

It was getting late, and we’d already discovered that hotels were in the $100+ range for a seedy place. So, we decided to ride around town in search of a Sunday evening Church service. We secretely hoped to find a sweet family that would take us in for the night, and save us some money.

However, after riding all over the town we found a couple of Churches, but NONE with an evening service… Ethan and I were at a loss so we decided to head back towards the hotel district.

I was in the lead, when I passed a small sign that said “Caution – Children at Play – Block Party In Progress” I looked up to see a small group of people all circled around a tent with a barbeque cooking away, and beers in there hands. Instantly, we knew we were home…

As Ethan and I pulled up, I switched off my bike, and said to the man who walked up to us: “I know all of you Canadians are heathens, but do you know of any Churches with evening services?” He laughed and replied “Oh, what the hell… Grab a beer and a hot dog, we’ll find one.”

Of course, we couldn’t say no to THAT offer, so off we went for our food and beverages. As the evening progressed and we got to know the group that was there, we were REALLY welcomed with open arms.

The host family, were extremely liberal mennonites and the rest of the crew was a sprinkling of other denominations and all of them were incredibly interesting folks.

One of the guys was a 40+ year veteran truck driver almost exclusively on the Alaskan Highway… When asked, he grabbed our map and marked up exactly where we should watch out for Mounties, where to buy gas, where NOT to buy gas and more… It was amazing!

“Map Marking”

As the night wore on, we made ourselves comfortable, sharing stories of the trip so far and hearing about life in the “Great White North”… We even had a cool conversation with a young guy, and fellow rider who works as a cook for a Diamond Mine up in the Yukon… 2 weeks on, 2 weeks off… Making amazing money.

“Comfy”

Of course, we had to ask at least one person to sign our bags… Today it was the ever so helpful truck driver Tom.

And the signature:

As we discussed heading out to stay at a hotel, the host family offered us their guest bedroom, so we stayed there until getting ready to head out in the morning… T’was a wonderful thing!

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