Hammerheadin' North

Home Sweet Home

2010-08-31T13:52:00.000-04:00

In case anyone was worried that the lack of blog updates was a bad sign...

We've both arrived safe and sound at our homes, me in Vermont on Friday night and Dad in New Brunswick on Saturday night. We both had a couple of days off to relax and recuperate before returning to work this week. I plan on going back and making updates for the last several weeks of this trip, so they'll be more pictures and some stories if you check back in a while.

Raucus Night at the Holiday Inn Missoula

2010-08-21T14:16:00.000-04:00

Last night Dad and I walked about an hour to a theatre to catch the late showing of "Inception". The movie got out at 00:30, so we got back to the hotel around 01:30. Around 02:30, we were woken up by thumping of feet (or was that bowling balls?) and slamming of doors. This had happened around the same time the night before as well. This time I called down to the front desk, and in about 20 minutes the noise stopped.

It took a while to fall back asleep again, soon after which we were woken by the fire alarm. We had a balcony that overlooked an indoor courtyard in the middle of the building, so I watched for a while to see what was happening instead of immediately evacuating. The alarm stopped after a while, and instead of going outside I saw other guests just sitting around the courtyard. We went back to sleep.

In the morning there was a letter slid under our door apologizing for the noise from the guests upstairs, and promising us free breakfast at the hotel's restaurant. All I wanted was sleep, but I'll take food as well.

While at breakfast we got some more of the story of last night. The thumping was drunk kids coming home from the bars. They were disturbing the whole 4th floor, not just us below them on the 3rd floor. They got kicked out. Sometime after that EMTs were called in when a guest collapsed as he exited the elevator on the 4th floor. Apparently he fell right out of his own shoes. Sometime after that someone pulled the fire alarm. Not only did that wake up the whole hotel, it also resulted in some other teens getting busted for smoking pot when the fire department came and swept for smoke. They hadn't set off the alarm, but they got caught because of it.

The motorcycle is expected to be repaired late today, so instead of getting an hour or two down the road and having to setup camp, then break it down again in the morning before riding, we've decided to stay one last night in Missoula and get going early Sunday morning. That is, of course, if we get some sleep.

We're staying in a different hotel tonight, but not because of anything I've mentioned. I originally booked two nights via Hotwire and I'm not able to extend our stay at the same rate, which was about 40% of tonight's regular rate. I found another good deal on Travelocity, so we're off to another hotel. It's a bit of a hassle, but we've nothing better to do today.

Repair Estimate: $2600

2010-08-20T18:43:00.001-04:00

Well, the techs at Big Sky BMW-Kawasaki in Missoula MT had a look at my bike this morning, and the front u-joint on the drive shaft is definitely dead. No ideas on why that happened. The kicker is that the failing u-joint thrashed around inside the swing arm enough to ruin it as well. The swing arm alone is about $1000. The total estimate is $2600.

At first I asked them just to replace the drive shaft and get it running again; I'd ride home with the swing arm beat up and patch it up myself. Then we rode to the dealership to have a look. The swing arm is structurally sound, but the beat up portion won't allow a rubber boot to seal properly, which could allow water and debris to get in and possibly cause another failure in time. The inside of the swing arm is hardly a clean environment, so I didn't think anything serious could happen in a week of riding even if the boot didn't seal perfectly. I wanted to just ride home with the damaged swing arm and try to complete the seal with JB Weld or some other filler, but Dad thought that could be risky because debris might get in during the week's ride home. The tech who was working on my bike seemed willing to discuss doing my JB Weld idea, but noted it'd take time to clean up the beat up swing arm and get the JB Weld set with the proper clip and rubber boot. Even if he'd try it, we wouldn't be rolling until Monday. The service manager didn't like the JB Weld idea at all, so I'm not sure if it was really an option. I really didn't like the idea of replacing a $1000 swing arm that is still structurally OK, but a failed u-joint can be pretty dangerous, potentially causing a rear wheel lock up. It was a tough decision, and I only had a few minutes to consider it because it was right at the deadline for ordering parts overnight. In the end I decided to go with a new swing arm, at the cost of what Jess and I usually spend on a week's vacation per person. No vacation in 2011, or rather, Jess will have to go by herself.

It may have been the fact that we hadn't eaten yet, but when I got the $2600 estimate around 13:30, I felt sick to my stomach. I've never paid that much to repair any vehicle before. I don't think I've spend that much on repairs in total for my 2001 Honda VF750 Magna with about 55,000 miles on it. I'm not feeling any love for my Beemer right now.

The good news is that parts should arrive by tomorrow, and they'll do whatever is necessary to have it running by the end of the day. They have two other bikes that are broken down right now, so they've got their hands full with emergency jobs. I'm happy with Big Sky's service, but not my motorcycle or the situation.

Ug.

Stranded - again

2010-08-20T12:28:00.001-04:00

I'm still behind by a couple weeks on my full updates, but I've unexpectedly found myself with some "free time" so I'll be working on rectifying that today. I am, you see, stranded once again by my BMW.

Yesterday we were cruising at about 120 km/h (75 mph; the speed limits are reasonable in MT and was 70 mph) south down highway 287 just south of Townsend Montana. Just as the cross wind really started to pick up, my bike started to get a funny vibration. I downshifted, and it seemed to get worse. I shifted back up, and it seems to get better... for a few seconds. It then went from "funny vibration" to "I must pull over NOW", which I did.

The short of it is, I was eventually towed 260 km (160 miles) west (wrong direction!) to the closest BMW Mottorad dealership. It seemed that the problem could be the gear box, so I figured my best bet for a speedy and proper repair would be at a dealer. My AAA membership covered the first 100 miles of the tow, but it cost me about $230 for the remainder. The tow truck driver was awesome and did everything he could to get AAA to cover the entire thing, but none of our schemes worked out in the end.

On the tow again

View Larger Map

Joe, from the service department at Big Sky BMW-Kawasaki in Missoula MT, was kind enough to come back to work an hour after closing to let us bring the bike inside for the night. (He lives across the street, but it's still working on his personal time.) He and a service tech whose name I didn't get had a quick look over the bike and found a disintegrated u-joint at the front end of the drive shaft. Hopefully nothing else died along with it. I smelled burning clutch plate and am concerned there is clutch or, worse yet, gearbox damage due to the resistance of the failed u-joint. We're waiting to hear back from the service department with an estimate right now.

I Hotwired us a hotel while sitting in the ally behind Big Sky BMW after the bike was put away, so we're staying in a cushy Holiday Inn with beds! electricity! internet! shower! and even a pool! I've nothing planned today except internetting, waiting to hear about the bike, and maybe seeing a movie tonight. I think Dad is going for a swim at some point.

The best I can hope for right now is to be back on the road Saturday afternoon, with some money left after the repair work to buy food. ; If that doesn't happen, it'll probably be Monday. Monday would mean really pushing hard to get back in time for a day's recovery before I have to be back at work, skipping all nice highways and just flying down the interstate almost all the way across the continent. Ug.

Quick Update

2010-08-16T01:13:00.000-04:00

I know, I know - it's been a long time since I've updated. Even when I've had internet access, there just hasn't been time to make any posts. Things have been go go go, which is great from one point of view, but isn't really conducive to maintaining a blog.

Dad and I are still both alive and well, and having a great trip. We're staying with an old childhood friend of my Dad's in Blind Bay BC tonight, and are going as far as his cousin's in Fruitvale BC tomorrow.

We only have 2 weeks left for the trip, but that should be plenty of time to work our way back across North America. I might even find some time for a few more updates! I'm almost 2 weeks behind on my full entries, but I'm going to try and make an update or two for back around Aug 3 right now.

No "Top of the World" for you!

2010-08-07T23:00:00.006-04:00

Well, it looks like The Top of the World Highway will be closed for the next several days. We don't have time to wait for it to re-open, so we've turned around and headed south from Dawson City. Our first alternative was to ride a highly recommended scenic loop between Haines Junction YT, Haines AK, and Skagway AK. It would be tight on time, but at least we'd get some riding done in Alaska and see some wonderful mountain views. Unfortunately, we discovered the ferry schedule between Haines and Skagway wasn't going to work for us at all, so that side trip is out.

We stopped in Whitehorse to nab some wifi

The Beard Shame continues

Having cut out the Haines/Skagway route we should now have time to ride out to Telegraph Creek BC off the Stewart Cassiar Highway, that is, if the Stewart Cassiar isn't closed due to forest fires. That latest news is that they're piloting groups through the fire area, so we'll show up in the morning and see what we see. We've ridden as far south as we can today, and we're still a couple hours north of the start of the Stewart Cassiar.

Tonight we've just setup camp down a trail on the side of the Alaska Highway. The first trail we tried tonight started with a climb up a rough hill with some large rocks. I bounced up the trial OK, but Dad hit one of the rocks dead on, and when the back end came up I think he accidentally twisted the throttle. The back tire landed and immediately whipped out counterclockwise a full 180 degrees, leaving the bike on the ground pointing downhill. I didn't see it happen, but the bike is fine and Dad swears he's OK. We rode a bit further down the road and found a gentler trail to camp along. We're not far from the highway so the trucks are still pretty loud, but I'm sure we'll have no problem sleeping.

Layover in Dawson City YT

2010-08-06T23:00:00.375-04:00

Today we were supposed to ride the Top of the World Highway from Dawson City YT into Alaska, including a stop at the curiously named village of Chicken. Much to our disappointment, we awoke to discover the highway was closed for the second time in as many weeks due to a washout. It had rained pretty steadily in Dawson City over night, and apparently the TotWH got much, much more rain than we had.

There was no way we'd get to Alaska today, so we took advantage of a break in the rain to cut some wood for the bath house I complained about in the last post. There was no chopping block, and I didn't want to abuse my hatchet so we used the unbelievably dull one (hereto referred to as a "mallet") provided by Dawson City River Hostel, as well as a buck saw we found that was in good shape. We sawed logs into lengths with one of us on either end of the saw, and split them with the mallet. We started a fire using our own matches, and continued to cut more wood for the next weary travelers. I did my best to cut up some of the shipping palettes using the mallet, but it mostly just bashed them into splinters. I cut up one ankle when one particularly bothersome board finally exploded. While Dad enjoyed the bath house, I kept at the wood. When we were done we had a pretty good pile, nicely stacked in a dry section of the wood shelter. We also stacked wood and kindling neatly under a bench in the bathhouse.

If there is dry wood available, you've got your own sharp hatchet, time to cut wood (including sawing the tree, not just splitting logs), your own matches, and time for the water and bath house to heat up, then the bath house is a great way to get clean! The sauna aspect was very relaxing, and it felt great to pour that hot water over myself and finally wash that Dempster mud off and out of my hair. Unfortunately, the bath house is not a reasonable way for a tired traveler to get clean at the end of a long day, if it's after dark, or if it's late enough that chopping wood would wake up other guests. It's a novelty, not an amenity.

We took the ferry across the Yukon River into town, and stopped by the visitor's centre for news on the wash out. The repairs wouldn't start until the rain stopped, and the rain wouldn't stop for a day or two. We'd heard stories of motorcyclist being let through previous wash outs, so we decided to stay around one extra night and see what news came from other travelers.

We went to the Dawson City Hotel for some food and to look for the previous owner, now employee, Dick. The adv riding couple we'd met while at Liard Hot Springs knew Dick, and said we should look him up if we had time. We definitely had time now.

Dick is one of the founding riders of the Dusk to Dawson ride, which now attracts hundreds of riders to Dawson City each year. He knows all about traveling by motorcycle in the north west (as well as other locals, I'm sure), and is The Guy to Know if you've got motorcycle problems while in the area. He's got a collection of used tires that can help you get by if you've a flat or need help changing a tire, he let us use his wash station with a pressure washer out behind the hotel, and is a great guy to have lunch with on a rainy Yukon day.

I stayed in the hotel's restaurant, The Jack London Grill, all afternoon catching up on blog posts, while Dad went out and played tourist for a while in the rain. I washed my bike up, in the rain, which might sound funny unless you saw how muddy it was after the Dempster Highway in the rain. We were still sitting at the restaurant come dinner time, so we had dinner there too before heading back to our tents.

Even though I'd already used the bath house in the morning, I thought I'd do so again before heading to bed. After all, we'd cut, split, and stacked a bunch of dry wood up that morning, so it should be pretty easy to get hot water this time. We discovered that the wood we'd stacked under the bench in the bath house was taken and scattered in front of the wood shelter, getting soaked on the ground in the rain all day. Much of the wood we'd stacked in the shelter was missing too. Dad gathered enough wood to get the small bath house warm again, and I went to ask the camp owner if he knew what'd happened to our wood.

He told me it was very dangerous where we'd stacked the wood under the bench. The sharp splintery bits (because we smashed the wood with a mallet instead of having a proper ax) could poke people. I agreed that made some sense, but wondered why the wood was scattered on the ground instead of being moved as a stack to a dry place. "Look, it's not my job to cut and stack wood." He was quite upset. I wanted to complain about his false advertising of a "hot bath", but decided to just walk away.

The next morning, as we were getting ready to leave we struck up a conversation with a fellow motorcyclist. Like us, he was turning back because the Top of the World Highway was still closed. At one point he asked if we'd had any problems with the camp owner, noting that he'd found him to be odd and in a really bad mood yesterday and this morning. The camp owner had even gotten angry at him for shaving after dark!

This happy HD rider from Michigan also found the owner of Dawson City River Hostel to be a angry oddball!

Method to my Madness

2010-08-06T21:37:00.000-04:00

I just wanted to clarify why things don't always seem in order here. I sometimes don't have much time to post, like if I find wifi at a restaurant during lunch, so I just fire off a quick update to let people know where we are. Then, when I find some time I try and make longer posts about how each day has gone. I'm trying to keep the posts in chronological order, so you might actually have to scroll back past what you've already read to see the longer post I've recently made. I post quite a few pictures, so just scroll back and look for pictures you don't recognize.

I've seen fire and I've seen rain

2010-08-06T17:36:00.001-04:00

Well, I've got several amazing days to post about, but not enough time to type about them all.

For now we're laid over in Dawson City, YT. Our dreams of riding the Top of the World Highway between Dawson City, YT and Chicken, AK having been dashed by rains that have washed out the highway. Road repairs won't begin until the rain stops, and the rain isn't stopping until at least tomorrow. No one knows how many days it'll take for repairs, and we don't have time to wait and find out. We're going to stay one extra night here in hopes of hearing news that motorcycles might find their way through the construction zone, but the rain is pretty heavy, so that seems impossible now.

Tomorrow, we'll probably ride south back to Whitehorse, then maybe over to ride a scenic loop around Haines Junction, Skagway, and Haines. The day after that we'd like to start our ride down the Stewart Cassiar Highway but it's been closed on-and-off for the past 10 days due to wildfires. We'll be lucky if we get through. Watson Lake, YT, near the north end of the highway, was thick with smoke when we went through about a week ago. If the fire gets really bad at Watson Lake, then we might be stranded north for a bit because the only two roads south (Stewart Cassiar and the Alaska Highway) junction there.

If we could only move this rain down to the fires...

Inuvik to Dawson City

2010-08-05T23:00:00.180-04:00

Today we woke up early intent on riding the entire Dempster Highway (plus a tad more to Dawson City) in one day. The weather was forecast to be good until late in the day, so the sooner we got to the bottom the better.

The first ferry south arrived just as we did. The young guy running the deck invited us to go up top to take some pictures and have a look around. We talked with the older guy piloting (?) the ship for a while, and discovered the ship's engineer was from the same small city my Mom grew up in, about 10 minutes from the tiny village my Dad grew up in. Dad disappeared to go talk to the engineer for the rest of the short ride, come back out only after we'd landed (?). I'm using flying terms for boating, but somehow it seems correct.

View from down low

View from up high

The riding was pretty easy, although there was a bit more truck traffic today than two days ago. I'd been trying not to think too much about having to ride back through the section north of the Yukon-NWT border that I'd had trouble with on the way up. When the time came, I didn't find it nearly as bad as before. I was much more aggressive this time, with throttle, body position, and attitude. I was saying things to that road about it and it's mother that an abusive sailor wouldn't say to the cabin boy. I figured it was my new madd ridin' skillz that made the difference, but Dad figures it was the fact that two days worth of truck traffic can make a big difference on a road of loose gravel. He, uh, may have a point there.

Having survived the fresh gravel north of the Yukon border, again.

We stopped at Eagle Plains for lunch again, and the waitress remembered us, welcomed us back, and congratulated us on surviving thus far. I made an Anniversary Post for my wonderful wife, and Dad video Skyped Mom while other restaurant patrons looked on in amazement.

With about an hour left on the Dempster we met up with rain. It wasn't extremely heaving, but it was enough to make the road messy and a little tricky.

Oncoming rain

Rain falling just north of Tombstone Park

A little south of Tombstone campground we rounded a corner to find a minivan with a camper pulled off to the side. There was gear piled up on the side of the road, some legs sticking out from under the minivan, and a concerned wife looking on. We pulled over to see how we could help. The travelers were a retired couple from Quebec who were touring all over Canada with their minivan and camper. They had a flat tire and were simply unable to get the spare out from under the back of the minivan. Seemed simple enough, but the poor guy had already been fighting with it for an hour before we came along. The spare is held up under the vehicle by one of those cables you have to loosen from inside the van, which should allow the spare to simply drop to the ground. Unfortunately, they had never needed the spare in the 10 years they'd owned the van and it was completely rusted in place.

They asked if we'd continue south and try and call help for them once we found a phone or cell coverage, and we were more than happy to oblige. I asked if I could crawl under and have a look before taking off though, noting that it'd be several hours before they'd even know if we'd managed to call anyone. The rain was really picking up, and the road was slick with a fine, greasy mud. They put down a rain poncho for me to lay on, but my squirming around quickly had me off of it and onto the mud. I fought with the spare for a while, but had no luck. We tried several things including WD-40 and a few methods of pry bars, but it was on there pretty solid. The most luck I had was with a small hack saw the driver had with him, but I found it very had to get a sawing motion with the room available. The driver offered his chainsaw, and I laughed thinking it was a joke. I came out for a breather, and while trying to clean the mud out of my hair I noticed he really did have a big chainsaw packed away in the back of the van. This guy had one of everything packed away in the back of that van.

Rejuvenated by our efforts, the driver got back under with the hack saw and went at it like a desperate man on the side of a remote road with a flat tire in the rain. He sawed that damn support column clean off. The spare fell right on him, but thankfully it didn't have far to go so it didn't hurt him. We pulled him and the tire out, and celebrated with applause and pats on the back. The spare wheel rim was full of several pounds of gravel, likely a collection from all around Canada. We dumped the collection onto the Dempster, and had the tire changed in a few minutes.

Helping some fellow travelers with a flat tire on the Dempster Highway

The couple was extremely thankful for our "help", and tried to give me a $50. I explained I didn't want their money, and that we actually hadn't accomplished anything that helped them - he'd done all the work. They were insistent, but we were slightly more so and eventually they seemed OK with us just being happy to have helped. Then the wife's face brightened, and she whispered something to her husband in french. He got a big smile, and started nodding in agreement. He told us he had something we just couldn't refuse, and came back from their minivan with a bottle of wine! They explained it was a very, very good wine from southern BC and that we needn't worry because they'd bought plenty more for themselves. He was right, we couldn't refuse the wine, even though neither Dad or I drink. What can you say when they're so happy with their very generous offer? We took the wine, exchanged email addresses, put some paper towel over my head so I could put my muddy head back in my helmet, and headed south while they headed north.

We arrived in Dawson City about an hour later. It was late, and the visitor's centre was closed. The only campground we saw signs for was Dawson City River Hostel, across the Yukon River by ferry. All I wanted was a place to put a tent, and a hot shower to get all that Dempster mud out of my hair and off my face. The sign for the campground said "Hot Bath", which I figured was close enough. We checked in, and headed back across the river into town for some hot lasagna at Diamond Tooth Gerties while catching the end of their evening show.

Once fed, all I wanted was that hot bath and into my dry sleeping bag. It turns out the "hot bath" isn't really a bath at all. There are two sauna/bath houses where you build a fire under a barrel of water, wait for it to heat up, then poor it over yourself while standing on a platform with a drain. OK, so it takes a little work, but the sauna aspect sounded nice.

Picture taken in the light of the next day of Dawson City River Hostel's bath house. This is the smaller of the two bath houses, and at least this one has a sawing block for the wood.

Inside the smaller bath house at Dawson City River Hostel

There was no cut wood for a fire. OK, I'd chop some. There was a wood shelter, but it was full of wet wood, and mostly-whole shipping palettes. I found a small hatchet, but it might as well have been a mallet it was so dull. OK, I have my own hatchet and saw packed on the bike. I couldn't find a chopping block. People must chop wood right on the ground. No wonder the mallet, er, hatchet was so dull. I stood in the rain and considered my options. It was well after dark, and all I had for light was my head lamp. The bath house doesn't have any lights, but I thought I could prop my headlamp up somewhere enough to see in the bath house. I realized it was near midnight, and I didn't want to wake the entire camp up by chopping or sawing wood, even if I went and got my own hatchet and saw. I went to bed wet, cold, muddy, and pissed off. "Hot bath" indeed. Dawson City River Hostel, you should be ashamed of yourself!

Cats I've Met While on this Trip

2010-08-05T17:54:00.001-04:00

Here, for my wife, are some cats I've met while on this trip, starting with our cat, Neechee. I'd introduce you to each of them, but we've just finished lunch at Eagle Plains on our way south on the Dempster Highway and we've 6 more hours of riding to go. Got to get rollin'.

Happy Anniversary, Jessica. I love you!

Tuktoyaktuk

2010-08-04T23:13:00.356-04:00

One thing we wanted to do on this trip was see the Atlantic, Arctic, and Pacific Oceans. Unfortunately, there aren't any public roads that go all the way to the Arctic Ocean. There are two roads in North America that cross into the Arctic Circle. In the US, you can take the Dalton Highway north from Fairbanks AK to Prudhoe Bay AK. You can't ride right up to the coast though because the oil companies have it locked down as a secured area. You have to pay to take a bus tour. In Canada, you can take the Dempster Highway from near Dawson City YT to Inuvik NT. Unless the ice road is open in the winter, there is no way to drive from there to the ocean though. The only choice is to take a boat up the MacKenzie river, or to fly.

We knew we wanted to fly to Tuk, but we didn't even think about booking tickets because we had no way of knowing if or when we'd make it up the Dempster Highway to Inuvik. When he woke up this morning to find we were actually in Inuvik, Dad started making phone calls (hiding in the bathroom to avoid waking me) to find out how we might get to Tuk, and how much we might pay.

I woke up to find out our only real choice was a $420 scheduled flight with Aklak Air, and we had to be at the airport in 1 hour. The $420 was steeper than I'd expected, but my wife had been encouraging me to take the flight since before I left on this trip, reminding me that I'd probably never get the chance again. We decided quickly, and Dad bought the tickets on the phone. We got dressed, booked our hotel room for another night (no time to move to a local campground), wolfed down some free continental breakfast, and took off for the Inuvik airport.

I met the pilot of our flight while checking in, and he offered to let us store our motorcycle gear in the hanger so we wouldn't have to take it to Tuk with us. He had coveralls on, and at first I thought he was a baggage handler or something, not our pilot. His accent immediately gave him away as a Newfie, as did the way he asked where we parked our bikes: "Where yer bikes to?" He was somewhere around my age, from out east, had flown out of every province and territory in Canada, and rode dirt bikes. We had lots to talk about, but not much time since we had to get flying.

Read the white sign posted behind my Dad

The flight was only about 20 minutes, which gave us just enough time to get a good look at the insanity which is the MacKenzie River Delta. We also had a decent look at Tuk's pingos during the landing but, as is often the case, my photos didn't really turn out because my camera has little zoom. We left the airport, stopped for some photos at the greeting sign, and started the short walk into town.

Welcome to Tuk, elevation: 5m!

We were maybe a minute down the road when someone stopped and offered us a ride into town. We hopped in the bed of the truck, and were taken directly to the main store and gas station. We hopped out and exchanged introductions with our driver, Chuck Gruben, a local guide and outfitter. Chuck took the time to describe the town to us, some sites we should see, and to talk about the traditional sod huts that are right beside where we'd stopped. He gave us the name and number of a tour guide, Joanne, in case we wanted a tour. He'd have given us one himself, if he weren't so busy that day. Thanks for the great welcome to Tuk, Chuck!

Dad in the back of Chuck Gruben's truck on the ride into Tuk from the airport

There are two sod houses built in "downtown" Tuk. Actually, I guess only one is a sod house because the other was left unsoded so the supporting structure would be visible. The house with the sod is in very good shape inside, and was surprisingly roomy.

After looking at the sod houses, we headed over to the store to call Joanne for a tour. While waiting for her, we looked around the store and it's shocking prices.

I knew coke habits were expensive, but this is ridiculous!

It turns out Joanne, our tour guide, is also the only taxi driver in town. Dad and I ended up getting a driven tour of Tuk, while Joanne also picked up and dropped off other customers going about their day. After we'd seen most of town, and learned some of the stories behind sites we'd seen, we were taken back to "Million Dollar Beach" at the northern tip of Tuk. We planned on walking back through town to have a closer look at things, then meet Joanne later for a tour of the communal ice cellar built 30" underground in the permafrost.

The "Million Dollar Beach" is a local nick name for the shore at the northern end of town since a significant amount of time and money has gone into ensuring it doesn't wash away - at least not any more than it already has. Besides boulders like the one you can see me standing on (below), there was a huge section covered with numerous concrete slabs that were each at least 10"x20". There we also several substantially constructed picnic tables, one of which we used while eating a packed lunch. One thing I noticed about Tuk, not just at this "beach", was that I couldn't find any garbage cans. The streets were awash with litter, but even when I wanted to properly dispose of my trash I couldn't find anywhere to put it.

Dad at the Arctic Ocean

Me at the Arctic Ocean

One of three ends of the Trans Canada Trail

After lunch we walked over to Our Lady of Lourdes, a ship that is now permanently resting in town near the churches. We learned that the ship used to be used, among other thing, for missionaries to gather children from the surrounding area to bring them to Residential Schools. It would also be used at the start of the summer to return the children home for a few months, "if they still knew where the parents were." Of course, there is still a lot of strong emotion around Canada's history of Residential Schools, and we were told many residents of Tuk would be happy if Our Lady of Lourdes had never been preserved.

Our Lady of Lourdes

While taking photos of the ship, we were approached by a nun who is visiting Tuk's Catholic rectory for several weeks. She told us some more about the history of the ship, the churches in Tuk, and a bit about herself. It turns out she was born in Fredericton NB (where my parent's live), and lives in St. John NB (where I was born). She's been coming to visit Tuk for several weeks each summer for the past few years. She ended up inviting us to the rectory to try some Beluga whale flipper they had recently been given. We met the nun who is a permanent resident there, as well as a visiting priest. We chatted while the whale flipper was heated up, and had some fresh bread. The flipper was very tough to cut, especially for hands where were sore and week from all that motorcycle riding. It was very fatty, the meat itself was very dark, and I thought it was delicious.

Beluga whale flipper. Left half is cooked, right half is still frozen in plastic wrap, but included to show full flipper size.

After the whale fat we were properly insulated for a dip in the Arctic Ocean (Beaufort Sea, actually). It wasn't nearly as cold as you might imagine the Arctic Ocean would be, which was somehow a little disappointing. Still, it was very satisfying to actually go for a swim in The Arctic Freakin' Ocean!

Joanne, our tour guide / taxi driver, had said she'd meet up with us later in the day to take us down into the communal freezer that is dug 30 feet under the town. Since we hadn't seen her driving around town, we followed the backup plan to meet her at the freezer's entrance at 2pm. We waited for her for 30 minutes, but unfortunately she never showed. (We later called her from the airport so we could pay her for the part of tour we had gotten, and found out she'd just forgotten about us.)

We stopped back by the store to mail some postcards from the post office, then continued walking through town. At Joanne's suggestion, we headed to the RCMP station to check out their swag. Instead of the normal Mountie on a horse, the RCMP in Tuk have their own logo with a Mountie on a polar bear. I thought the logo was awesome, but I've got more than enough t-shirts so I didn't buy anything. Dad was interested in one of their jackets, but they only had women's left. Apparently it had been a busy tourist season.

Finally we walked over to the radar station that looks out over the town. The lady at the RCMP office said it was the highest ground around Tuk, besides the pingos, and that it offered a good view of town. It may have been slightly higher than the rest of town, but I'd hardly call it high ground. Still, it was cool to visit one of the DEW Line sites and have one last good look at Tuk before heading to the airport.

DEW Line sit at Tuktoyaktuk

We walked back to the airport with almost an hour to spare before our flight. That gave me time to take my boots of and air out a little. Joanne came to drop some passengers off, and realized she'd forgotten about us and the freezer. She stayed around for about 30 minutes to chat though, and did her best to answer Dad's questions about local power generation. Chuck Gruben came by too, so he was the first and one of the last Tuk residents we saw today. The Gruben family seems to be prominent in Tuk; besides the mayor being a Gruben, the airport is name after James Roger Gruben, a local charter flight operator who died back in 2001. There is a cool statue of him in the airport, with his arm appearing to rest on a propeller blade. The propeller isn't attached to anything though, and is actually hanging from the statue's arm.

James Roger "Havgun" Gruben (Aug 28, 1957 - Apr 13, 2001)

As he'd promised us that morning, the same pilot that flew the flight in came to pick us up for our 7 pm flight out to Inuvik. The official boarding call was him walking up to us in the airport and asking, "y'buys ready t'go?"

MacKenzie River Delta during flight from Tuk to Inuvik

After landing we went to The Roost again for dinner and to say hi to Fadi before heading to back to the hotel to get cleaned up and hit the sack. Not much riding today, but a tiring and unforgettable day nonetheless. I'm thankful for all the people we met today who were eager and happy to help make our day enjoyable and interesting. I just can't get over how many great people we're crossing paths with on this trip!

Arctic Circle! Inuvik!

2010-08-03T00:00:00.000-04:00

Today we woke up at Tombstone Campsite about 70 km up the Dempster Highway. The weather was good, and we wanted to make the most of it by trying to ride all the way to Inuvik, the end of the road, the furthest north you can drive in Canada. That's 665 km (412 miles) of dirt and gravel - potentially very nasty dirt, gravel, mud and clay.

Really, my entire reason for this trip was this picture taken at Engineer Creek Campground. I never told Dad that because I didn't think he'd agree to come.

Although the Dempster was closed last week due to washouts and one of the ferries being shutdown due to high water, the weather had been dry for the last several days. That made for good riding condition most of the time, although it was very, very dusty. We could have ridden faster, but we kept it around 90 km/h (55 mph) to protect the tires from the sharp gravel, to help protect us from wiping out, and to conserve gas for the 369 km (229 mile) stretch without any gas stations.

We were trying to make good time, so we didn't stop to take too many scenic pictures, which we could have done constantly. One of the things that struck me most about the Dempster is how varied it is. The road condition and type varies constantly, and the landscape even more so. Sweeping river valleys, ancient mountains, arctic forests, arctic plains, marshes, forested river deltas, and all sorts of geological formations. I found it amazing that I could see so much in one day's ride.

Looking about 180km across the Ogilvie River Valley

Dad looking across the Ogilvie River Valley

We arrived at Eagle Plains Lodge, dusty and hungry. The lodge felt very much like "An Oasis in the Wilderness", as it claims to be. We got good food with good service, cleaned up our faces and motorcycle lights, and filled up on gas. We even managed to email our wives using their free wifi! The break left us both feeling re-energized, which was good because we weren't even half way done the day.

Our friend that took us for the acrobatic plane ride earlier in this trip had recently flown to Tuktoyaktuk with two students. He made a great 15 minute video of their trip, which included some video and shots of them landing on the Dempster highway. We promised we'd take some shots of us at the same air strip, and as you can see it was pretty windy.

The Arctic Circle, if I may remind you, is defined by the southernmost latitude that experiences 24 hours of sunlight during the summer solstice, and 24 hours of darkness during the winter solstice. As far as I could tell, it was defined by some picnic tables, a sign, a nice view, and an abandoned Astro minivan with a blown out rear tire.

Dempster Victim

Sixty km past the Arctic Cirlce we hit the Yukon/North West Territories border. The road conditions changed at that point from mostly hard packed gravel/dirt to quite a bit of loose, freshly graded gravel. That might not sound that bad to car drivers, but loose anything is bad news on a motorcycle. A shallow amount can cause a bit of slipping, which I didn't find too hard to handle. Any deeper, and the front end can start to wobble dramatically as it tries to plow through the gravel instead of rolling over it. I'm not very experienced with this type of riding, and found it pretty hair raising at points. There was a strong cross wind, and a few times it pushed me sideways across the gravel towards steep edges with no guard rails. As I moved sideways, the gravel would get deeper near the edge, causing the front end to wobble as I moved closer to the edge.

I've been considering how I can explain how I felt, besides the obvious "terror" and "dread". It was the very overwhelming, whole-body terror that can only come when your brain thinks it's about to cease existing. Adrenaline surges, and the fear creates an extreme singular focus that can either be just what you need or exactly what you don't want. If it's a situation you're familiar with, the adrenaline is helpful and the fear not-so overwhelming. Being unfamiliar with this left me with on the edge of panic, and a very real feeling that if I didn't supress that panic I'd die.

Now, in all likely hood a fall would not have meant death at all. I'd probably just have slid down the road and maybe a ways down a steep embankment. The bike and I may be damaged some, but likely not fatally in either case. Still, the ancient instinctual part of my brain didn't know that, so it was very concerned and doing all it could to prepare my body to fight a saber tooth tiger or whatever else it thought I needed the adrenaline for. Thanks, but I just need to stand up on the footpegs and give it some gas.

After a second's hesitation where I had the normal panicked reaction of letting off the gas (which usually makes the wobble worse), I forced myself to stand up on the pegs (if I wasn't already) and give it some gas again. We had about 40km of this stuff, and it was exhausting. I don't think Dad was nearly as freaked out as I was, but it took us a while after the conditions improved to get back to our previous cruising speeds.

The roads improved, and except for some tricks in construction zones (of which there were plenty) the ride was pretty straightforward and enjoyable. We crossed a couple ferries, and pushed on after the last ferry for a late arrival in Inuvik as some clouds rolled in. We'd done it - we'd ridden from the Atlantic Ocean to as far north as roads will take you in Canada!

We opted for the first hotel room of the trip, and got a greasy dinner at The Roost. The Roost, owned and operated by a Lebanese guy and his relatives (serving American, Greek, and Chinese food), has a dining room decorated with a Polar Bear, a musk ox head, antlers, and other northern memorabilia. We had a good conversation with one of the owner's cousins and employees, Fadi, who moved directly from Lebanon to Inuvik in the winter about two years ago. Poor bastard.

Attacked by a polar bear at "The Roost" in Inuvik

The Dempster, Started

2010-08-02T23:00:00.044-04:00

This morning we had a quick but yummy breakfast at the Baked Cafe at 100 Main St. in Whitehorse, YT, right near the corner of Main and 2nd Ave. We only had some pressed breakfast sandwiches, but it seemed like a good place to get a warm drink and hang out. I wished I had found it before spending hours blogging at the campground yesterday.

We then headed over to Yukon Honda, where we had two sets of knobby tires shipped earlier in our trip. We got there right at opening, and John from the service department was able to mount and balance our tires right away. They were fine with Dad and I removing our own wheels out in their parking lot, which saved us $40 and allowed us to keep the bikes partially loaded instead of having to strip all the bags off.

We shipped the street tires that were taken off down to a friend in Prince George BC on the Greyhound bus. We'll have those installed and change our oil on our way south to Vancouver next week.

We left Whitehorse a bit before noon, and headed north towards the start of the Dempster Highway. The Dempster Highway is the only road in Canada that crosses the Arctic Circle (the Dalton Highway is the only road in the US to do the same.) Completing this highway is one of the main goals of the trip, but is also one of the least likely. Road conditions change as quickly as the weather, and can range from "hard and fast like pavement" to "road closed because there is no more road". Those that make it often have tales of wipeouts, and very commonly flat tires. Buying oil at Canadian Tire this morning, I started talking with two locals who were full of warning about riding the Dempster. One guy drove a maintenance truck on the highway for a few seasons, and repeated the common warning of Just Keeping It Slow. Most flat tires apparently happen when you're going above 90 or 100 km/h and the front tire throws sharp rocks up in the air, and the rear tire rolls over them and gets punctured. Keep it around 80 km/h and we should be fine. The knobby tires we just installed should help avoid both the flat tires and the wipe outs. Having read plenty of accounts of others attempting the Dempster, I figure our odds of reaching Inuvik at the north end are 50-50.

Our goal today was just to get as close to the Dempster as possible, which worked out quite well because we camped at Tombstone Campground, about 70km along the highway. Tomorrow we try for the Arctic Circle and Inuvik NT!

Father and Son at the start of the Dempster Highway

Camping at Tombstone Campground, on the Dempster Highway

Quick Update

2010-08-02T02:15:00.000-04:00

We arrived in Whitehorse YT Saturday evening, having left Liard Hot Springs that morning. That meant we had to hang out Sunday and wait to have the knobby tires we shipped up here installed Monday morning. At least we got some laundry and internetting done.

I'm heading to bed now (although it's just getting dark now at 11:15), and after the tires are installed in the morning we'll ride north towards the Dempster Highway. If things go well we'll cross the Arctic Circle Thursday morning, and take a flight to the Arctic Ocean on Friday. We likely won't have internet access for quite some time, so you may not see anything for over a week.

Thanks for checking in!

Layover in Whitehorse YT

2010-08-01T23:00:00.008-04:00

We're staying in Whitehorse for the day because we have to wait until Monday morning to have our knobby tires installed. It's a bit frustrating that we arrived on the 1 day out of 7 when we can't go get our tires, but it gives us a good opportunity to clean up a bit and get some blog posting done.

That beard thing still isn't working out for me. Can I shave now, Jess?

When we arrived at the campground last night, we were met by a German guy who was very eager to give us his campsite for free. It turns out he wasn't so much eager as he was rushed; he'd just developed an upset stomach (pronounced as a German would - "stum-atch") and was in a hurry to find a place with better facilities than the campground. He couldn't get a refund, so he wanted to be sure someone got his site. We took the site, but managed to pay him for it as well.

Although he was in a hurry, we still ended up chatting for a while with he and his wife. They're both German, and this was something like their sixth or seventh visit to the Yukon! They love it here, and come every other year. They'd found out about a marathon taking place on Sunday, and had just signed up to run a half-marathon and bought some running shoes since they hadn't brought theirs. Dad got pretty excited, and we decided to enter the half-marathon as a team (just over 10km each) since we hadn't been training for running at all.

By the time we'd learned about the marathon on Saturday night, almost everything in town had closed and there was nowhere to get info or sign up. Dad got up this morning and went to find out what he could about the race. Unfortunately, he found the event shortly before it began, and there were no registration slots left. He hadn't had breakfast yet, and there was no time to come back and get me to run the other half of the half-marathon. The organizer invited him to run as a "bandit", but without time for breakfast and some digestion, even that wouldn't have been a good idea. In the end he went for a run while I stayed at the campground and make some blog posts.

Loop de Loop

2010-08-01T22:09:00.002-04:00

Here is one of the videos I shot from the back seat of the plane I talked about a few days ago. I wanted to shoot videos of every maneuver, but at the same time I just wanted to look around and enjoy the experience. In the end I took videos for about half the maneuvers, but don't have any for the crazy Death Spirals (my name, not his) he did at the end. Those felt a lot like very quickly losing altitude while spinning out of control, except apparently he was in control the whole time. A part of me still wonders if it was just dumb luck we pulled out of that...

Liard Hot Springs BC to Whitehorse YT

2010-07-31T23:00:00.000-04:00

Leaving Liard Hot Springs this morning, we enjoyed more great scenery and a very busy day for wildlife on the road side. We saw a black and then a brown bear, then an elk that was pretty much black (caught in those forest fires, I guess), then some bison.

At first we just saw this lone bison lumbering down the side of the road. He was up on the rise, then angled down towards us and walked right along the side of the road. You can't really make them out in the picture, but he's got a massive swarm of flies around him. We knew bison were prevalent in the area, but felt very lucky to get to see one right up close like this!

A few minutes down the road we saw another bison running in the opposite direction beside the road. We took several pictures of the first one, so we just slowed down but kept on riding this time. One bison, pfft.

A few minutes after that we came across a whole herd of them grazing by the side of the road. I estimated 20, and Dad counted 19. Craziness! I don't have much have a zoom on my camera, so I don't have any decent close ups, but they are quite an impressive beast.

A few more minutes down the road, and we find an even bigger herd spread out all over both sides of the road. There had to be at least 40 of them, just grazing our laying around, sometimes just a few feet off the roadside. I wanted to ride right up and snap some good close-ups, but I also wanted to live to ride another day so we stayed at a good distance then crept through on the yellow line. I was expecting a herd of about 80 next, likely right in the middle of the road, perhaps driving cars or riding motorcycles. Apparently we'd seen our fill of bison though, because this was it for the day.

We stopped for gas, breakfast, and info in Watson Lake, YT. The info centre has a "forest" of signs all around it. At first I thought it was just a few rows of signposts, but as we rode around the centre I realized there are hundreds of posts and thousands upon thousands of signs. We didn't have time to wander the entire forest, but you could easily spend half a day looking for places you've been or lived. I found Kanata, ON, a few places in VT and NH, a NB license plate, and quite a few from near Hudson's Hope BC.

There are forest fires burning just west of town at the top of the Stewart Cassiar Highway, and the whole down was full of smoke. None of the shots I took really portray just how smokey it was, perhaps because having the smell permeate everywhere was part of the effect. We want to take the Stewart Cassiar on our way back south, so we're hoping the fires are out by then. It's been a really dry season for this area though, and we hear the fire is spreading quite quickly.

We arrived in Whitehorse in the early evening. We didn't even think we'd really make it all the way today (Sat), else we would have left earlier so we could have arrived during business hours. Now we have to wait until Monday morning before we can go to Yukon Honda and have the knobby tires we shipped up installed.

We stopped by the visitor's centre when we arrived to get help finding a campground and dinner. They had one of those big topo maps with points of interest that light up. Here is Dad lighting up the Dempster Highway and the Arctic Circle.

Liard Hot Springs

2010-07-30T23:00:00.032-04:00

We left Hudson's Hope early this morning, after a good night's sleep in our "Swiss Cabin".

The morning was cold and drizzly, and breakfast at the Blueberry Esso in Wonowon (at mile 101 of the Alaska Highway) didn't exactly brighten the day. We met up with an adv tourer from North Carolina, and rode with him on and off throughout the morning.

We all stopped for gas at Buckinghorse River Lodge, but found a note on the pump apologizing for there being no gas left. The note said the next gas was 125 miles north (too far) or 30 miles back south (too bad). Then I noticed a sign at the building across the highway. It looked like it said "unleaded gasoline" on it. Why would the gas station I was at send me back 30 miles when there was gas right across the highway? We went to check it out, and sure enough they had plenty of gas. I asked the guy who unlocked the pumps for us if he knew the competition across the road was sending people 30 miles back. "Yeah, that guy is crazy. We put signs up along the road saying we had gas, and he drove over them with a truck. His wife has a black eye, y'know? Some guy ran out of gas, then found out we have gas from someone who stopped to help him. He came back and punched the crazy guy out." So…if you ever need gas at Buckinghorse River, go to the building on the EAST side of the highway not on the WEST.

The scenery north of Fort Nelson is amazing. If we'd stopped to take pictures, I'd show you, but we didn't. They wouldn't have done the scenery justice anyway. There was quite a bit of gravel due to roadwork, which made for some very dusty and a few tricky sections as gravel mixed with pavement. The highway snakes along immediately beside Muncho Lake, just a few feet above the water. The lake is breathtaking, even with bug guts splattered in your right eye and nowhere to stop to wash them out.

We stopped at Liard Hot Springs Provincial Park for the night, caught dinner at the lodge across the highway just as it closed, and walked up to enjoy the hot springs with all the other tourists. The beta pool was probably the nicest, although perhaps only because it wasn't nearly as busy as the alpha pool. There were languages and accents from all over, which I always enjoy. Most people at the pools were friendly, and happy to chat and give tips on how to fan cool water from the pool floor up onto yourself as you make your way to the searing hot source to place a trophy stone on the pile.

We met Anne, who is heading from Vancouver to Dawson City by truck to pick up a friend then up the Dempster to Inuvik. She gave us some tips on the pools before we headed up, including the fact that the sulphur smell does not go well with an empty stomach. She was gone by the time we got back, but left a note wishing us well. Maybe we'll see you up the road, although you've got a good head start on us now.

We also met a couple of adv riders out of Anchorage, who were heading back after three weeks down to California. I hope you guys get some sleep before work on Monday! We'll do our best not to make any "trophy rocks" on the Dempster.

Finally, thanks to the staff who runs Liard Hot Springs Provincial Park for allowing us to stay in the Day Use area because the normal tent sites were all full. There were several other tenters staying there as well, and we were all grateful for this exception from the normal provincial park rules. The park is particularly far from any other accommodations, and allowing tired campers to pitch a tent where there is room surely keeps many tired campers off the roads at night. Good policy, and I hope it doesn't get abused.

Swiss Hospitality

2010-07-29T23:45:00.019-04:00

It was raining when we finished our tour of the W.A.C. Bennett Dam this afternoon, so we sat in some dinosaur footprint fossils under an awning to wait for the rain to stop before riding back into town. I returned the nod of a passenger of a minivan that arrived as we waited; nothing unusual, must be just another rider who happens to not be on their bike at the moment. I noticed he took an extra long look at our bikes, then back at us before heading into the visitor's centre with his family.

The rain wasn't letting up, so we decided to head to the visitor's centre's cafe to see if they had internet access. As we started to sit down at a picnic table outside, the guy I'd exchanged nods with earlier came outside and asked if we'd care to come inside and enjoy some BC hospitality. I didn't catch his meaning at first, and his slight accent threw me because "Thick Canadian" is the only accent I've heard around here, but he explained he'd like to buy us lunch. We declined lunch, but allowed him to get us something to drink as we sat and chatted with he, his wife, and their daughter and son.

They'd recently moved to Hudson's Hope when he started a job as a mechanic at the W.A.C Bennett Dam. He works in the same garage my Dad used to work on our old Volvo in the middle of the cold BC winters. (I remember being in that garage as a kid, probably 5 or 6 years old, seeing a truck tire being taken off a rim.) He and his wife are originally from Switzerland, and have been in Canada for almost 20 years. He'd always been interested in Canada, and his obsession was cemented when he visited in the early 80's, and returned to buy a motorcycle in Montreal and ride it to BC and spend several months there. He met his wife back in Switzerland, but made it clear from the start he'd one day move to Canada.

We soon asked about the sling he had his arm in, having also noted how he was obviously in a bit of pain. It turns out he hit a deer while riding his motorcycle not two weeks ago - his first accident in about 30 years of riding. He was coming home and had only 1km left when there was suddenly a deer out in front of him. He said he remembers thinking "oh, this is going to be close", then waking up in the hospital several hours later. He was wearing a full faced Shoei helmet, a proper jacket, heavy-duty double layered Carhart pants, and tall leather boots. He hit his head hard enough to crack the helmet near the temple, but it did it's job and his head is fine. He suffered 2 broken ribs, a cracked shoulder blade, and two breaks on one collar bone, but his jacket and pants saved him from being torn up. His boots took a beating, but saved one foot which was drug under his bike.

As scary as that story was, we really enjoyed talking with he and his wife about riding, living in Hudson's Hope, moving far from family, and lots of things in between. Much to our surprise, they welcomed us to stay for the night in a cabin they have next to their house a little ways outside of town. (It was actually about as close as any house gets to the campground we'd stayed at the night before.) His wife greeted us as we rode in, and made us feel very welcomed. We'd arrived later than we wanted, and the kids had already gone to bed. Their oldest, the daughter, had really wanted to be awake when we arrived, so her Mom woke her up so we could talk a bit. I'm guessing she's about 6 years old (I'm horrible at that game though), with long blond hair she tucks behind her ears, and a huge smile. Really sweet. Their son was younger, and a bit more shy. Hopefully we'll see him before we leave in the morning, although we hope to get going pretty early.

I'm typing this from inside their cabin right now, and this is easily the coolest accommodations we've had so far. Like their stunning home, the cabin is completely log construction with a red metal roof. It's got two small beds, a wood stove, a skylight, some tables, and chairs for the kids. Their property backs onto the Peace River, and is just a few hundred metres down from the Peace Bridge and Peace Dam. What a house, what a view, and what hospitality!

So, we've showered, I washed some socks in their sink (they offered to let us do laundry, and to transfer to the dryer for us if we wanted to get to sleep!), and we're now both in bed. I think Dad's asleep already, as I'll be in just a few minutes.

Can't Go Home Again

2010-07-29T22:00:00.060-04:00

We spent today riding around Hudson's Hope, visiting old friends and reliving old memories. Naturally, the town has changed quite a bit in the last 25 years, but it was sometimes surprising to see how things have also stayed the same. Memories lurked around every corner, and if I stood in any one spot long enough more would just keep coming, sometimes with overwhelming power and clarity.

One third of my elementary school was disassembled and sold to another town, and the remaining two thirds are now offices, meeting spaces, stores, and a nice hair salon. Thanks to the Pearkes Center's owner for letting us look around.

The trailer park that used to be nearby is gone, but the roads and pads remain. What an odd sight.

The ice arena my Dad helped build is still there, but we didn't find time to go inside.

The pool I used to swim at is still open, and I met one of the people who taught me to swim. (We didn't actually see her at the pool; she's the daughter of friends we had dinner with, and she stopped by to say 'hi'.)

Here are the townhouses we used to live in. Later, when we lived in the house shown below, I was on a bicycle ride with my Dad on my new two wheeler. I froze with terror as I careened down that incredibly steep hill (yes, the one in the picture) and failed to negotiate that sharp right hand turn before the townhouses. I left the road heading straight for the broad side of the townhouse, and became air born as I cleared the ditch. I landed on the grass on the far side of the ditch, and remember laying there for a few minutes, with my Dad on the grass beside me as I recovered from the accident. A nice memory, all told, but I decided not to try and recreate it with the motorcycles.

My childhood best friend Katherine's house is still there, but she and her family are long gone. (She's recently married, and I've seen wonderful pictures of her with her husband in Paris.) I didn't have time to go looking for the tree house behind her old place, but I did see the field she ran across, crying, after I happily explained to her how I figured out that the whole Santa Claus thing was a scam. As I recall, neither she nor her father were nearly as happy about my discovery as I was. He'd already called my Mom by the time I finished walking home (Katherine must have run fast when she was upset), and my Mom tried to explain to me why I might not want to tell all my friends about my discovery. Over 25 years later, and I'm still surprised when people want to believe obvious lies. When will I learn?

The family that bought our old house when we left still live there, although the father of the family passed away suddenly about two weeks ago. He used to work for the Hydro commission like by Dad, and was just two years older. Scary.

The grocery store is just as sad as I remember it.

The high school has been demolished, and a new health centre has gone up nearby. I somehow forgot to find out where kids go to highschool now. Perhaps the new elementary school I saw is actually K-12.

"The Hill" where we used to toboggan has been ruined by a Rec Centre of some kind. We already had a Rec Centre! It was called "The Hill"!

I played "I'll show you mine if you show me yours" in those trees over there, and in that house. (Oh my!)

The dams my Dad helped commission are overrun with security now. We had to register when we showed up at the W.A.C Bennett Dam, and got in trouble for going down to the main building to take pictures. In our defense, they didn't tell us we couldn't, and there were no signs saying so either. I stupidly began to explain this to the security guard, but she wasn't too upset with us to start with and I quickly realized I should just apologize and move on. In the picture below, you can see someone just behind the bike coming to ask if we're lost. "Not at all," I told her. Security found us a few minutes later.

We took the $6 tour of the dam ($4 for seniors, Dad), which felt a little odd to me, and must have been downright surreal for my father. I remember my Dad taking me to the dam when I was about 6, and we could go anywhere. I've walked around the bottom of the pencock where a turbine usually sits when it was apart for service! The $6 tour wasn't half that cool. Cameras were not allowed. I kept trying to imagine what it would be like going back to my old workplaces, but having to stay behind all the tour boundaries, and just look at things from the walkways. At one point the tour guide asked if anyone had been under a dam before. I LOLed. I then had to explain that my Dad (indicating to the man next to me) worked here 25 years ago. The rest of the tour group seemed very impressed and, although our tour guide did an excellent job, they sometimes looked at my Dad as if for verification if she stumbled at all during her spiel.

The church I grew up in recently had it's surfaces restored, and it looks like new, which is saying something because it was built in 1938. I used to ring the bell on Sundays, and the rope could lift me off the ground. I once froze my tongue to the doorknob of the front door. I see they've replaced both the door and the door knob since then. The surface of my tongue has since been replaced as well.

I had a crush on Tina when I was a kid. She always wore dresses, which didn't seem practical to me for playing at recess. She lived in a trailer at the top of a hill. Apparently her parents are still there. I rode by, and it's been very well maintained, but Tina's play house is gone. I remember her dad's old Honda Shadow. It had Honda motorcycle's wing logo on the tank, and I thought it looked way cooler than my Dad's CB550K because it was so new. (Probably a 1982 instead of my Dad's 1974.)

I was playing in that ditch at the end of our old street one summer when I realized, as a 6 or 7 year old, that summers seemed like a different life from school. How long were summers anyways? When would I have to go back to school?

The road I was riding my bicycle on when I accidentally swallowed a bee (it flew right in my mouth!) is actually gone now. I guess that'll stop it from happening again.

We caught an old hockey teammate of my father's as he was heading out fishing with the son of another former teammate. I used to go to school with their daughter, and would go over to their place to play. She lives in New Zealand now, and her parents are hoping to buy a home there soon too.

They want to finally leave Hudson's Hope because a third dam, "Site C", has been given the go ahead. Site C will flood the beautiful Peace Valley, covering hundreds of square kilometers of valley, including homes and farms. It will also create hundreds (thousands?) of jobs, and will provide a large amount of clean electricity. I can see both sides of the issues, but was surprised to see so many signs of opposition in an area largely built on the existence of two other dams.

Finally, it was wonderful to spend some time with you, S and A. Thank you for the steak dinner, including my first corn on the cob of the year, and for helpful tips for our trip north. I look forward to getting those old pictures of St. Peter's, and to seeing some of those sunrises you've photographed from your porch overlooking the Peace River. What a view you have!

Remember for your next trip back East, I'm one day's drive from New Brunswick - the perfect place to stop for the night on your way through.

(Back) To The Beginning

2010-07-28T00:21:00.040-04:00

Pulled over to "Batten Down the Hatches" for the storm ahead. It was a good one.

Today we rode from just North of Edmonton AB to my 'home' town of Hudson's Hope BC. Although I wasn't born in HH, we moved there when I was just a few months old, and stayed for the first 7 years of my life. As much as anywhere, this is my home town.

On the way there, we passed through Dawson's Creek. Before it was a teenage drama on The WB, Dawson's Creek was well known as "Mile 0" of the Alaska Highway. Jessica might understand how "Mile 0" connects with "I'm a ninja. Kawabunga time." in my head.

Some shots from Mile 0 of the Alaska Highway

Nothing looked very familiar on the ride through towns I'd seen as a child, such as Grand Cache AB, Dawson's Creek BC, or Fort St. John BC. The main drags all look the same from one town to the next now, with the same restaurants, and the same box stores. Then, as we turned off from the Alaska Highway to Hudson's Hope, I had a memory of my Mom at the turn off's gas station, just a few years older than I am now, packing her two kids into the silver Volvo 242 I later learned to drive on. I only remembered a few bits of the drive from Fort St. John to Hudson's Hope, but maybe more would have looked familiar if I'd only looked up and to the right, like I was a kid sitting in the back seat of a two door car. The road is much more dramatic than I remember, with some amazing vistas, and some pretty steep climbs and descents. If it hadn't been close to dark by the time we arrived in HH, I would have turned around and ridden it again!

One of the many vistas on Hwy 29 east of Hudson's Hope BC

In the last 20 minutes before reaching Hudson's Hope we saw nine deer along the side of the road. Nine! Although most were by themselves, we did see one group of three. It turns out Hudson's Hope is overrun by deer right now, which wasn't the case when we lived there. It seemed like there was a deer around every corner, and they stroll right through the middle of town, eating garbage and destroying flowers and trees.

We hadn't managed to contact any friends in HH on our way in, so we pitched our tents at the campsite by the Peace Canyon Dam. The dam's construction is the reason we moved to HH in the first place, and there are pictures of me walking on the floor of the valley that is now flooded by the lake we camped on. The valley was full of dinosaur fossils, and there is a good one of me sitting in a footprint thats larger than I was. Dad figures he and I were part of the first group to ever canoe those waters, having carried canoes down to the water shortly after the dam was completed, well before they were open to the public.

Me, contemplating the flooded Peace Canyon

Dad, indicating rules that obviously can't apply to us.

Edmonton

2010-07-27T22:16:00.036-04:00

Having put my bike back together, we were ready to roll out of Three Hills this morning. Thanks once again to our friends and trailer haulin' saviors there, for your help and hospitality. Thanks for the aircraft hanger in which we worked on and cleaned our bikes, too. Nice digs.

We rode west then north into Edmonton, and swung east to visit Sherwood Park, where we used to live in the late 80's. The house we used to live in looks almost exactly as we'd left it: same horrible pea green color, same number Dad had hung on the front step, same trees (just a lot bigger.) The neighbor across the street came out to leave in his car, but stopped to take a picture of us and chat for a few minutes. He said the owners of our old house were on vacation, and that we could probably just snoop around back. We rang the doorbell, and when no one answered we took to snooping. There's a shed in the back yard, and my basketball net isn't up anymore, but it looks very much as we'd left it 20 years ago. Are those our Christmas lights hanging up?

We stopped by my old school, and walked around the grounds a bit. I was surprised to discover I remembered most of the paths through the forest out back, as well as all the streets, alleys and shortcuts in the surrounding neighborhood. It's funny what sticks with you, buried away.

Next visited my Dad's brother and his S.O. I hadn't seen them in about 12 years, and the few hours we had for dinner hardly made up for that. Unfortunately, it was getting late and we had to be a little north of Edmonton in Morinville before dark.

We had friends to stay with there that I hadn't seen since leaving Alberta. The "kids" who are around my age looked a little different than when I last I saw them, but their parents hadn't changed all that much. Thanks to Mrs. P for the spare beds, and the wonderful breakfast. Thanks to Mr. P for hurrying home so you could see us before we took off. Thanks to T. and her boyfriend for riding up from Edmonton to see us; that's a sweet Suzuki you guys were on. If it ever gets traded for something more comfortable, I'll take you for some nice rides in Vermont. Thanks to N. for coming over with three out of her four daughters, the youngest being just four weeks old! That grey streak is understandable, and pretty hot! Do people compare you more often to Rogue, or Bonnie Raitt?

Baby Face

2010-07-27T01:30:00.001-04:00

My wonderful, but sometimes naive, wife thought this trip would be the perfect opportunity for me to finally try growing a beard. When she says "beard" what she really means is Bradley Cooperesque stubble. I've tried to explain that I just don't grow enough hair to have any kind of beard. I don't think 6 weeks is going to help that fact. Six weeks will simply give me a longer, very patchy beard instead of a short, very patchy beard. More time != more stubble. A face full of stubble will never happen.

Here's what about 8 days of "beard" looks like. Note the distinct "no hair will ever grow here" zones. Who thinks I should give up this experiment now and save myself further humiliation?

Thanks to all the friends and family who refrained from asking what was wrong with my face, and apologies to the children I've scared.

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles

2010-07-25T15:03:00.000-04:00

Actually, it's motorcycles, trailers, and airplanes. After yesterday's further motorcycle troubles, we were rescued by an angel from Three Hills AB who came all the way to Rosetown SK to pick my bike up with her trailer. We didn't get back into Three Hills until almost 2am this morning.

We've removed the final drive's pinion housing from my bike, and I'm going to ride Dad's bike to Calgary to try and get it repaired first thing Monday morning. It looks like I get to see my friends in Calgary after all!

As I type this, I'm sitting at Prarie Aviation's hanger, watching our friend land after taking my Dad up for an acrobatic flight! They /just/ touched down.