7-7-08 Day 10 Edmonton to Dawson Creek

Today was one of the best days on the road yet despite the late start. We left Edmonton just before 11 am and got into Dawson Creek about 4:30 which includes gaining another hour with a time zone. It was a bright sunny day around 60 and stayed in the mid 60's. Toms bike ran flawlessly today. This stretch of road is similar to what we've seen for the last 2500 miles which is farm land. The main crop seems to be Canola as its well over half of what we see and we've probably seen a million acres planted. We took 16 (the TCH) out of Edmonton onto 43 North which gets you to Dawson Creek and then tomorrow we start the AlCan. I can't remember if I said this but the Canadian roads have been superb the whole way so far. Very rarely is there a poor road surface and very little in any one spot. The patches here are visual only you can't feel them. Pretty amazing isn't it. We keep hearing horror stories of what lies ahead but so far the roads are great. Dawson Creek is the gateway to Alaska and Mile O of the AlCan highway as seen in today's pic.

Update on Wildlife - None today but on last Saturday from Banff to Jasper we saw a black bear and elk and 3 packs of mountain sheep/goats walking in the road! That's all today as it's an early start tomorrow because we're not sure what type of speed well have from here on out as it's only 2 lane from here and we need to cover some ground in the next 5 days.

7-7-08 Day 10 Morning Snippets

Up at 6:20 to a bright sun that's drying things out nicely. Tom is having breakfast and will be heading out to the Harley shop. This mornings pic is a first for Tom. He told us yesterday that he's never ridden on the back of a motorcycle!!!!!!! Congratulations Tom!

Tom affectionately calls his bike "Old Red" as it's a 1984 Electra Glide and of course it's red. Well "Old Red" is being tested to its limits and after today there's nearly 2000 miles to the next Harley shop. Old Red has not died on the road but it has slowed the pace at times. We're hoping that this is the end of Toms trials & tribulations and all goes well from here. Our goal today is to make it to Dawson Creek, BC. We have 6 days including today to be in Fairbanks to meet the fly babes. Stay tuned!

10 AM update - Toms back with the part and its installed! We should be on the road within a half hour! Dawson creek here we come!

7-5 & 6-08 Day 8 & 9 Calgary to Edmonton

After the late night last night we are packed up and hit the road by 8am headed to Edmonton. It's only 180 miles if you go the direct route but numerous folks have told us that if your in this area one of the best bike rides you can take is the Icefield Highway (route 93) from Banff to Jasper. This route will be about 500 miles. So we get on the TCH heading west to Banff. I forgot to mention that since we left Regina, the prarrie has changed from flat to long gently rolling hills. Also the yellow topped plant that we didn't know what it was is Canola which is a very large crop out here. About 5 -8 miles out of Calgary in the distance you can see the snow covered Rockies in Banff which is about 60 miles away. Tom mentions that his clutch seems to have some slack all of a sudden and that when we stop for gas he'll adjust it. In Banff we stop for gas and are told that there's no services until you get to Jasper, 180 miles away, as the Icefield highway is within the Jasper National Forest which has a $3.90 US admission. We gas up, Tom adjusts his clutch and off we go. This is a 2 lane road with lots of cars/campers/RV's/bicycles/hikers etc. so you won't set any land speed records. The road winds up & down through the Rockies with some great scenery including glaciers hence the name Icefield highway. I'd be surprised if this road is open in the winter. There are turn outs along the way to take pics. We're heading up one pretty steep pass and there's a turn out with a great vantage point (see upper pic above) and through our CB's we decide we'll stop here. Tom comes back and says he'll meet us at the top! We stop for about 10 - 15 minutes and then continue up. We get up to the top and don't see Tom. As this road has no turns off of it we decide he must of kept going and we keep watching for him along the way at the turn outs but never see him. We continue on for another 60 - 70 miles and never see him all the while calling on the CB. As we cross out of the National Park just before Jasper there's Tom parked on the side of the road. He says that his clutch has slack again and he decided not to stop unless necessary. We are at about 178 miles on this tank of gas and we need gas which is just a few more miles up into Jasper. We fuel up and get lunch around 2:30. We have a little over 200 miles to get to Edmonton. At lunch Tom seems to think that he might have a throw out bearing issue rather then ordinary clutch adjustment as that hasn't worked. The good news is the intermittent power and chain issues he had seemed to be cured. We head for Edmonton via route 16 and the skies are not looking good. About 60 - 70 miles from Jasper we decide to pull over and get our rain gear on as there's some big dark clouds ahead. Perfect timing as it starts raining as we finish getting our gear on. It rained off & on til we got to Edmonton around 7:30 pm. We come into a stretch of hotels and pull in to get rooms. They laugh at us when they realize we don't have a reservation because there's a huge Triathlon and BMX events in town this weekend. We go to about 6 hotels and get the same story although a couple places mention there is 1 smoking room available. We call a place someone says will have a couple rooms and they do but are smoking rooms as well. We decide to bite the bullet cause it's still raining and getting later. We go there and these rooms were wreaking as if the people were still smoking in them, beds not made disgusting. We end up going back to the couple places that had 1 room and stayed in different places. We unload our bags, check in and get to our room and all of a sudden the skies open up with high winds, hail, thunder & lighting. Luckily we got off the road when we did. Tomorrows plan was to check out Edmonton and go the the worlds largest mall and then head north later in the day.

Sunday morning Tom & Mark open up Toms bike and find out the throw out bearing is toast. Of course it's Sunday and the Harley dealers here are closed. There's 2 dealers here so we hope they have the part which we are told is the same since 1984 so it should be in stock. It's a quick fix once we have the part and hope to be back on the road by mid morning. The weather today is showers off and on and we go to the mall for a while have lunch and come back in the rain. Stay tuned for the next part of our adventure.

7-3 & 4-08 Day 6 & 7 Regina to Calgary and Calgary Stampede Day

We left Regina at approx. 7 AM, temp was about mid 50’s and mostly sunny. Back on the TCH heading west to Calgary which is close to 500 miles away. Tom’s bike continues to have the intermittent lack of power problem again that have plaqued him from day 1. So far he has adjusted the float level, removed some weight by taking the tires off, drained the tank and removed the petcock in order to clean the screen which only found minor pieces of debris. Symptoms seem to point to lack of fuel but the problem occasionally persists. About 90 miles out this morning it starts again. Tom & Mark decide to pull over on the side of the road and shut it down when it''s doing it so that they can maybe see what’s happening in the carburetor. They take it apart and find that the o-ring on the vent tube had slid off and may have been blocking the jet. They are hopeful that this will cure the problem. We take back off and all seems good. A while later same issue but now it seems like it’s more of a misfire or skip. Tom has spare used spark plugs so at the next gas stop he puts them in. A policeman who’s also a biker sees us at the gas station and let’s us know there’s a Harley shop about 2 hours away when we’ll enter into Medicine Hat. This seems to clear things up and now the bike is running much better. We pull into the Harley shop and Tom gets plugs and a coil just in case. He puts in the new plugs and all is good. We have lunch and head for Calgary. About 80 miles from Calgary, Joe notices something hanging from Tom’s bike and we pull over. We find that the rubber boot that encases the drive chain to keep it oiled is torn and probably has been for a while. The lack of oil has caused the chain to stretch. Tom attempts to adjust the chain (left pic above) but there is not nearly enough adjustment. We continue on into Calgary at a slower pace hoping we can get there without incident. Of course the weather has warmed to the 80's and muggy so it's about 7:30 when we get to our hotel. Fortunately we booked a room 2 days ago because we knew that the Calgary Stampede is a huge draw and rooms were difficult to get. We ended up having to upscale a bit to the Sheraton. We have dinner and get the info on where the Harley dealer (2 of them) is for the morning and how to get to the Stampede which turns out the Sheraton has a shuttle that takes you to the train which makes it nice not to have to deal with taking the bikes there.

The next morning we are up early cause we're not used to the 2 hour time change and were done with breakfast by 7:20 and the Harley shop parts dept. doesn't open til 9am. As we're not sure where the shop is we leave around 8:15 even though it's supposedly only a couple miles away. Of course we have lost Tom (using Marks bike) before we leave the parking lot as he thought we left without him. After several wrong turns ourselves because the left turn on the map that we were suppose to take didn't exist we show up about 8:40. We look around but don't see Tom. A couple minutes later he shows up and of course he got lost as well. The Shop was barely 10 minutes from the hotel. We go inside and they have the chain but not the boot. The boot is in stock at the other dealer across town. Pete, Joe & I decide to go get the boot while Tom goes back and he and Mark can start tearing the bike apart to do the repair. We get back about 10:30 with the part and they start to put it back together. See pic above. Of course the new chain is 2 links to long so Tom has to go back to the dealer to get it cut as that's a tool we don't have with us. We have tickets to the Rodeo that starts at 1:30 and is a ways downtown so Pete, Joe & I take the shuttle and head to the Stampede. Tom & Mark say they'll catch up when they're done.

They show up to the rodeo about 2:30 and Toms bike is ready for the AM. The Stampede is similar to the "Big E" but on a bigger scale and has the largest rodeo with the biggest cash prizes. The rodeo takes place in the afternoon and they have an unbelievable Grandstand show at night that lasts over 4 hours non stop with an awesome fireworks that's the closest you'll ever be to shells going off. It was part Broadway/Cirque du Soliel/comedy/music/acrobats/ motorcycle stunt riders/chuck wagon races and fireworks. We got back to the hotel about 1 AM. tomorrow were going to Edmonton. Stay tuned

7-2-08 Day 5 Winnipeg to Regina

The word of the day is wind. We left Winnipeg around 7AM, at 48 degrees and headed back out on the TCH. We had some gas left so we decided to ride for a little while and grab gas & breakfast together as previously we had breakfast in the hotel each day. As I said yesterday this is the prairie area which is farmland, with numerous crops such as alfalfa, hay, some type of yellow top plant and soybean. The road is flat & straight as far as the eye can see. The difference is there is nearly a constant 15 - 20 mph cross wind coming out of the north. You find yourself riding leaning about 5 -7 degrees into the wind and getting blown sideways 2 -3 feet when there’s a gust or passing trucks. We actually watched a bird trying to fly across the road into the wind and was not moving! You have to be ready at all times when riding through here.
One thing I haven’t mentioned so far is wildlife sightings. There are signs all along the road cautioning about moose/deer jumping out. We’ve seen quite a bit of road kill, mostly deer and raccoon but Tom got 2 birds yesterday. I got my own road kill today when I was leading the group and a prairie dog hesitated crossing the road. As for the wildlife sightings, the totals as of today, we have 3 moose, 4 deer, and a bunch of prairie dogs. Oh I forgot to mention about eleventy billion dead bugs on our bikes!!!!!!!
We arrived in Regina around 3:45 thanks to our second time zone change. The temp had warmed up to about 75. We are heading into Calgary tomorrow and because the Stampede starts tomorrow we decided to book our room today ( we have been just getting a room when we ride in) and as expected a room was difficult to find but we got one at one of the airport hotels. We also got our Stampede tix for Friday as well.

7-1-08 Day 4 Thunder Bay to Winnipeg

We got up a little earlier today and got on the road about 7:30. It was an absolutely beautiful sunny morning, a little brisk in the low 60's. I decided to just wear a sweatshirt over a t-shirt. As we left the hotel and started back out on the TCH I thought to myself I maybe should have put on a jacket but the TCH heads northwest out of Thunder Bay and away from Lake Superior. Within 5 minutes of getting away from the lake the temp warmed up to about 70 and all was good. About 15 minutes out of Thunder Bay we're going through a small village and there's a policeman sitting on the side of the road, As we go by Pete waves to him. Seconds later he's following us with lights and sirens pulling us over. I'm thinking this isn't a very good start to the day. Turns out by Pete waving to him he notices that Petes wearing his small non DOT approved helmet which is why he was stopping him. Well, you remember yesterday I mentioned that Petes trailer harness got melted by his exhaust and the trailer lights weren't working. Bingo for item 2 that he had for Pete. After a few minutes of he and Pete talking and Pete having the right type helmet in the trailer he let him go with a verbal warning and Petes word that the lights would be fixed immediately. We got the lights fixed in about 20 minutes and we were back on our way. As we continued west on the TCH the skies started looking unfavorable. We felt a few drops and saw some lighting in the distance. We were close to needing gas anyway so we stopped to gas up aand put on our rain gear which was perfect timing as it was raining before we got out of the station. This station turned to be a story about a small world. If you read the day article from Sunday about us, there was a comment posted from a Peggy from Texas. Tom, Pete, Joe & I pulled out of the station and started up the road. Mark has been riding sweep and we quickly realize he's not with us. As we were pulling out Peggy managed to stop Mark to ask if he was Evert or one of the guys from the NLMC. He said that he's Mark and Evert and the other's just pulled out. She wished and a safe trip and to tell us the same and maybe we'd cross paths again as she was headed the same way. Well about 2 hours later we had lunch at Subway and when I got done I was first across the street to fuel up. I'm filling up and this fella on a Harley is parking to go inside and have something to eat and sees the Alaska or Bust sign that's identical to Marks. he says your one of the guys from the NLMC group and I said yes and asks if I'm Evert. He's Ray and Peggy is inside. Turns out Peggy is originally from Salem and now lives in Texas but keeps a link for the Day paper to keep track of whats happening back home which is how she found the story about us and then went to both the NLMC website and my blog. They have a website at groups.msn.com/lifeonaharley There post today talks about our meeting and Peggy says she may join the club!!!!! They ride a 07 Heritage now but did 175000 miles 2 up on a 98 Sporster before this bike.
Back to the ride. Tom has been having occasional power issues and we're not sure if it's carburetor, the weight of the gear he's carrying or the head winds or a combination. Well in typical Tom fashion, during the rain today his bikes running good and we are screaming down the road, later when the sun comes out he can't get out of his own way. Tonight he and Mark adjust the float level to make sure there's plenty of gas available when he gets to a hill or into a head wind (we've had fairly strong winds and with all the gear we're carrying the bikes are getting pushed around) and we relocated the spare tires onto Petes trailer to see how much difference this will make. We crossed into Manitoba today and ended our day in Winnipeg around 4:30. Manitoba is the begining of Canada'a prarrie so we'll have straight flat road for a while. Also the TCH has now become a 2 lane divided highway supposedly all the way to Calgary and is now numbered Route 1 instead of 17. By the way gas here in Canada has been about $1.54 liter which makes it close to $6/gallon. So far gas has been our biggest expense each day.

6-30-08 Day 3 Sault St. Marie to Thunder Bay

We awoke to 51 degree temps so we had breakfast put on our leathers and got back on the TCH. Both yesterday and today we've been in Ontario Province which is basically rolling hills and valleys that follow along the Great Lakes. Until you see them for yourself you cannot imagine just how vast these lakes are. To give you some perspective, we rode some 420 miles today following the edge of Lake Superior (which Tom is pointing out to you) and only covered about 60% of the northern shoreline. We've seen lots of motorcyles going in both directions but from the ones we have spoken to few are doing what we are. Most are doing from 3 to 7 day trips. This part of our route had some great vantage points coming up over some of the hills and looking out over the dozens of bays and inlets along the lake. The weather warmed up into the 70's and we got into the hotel around 6:30 pm as we had stopped to take pictures along the way and our lunch spot was lets say not the speediest but the food was very good. After dinner Pete ran down to the store to get a crimp tool and wiring connectors cause some how his trailer harness got to close to his exhaust and melted the wiring so the trailer had no lights. By the time he came back it was to late to fix and we'll try to get it done tommorrow night.