7-15-08 Day 18 Fairbanks to Denali National Park

We left Fairbanks Tuesday morning and had a magnificent ride from there to Denali park. That 120 miles probably was one of the best rides I've ever taken. The weather was sunny, temps in the low 60's, great road, light traffic and scenery that was magnificent. Our lodging was about 15 miles north of Denali so we stopped there, unloaded our bags, checked in and went for lunch and then to the Park to get the lay of the land. Because it was a great day I was saying we should go in the park today as the weather can change in an instant and only about 20% of the folks that come here get to see Mt. McKinley. But I was overruled and we booked an all day (11 hour) bus tour that takes you 85 miles into the park to an area called Watson Lake. Private vehicles are only allowed in the first 15 miles. We spent some time at the visitors center and the little village and went back to our room for an early night as the trip tomorrow is at 6:45 and there is no food in the park so you need to have breakfast early and brown bag your lunch. Conveniently, there's a Subway in the village that takes orders so we scheduled a 6 am pickup. Hoping for good weather tomorrow!

7-14-08 Day 17 Fairbanks

Today is a leisure day. We're doing laundry, shipping some things back to lighten our load as we've found we didn't need some things we brought like spare tires, tents, sleeping bags as well as some gift items the ladies have purchased. This afternoon we went to the Chena Hot Springs as the weather held out and we luckily kept missing the rain but found wet roads. In addition to the Hot springs this is a complete resort & RV park that has dog sledding in the winter, a huge Ice Museum that's really cool (no pun intended) and is a great spot to watch the Northern Lights. They claim they are much busier in the winter then now! The pics today are of the inside of the Ice Museum where everything is carved from ice and they use LED lights cause they are a cool light. There's a pair of knights jousting on their horses, a fireplace, a shot of the main hall with the chandeliers and last but not least Joe with his hot date, Venus de Milo! It's 20 degrees inside all the time. The resort is also a test site for a self-sufficient community for energy, food, heating & fuel using renewable sources such as Geothermal. They are in partnership with United Technologies. Here's a link to the website that tells all about it. http://www.yourownpower.com/ Tomorrow we head for Denali National Park.

I also need to give credit to Joe Lodi who is responsible for many of the pics that have been posted. Thanks Joe.

7-12 & 13-08 Day 15 & 16 Fairbanks

On Saturday we all went to the Harley dealer for service. We all had oil changes, and Pete had a new front tire installed and Mark & I had rear tires. This dealer is also a Honda & BMW store as well so this place is very busy. They don't take appointments so it's first come first served which we checked on the afternoon before when we got into town as the dealer was across the street from our hotel. We were there at opening bell which is 9am and we we're all done by about 2pm. Mark was not planning on a rear tire just yet but after his service we were waiting for my bike which was last to be done, he was looking at his bike and happened to notice there was a split within the tread of the rear tire. He had the extended warranty and the tire was covered at no charge! We asked the guys at the dealer about going on the Dalton highway to the Arctic circle. They said none of them had done it. We asked why. They said that they see day in and day out the bad stuff that happens to folks who try it. The lucky ones can ride back in, many are towed and some have died. Two this year so far. They admit they don't know how many make it as they only see the problems but has convinced them not to try it. As we're waiting for our bikes 2 guys (father & son) on V-Storms from Maryland come in with beat up bikes. They had both crashed with a Caribou on the Dalton highway. They said they were lucky to not be seriously injured and managed to fix the bikes enough to ride out. The road was nearly impassable basically because it had been raining for most of the ride and was difficult to even see the road never mind keep an eye out for wildlife. This convinced us that the Arctic Circle isn't in the cards. We finished the day by having a late lunch and relocating to the hotel were the ladies were. Mark had to go back after lunch to get his rear tire done. It was nice to have a day to hang out. I think we all slept well last night. I know I did. Sunday we did some tours around Fairbanks. One was a paddle wheel boat on the Chena River and the other was the El Dorado gold mine. The riverboat stopped at Breaking Trails kennel which is the home of former 4 time Iditarod champ Susan Butcher who has passed away but her husband still runs. These sled dogs are amazing as they live and love to run. For summer training he hooks them up to an ATV. (see pic) A team of 12 will pull the 600 pound machine about 25 mph! Another pic today from the boat is where the Chena meets the Tanana river. If you notice you can see a distinct line where the Chena is the clean water but the Tanana is fed by numerouis Glaciers and is mostly muddy silty water from the Glaciers weight moving across the earth and scouring the ground like sandpaper and the runoff from the melt becomes the river. This creates a navigation problem for boats because the silt settles out and the channel is constantly changing. We also stopped at the Aleyeska Pipeline visitor center which is today's other pic.

We made it!!!!! 7-11-08 Day 14 Beaver Creek to Fairbanks

Our motto has been "Alaska or Bust". As you can see from today's pic I'm happy to say we made it. It has been a looooooooong ride but very satisfying to have acheived our goal. The last few hundred miles have shown us the the AlCan has it's moments especially when your in the construction zones and it's raining. Overall the AlCan was not as bad as we had heard but you must be ready to respond to the road conditions especially during the the last 2 -300 miles which includes the first 100 inside Alaska. Gas cost has dropped between .60 and 1.00 here back in the US. We payed anywhere between 5.05 and 6.43 a gallon through Canada with the average being probably 5.60. The first station in Alaska was 4.89. Also oddly, the weather is getting warmer as we come north. Yesterday was 40's and rain, today is fifties and partly sunny and warmed up to the low 70's. We went to dinner in short sleeves when a few day ago we had to wear electric gear! The ladies are flying in tonight and will be here shortly. We will be in Fairbanks for another day or so and then head to Denali Park. The weather is still saying rain for the next 5 days so it looks like the Arctic Circle won't happen. It'll be nice to relax for a few days but that might be to much rain in a row! stay tuned.

7-10-08 Day 13 Whitehorse to Beaver Creek

Awoke at 7am to wet ground and threatening skies. During breakfast we checked the weather and things were supposed to be clearing west of us. It turns out there was a HOG rally scheduled for this weekend here so to kill a little time hoping the skies would break we went over to the Harley dealer. Things weren't really scheduled to get going until tomorrow so we quickly looked around and decided to just head west and find clearer skies. We lucked out about 15 - 20 miles out of town the rain eased up and within another half hour the sun was out. We opted to keep the rain gear on cause over the course of this trip especially the last 4 -5 days we have learned that things change quickly and we're becoming superstitious about taking the rain gear off. Today was another top day as you can see from the pic. The scenery is magnificent here in the northern Rockies. We stopped at Haines Junction for gas and lunch. As we're coming out from lunch there are 3 ladies getting off BMW dual sports with Mass. plates and they had noticed our CT plates. We of course spend 20 minutes talking and comparing trips. They had shipped there bikes to Seattle and taken the ferry up to Haines and were taking 2 weeks to ride around Alaska. They belong to an all women's MC club from Boston called "Moving Violations". One of the women was well into her seventies and was between Chemo treatments! She had the best attitude about life that you can imagine. She has ridden her bike all around the world. She even rode a trip from Switzerland to South Africa. We wished them a safe journey and headed out. As I said we ate at Haines Junction and when we took off after lunch failed to pay attention to road signs and continued the way we came into town. We realized this when we stopped for today's pic and a trucker at the rest stop asked us where we were going and let us know of our error. Luckily we were only 60 miles down the road! We went back to Haines Junction, gas upped again and took the correct road this time. The roads continue to be pretty good although after getting back on the right track we finally came upon our first pilot car area. A pilot car is at a construction site where there is a vehicle that you are required to follow through the construction as it's alternating one way and the pilot car escorts the cars one way and then turns around and goes the other. Depending on the length of the work zone it can take 10 - 30 minutes so everybody is out/off of their cars/bikes talking. Some of these work zones are up to 8 miles long! Another thing we found out is that bikes get to go to the head of the line which is nice to pass all the trucks and campers and you don't have to eat as much dust. This first area also had a water truck which we had the pleasure of having to have our pilot car be right behind. Can you say very dirty muddy bikes!!!!! This construction was in an area called Destruction Bay, how appropriate! Shortly beyond this area we get into road conditions that we had heard the horror stories about. Basically the road is now an intermittent series of frost heaves/patches of gravel that are sometimes marked/sometimes not/sometimes marked for no reason. These heaves are not as bad as we had heard, but you need to be ready to zig/zag/slow down at a moments notice. So now we are finally indoctrinated to the AlCan highway. We get into Beaver Creek about 7:30 after we blow by our hotel and realize when we get to Canadian customs that maybe we missed it. Canadian customs is about 22 miles inside from the actual border. We go back about 1 -1-1/2 miles and this time we manage to see the hotel but that's a story for another time! We unpack, go to dinner and then go to bed. Tomorrow we'll be in Alaska!!!!!!!!!

7-9-08 Day 12 Muncho Lake to Whitehorse

The hotel didn't start to serve breakfast until 7 so we didn't head out til slightly after 8. The forecast was cloudy and rain so we geared up for rain. It was 41 when we left but sunny. Electric jacket weather for sure. The roads on the AlCan are awesome biking roads and have some great sections of twisties and sweeping hills & turns. There's a major drawback to really letting yourself go and enjoy and that's the high probability of some type of wildlife either being in the road or jumping out into the road. Today we saw probably 50 Buffalo, a few bears and a deer. The road here has about a 50 foot wide strip on each side that is cut back probably once a year so you have a chance to see any wildlife coming to the road. This area is heavily forested and this maintained strip turns out to be a nice grazing area for the wildlife which is probably why they congregate in it especially the Buffalo as we saw them in packs. The views along the road are just fantastic. By the afternoon we were into the Northern Rockies and we had snow topped mountains all around us! Of course the weather did finally turn on us and the last 150 miles was in 44 degree rain. We were glad to get into the hotel today! By the way, Old Red has run flawless the last 3 days. Hopefully his gremlins have been exorcised!!!!!!!!

The forecast for the next 8 days is grim with rain predicted most every day. If this turns into reality it will deep six our plans for the Top of the World Highway and the run to the Arctic Circle as these are both gravel roads and turns into grease slicks when wet. Stay tuned!

7-8-08 Day 11 Dawson Creek to Muncho Lake

On the road at 7:10, temp about 50 and sunny. We get on the AlCan with the heresay telling us to expect gravel, potholes hat swallow RV's, etc. Well let me tell you it's BS. The road continues to be pretty dam good for being in the middle of no where. Yes there are very occasional gravel patches but they are well graded. Sometimes they have signs but not always and the tricky part is the gravel is the same color as the pavement so t blends in. As long as you stay alert it'snot a problem. If your in a 4 wheeler you have zero to worry about. The biggest concern is wildfire as it's abundant. We saw a few bear, moose, caribou, deer & mountain goats which are generally in the road in packs and are generally around the rock outcropping along the mountainside where the road is cut into the mountain. Todays pic is the road along Muncho Lake with the mountain on the right and of course the lake just a couple feet below the road. Lakes up here go on for miles & miles! We ended up having rain for the last half hour of the day but the temp had been up to about 60 but dropped back to 50 when the rain came. Our hotel tonight is very secluded. There is no power lines here. The power is from generators and everything else is via satellite. Cell service is non existant and probably will be til we get to Fairbanks.

An observation that has come to me is the anti developement/greenies/global warming people that say our carbon footprint is out of control. I challenge any of them to take the ride that we've done for the last 8 days and explain to me that we're in trouble. You can not imagine the enormity of our planet. Yes there are areas that may be over developed but look at the big picture. There is a truth to the saying See America/World at Sea Level! Flying does not give you any feel of what the world has to offer!