To Sturgis & the Black Hills

Taking a Break in Bighorn Pass

I woke up to the fragrant smell of fresh shit.  Chloe had left a present for me right outside my tent.  In fact, it was so close that I struggled to imagine how she could have squatted that near the tent without falling through the screen door.  I guess the paper lady was right and it was my fault for feeding Chloe that stinky fish.  I dragged my tent away from the putrid pile and packed up to leave.  By this point, I had gotten pretty good at rapid camp set-ups and tear downs.

Awesome Curves Ahead

Hester and I headed east on highway 14 towards Sturgis.  The route took me through Bighorn National Forest and over the 9,000+ foot high Bighorn mountain pass.  This was a stellar sixty mile ride that I didn't even know existed.  The horseshoe curves, switchbacks, and elevation changes were the most extreme I had ridden in all of the previous 7,000 Alaskapade miles.  Fortunately, these roads were all paved and in great shape with no gravel sections or pot holes.  When I saw what was in store for me on the GPS display, I stopped at a scenic spot to rest for a second and to mount my helmet cam under the right footboard.  I had fabricated a mount there before I left, having anticipated the cool views it would capture on roads just like this one.  The road was so tight that it took me over two hours to ride sixty miles and I loved every second of it.

Floorboard Cam

Actually, there were a few tense seconds when I played a game of chicken with Bambi.  I had just negotiated a tight uphill curve and finally passed a slow moving cage that had been holding me up when I saw the deer standing at the edge of the rocks on the road on my right.  I eased back on the throttle and kept a steady eye on the deer.  It stared at me; I stared at it.  I had horsepower, but this was the deer's turf.  I remembered that deer usually wait till the last second to react, so I approached with even more caution.  Just as expected, it darted in front of me the instant I was next to it and glanced the leading edge of my right saddle bag.  I looked behind me and saw the deer spinning on its side in the middle of the road.  It jumped up and limped off the road just before the cage I had recently passed rolled up.  That was a lucky deer.  I was a luckier rider.  The video camera caught it all.

A Deer Playing Chicken

Bighorn Pass - Adventure at Every Turn

The Bighorn run was a mix of painted rocks, canyons, snow capped mountain crests, and jagged cliffs that reached vertically downward into roaring rapids of  water that were as blue as the sky above and randomly topped with white foam. I saw numerous trails leading from the roadside up to caves in the sides of the mountain walls an I was tempted to pull over and climb up for a closer view.

Highway 14 dumped me out on highway 90 near Sheridan, WY and I found myself rocketing towards Gillette. I crossed I-25 and realized that I was intersecting the exact same spot I had ridden on day two of the Alaskapade. 

At 2:00pm on Friday July 1st, a copper wire snapped inside Hester's fairing and the music which had violently shattered the tranquil silence of the unsuspecting countryside with blistering rock music all the way from Texas to Alaska and back to Wyoming and all the while entertaining your humble writer - was suddenly silenced.  At the next gas stop, I checked my cigarette lighter and it had no power.  Way back on day three of the Alaskapade, the auxiliary cigarette lighter and USB power ports I had wired-in had melted in my glove box.  In a rush, I had stuffed a bunch of cables into the the glove box and one of the USB plugs dropped into a 12 volt cigarette lighter socket and shorted out.  I saw smoke billowing out of the glove box and damn near had a heart attack.  I pulled the melted cable out and saw that the plastic power housing I had installed had actually melted into the glove box.  Since that happened on day three of the Alaskapade, I had been swapping out charging cables in the stock cigarette lighter on the left side of the fairing.  It was difficult to keep all my cameras and bluetooth headset charged when I was tent camping without electricity.  Now, my last source of recharging power was gone.  There was a Harley dealer in Gillette, so I stopped in and checked my fuse in the parking lot.  The fuse was fine, but the circuit was dead.  I resigned myself to riding the rest of the trip without music.  I could play the tunes though my bluetooth headset, but the audio quality sucked.  I had plenty of audiobooks to keep me entertained and was in the middle of Atlas Shrugged (from which I stole the opening line to this paragraph).  At 67 hours, there was plenty to keep my mind occupied for the rest of the trip.  

A service tech who was smoking a cigarette outside the dealership walked over to talk to me when he saw the Alaskapade.com logo on the trunk.  "I'm guessing by the look of that bike that you really rode it to Alaska" he said.  I replied that I had, suppressing a prideful look and acting cool about it.  The next question he asked was common among bikers. "Where did you get that windscreen?"  I told him that it was from MadStad Engineering and that I wouldn't own a bike that didn't have a MadStad screen available for it.  A sales rep came out, took pictures of it, and wrote down the name.  The coating of bloody, squashed bugs probably didn't make for a very good representation.  Perhaps my testimonial and recent miles lended a bit of credibility.

I rolled out from Gillette and made my way to Devil's Tower.  I've been fascinated by this monument since seeing Close Encounters of the Third Kind in high school and I wanted to see it first hand.  I took a thirty mile detour off the highway to get Hester's picture with the monument in the background.  The line of cages waiting to pay to get into the park was half a mile long.  After my experience in Yellowstone, I wasn't falling for that again.  I rode on the shoulder, stopped at the monument park entrance sign, took a picture, and turned around to head for Deadwood.  It was worth the extra miles. 

 

The Devil & Miss Hester

I exited off the interstate and took highway 85 into Deadwood.  Honestly, I had never heard of Deadwood until the HBO series aired a few years ago.  I had heard cool stories about the place since then and it was on the way to Sturgis, so I thought I'd drop in.  Deadwood was bustling with tourist buses, bikes, and pedestrians.  As far as I could tell, the only attraction to Deadwood was the mere fact that it was Deadwood.  Still, I found it cool and enjoyed riding the main street.  I must have found the back way in because on my way out, I saw a nice Deadwood sign atop a hill and had to stop to get Hester's picture there.  I just had to stop.  The wind was gusting up pretty good and I wondered if we would get some rain.  I pulled Hester in front of the sign and dismounted.  While I stood fiddling with my camera, a blast of wind blew Hester right over.  I literally screamed "FUCK!" so loud I was sure it echoed all the way back into town.  Bruce Banner had nothing on the rage I was feeling and I thought I was going to Hulk out right there on the side of the road.  I had ridden over 7,000 miles through hell and back with no problems and now Hester was dropped by the f-ing WIND?  I struggled to pick her up on my own.  I tried everything I learned in the Motorcycle Safety Foundation class I took thirty years ago.  The Honda XL-100 I rode back then was much easier to lift than Hester was. The rage I was feeling and the physical conditioning I had put myself through in the months prior to this day were no match for Hester's weight. I struggled for several minutes on my own before another rider stopped to help me stand her up.  I was as embarrassed as I was outraged, but I was also grateful.  I dusted Hester off and hit the road heading for Sturgis.

I've never been inclined to be in Sturgis during the corporate mess that the rally has become, but I wanted to see the place nonetheless.  Up until Hester's fall, I was in a great mood.  I had ridden through the most incredible mountain pass I've ever seen that morning and I had spent the rest of the day knocking off places that I've wanted to see for years.  I was still fuming and was in no mood to let myself enjoy the moment.  It was a good thing I was riding alone because I was not fit for company.  I rolled into Sturgis and it was empty.  A month before the rally, I didn't expect much of a crowd, but I figured this being a holiday weekend, there would be a few bikes.  I found it odd that Sturgis was the ghost town and Deadwood was the boom town.  

As Hester and I rolled down Main street, I envisioned pictures I had seen where tens of thousands of bikes were parked on both sides and down the middle.  Now, Hester and I rode solo down the empty street, stopping every fifty feet at each of the legendary annoying stop signs.  I rode through town avoiding blinking so as not to miss it and headed for the Full Throttle Saloon.  I had watched every episode of the Full Throttle's reality TV show and was looking forward to seeing the place in person.  Of course it was pretty much empty, but wandering around the place and seeing all the landmarks I had watched on TV was pretty cool.  I bought a t-shirt and remembered when I met the Full Throttle Saloon owner Michael Ballard at the Lone Star Rally in Texas last year.  I wanted a shirt then, but told him I would buy it on site in person.  I have a few Harley shirts given to me by friends, but I only buy biker shirts for myself from places I've actually been.  I bought my shirt, snapped a few photos, and mounted up planning to head for Mount Rushmore.

Hester in a Ghost Town Under Threatening Skies

Then I looked up.  The skies to the east were black and hung low on the horizon.  The air was dead still and in the silence that was the emptiness of Sturgis, I could hear my heart beating.  I topped off Hester's tank and asked a local at the station if he thought it looked like rain.  He replied "Are you kidding? This is Sturgis, man."  I was already in a fowl mood and I didn't need this.  My plan (born out of anger) was to ride to Mount Rushmore, find a nearby place to camp, and then just head towards home in the morning.  I had accomplished my goal if riding to the Arctic Circle a week ago and in my angered state, I convinced myself that Ill these extra stops were just gravy.  Nevertheless, the weather altered my plan and now I needed to find a place to stay.  None of the popular Sturgis campgrounds were open yet as the rally was over a month away.  Despite the date, the hotel rates were all still ridiculously high.  I rode back across town to look for a tourist information center I had seen earlier on my way into town, hoping they could point me towards a campground.  As I sat at a traffic light, a pickup truck with a dog in the back rolled up next to me.  This was one of those dog mixes that defied breed classification; a real dog's dog.  His coat had more colors than Cyndi Lauper's hair, he had one white eye, and proudly wore an old bandana around his neck.  This was one happy dog.  He looked thrilled just to be alive in the back of that truck sniffing the world as it passed by.  His little stub of a tail wagged so hard that his whole rear end shook.  One ear stood tall and the other hung folded over, half erect.  His tongue hung out of one side of his open mouth as he panted and it looked as if he was actually smiling.  When the truck stopped next to me, the dog stepped up on the side of the bed and stretched himself as close to me as he could without falling off.  As I reached over to pat his head, I wondered if I would draw back a nub.  I could see a young boy in the truck's cab peeking at me through the passenger mirror.  His head was resting in the crook of his folded arm at the bottom of the open window and his face was devoid of expression.  I thought to myself, what a contrast.  The dog was thrilled to be alive and the mere site of a person on a bike patting him totally made his day.  The boy remained stoic as the light changed and the truck and dog drove off.  For some reason I felt better.  My anger over Hester's fall had passed.  I missed my dog Zeus.

On the way to the visitor center I saw the Sturgis RV Campground up on a hill above town.  I rode up and down the street looking for the road to get there.  The skies were growing darker by the minute and the wind was really picking up.  Long, thin forks of bright lightning were streaking from the sky to the ground in the distance.  I was mesmerized by the sight of the lightning. It appeared to me as a 3D special effect projected against a constantly morphing bruised backdrop of grey, blue, and black curtains.  I snapped back to reality and realized I was in trouble.  I could either ride west in an attempt to escape the storm or find a place in Sturgis to hunker down and ride it out.

The Previous Name & Sign of the Sturgis RV Park

I finally found the road that led up to the RV park.  It was a brand new road that wasn't on my GPS.  I rode in and figured it was open because there were a handful of large campers there.  The office door was unlocked, but the office was empty.  I decided to pull Hester in under the porch overhang and ride out the storm there. A woman exited a camper parked immediately across from the office and asked if she could help me.  I looked up and said "Tell me you allow tent camping and you can definitely help me."   She replied that they had tent spots with water and electricity and the rate was $10.85.  "Per hour?" I said. I mean, this was Sturgis.  "That's the daily rate through July" she replied.  I was stupefied.  She said that there was only one other tent and that I could have any spot I wanted.  I found a place near a tree and quickly set up my tent.  It was only 4:00 in the afternoon, but it looked much later because of the approaching storm.  As large raindrops began to fall intermittently, I used all the stakes in the tent package to anchor it to the ground.  The gusting winds were already making it difficult to set up the tent.  I placed as much gear from Hester's saddle bags and trunk as I could into the corners of the tent to weigh it down.  It was starting to rain pretty hard by then, so I rolled Hester up to the large tree, sat her up on the center stand, covered her, and used my tie downs to strap her against the tree trunk.  I had learned my lesson about high winds well earlier today.  As I went to crawl into my tent, I noticed all sorts of stuff blowing off the picnic table adjacent to the only other tent in the complex.  There was a small bike trailer there and a canopy was erected over the table, but no one was around.  I slipped on my rain suit top, walked over, and placed as much of the stuff as possible under the table and then took some rocks from the fire pit and used them to anchor the outside corners of the tent.  It was almost completely dark by then and the approaching wall of the storm was hanging directly over the edge of the RV park.  The air was dead still.  The only sound was the faint hint of music emanating from an empty bar across the street.  I heard sirens and wondered what happened.  I quickly realized that these were storm sirens.  Did they have tornadoes in South Dakota?  I was about to find out.  I high tailed it to my tent, crawled in, zipped up, and hunkered down.

Once inside, I inflated my air mattress and unrolled my sleeping bag. I made a dizzy mental note to buy an air compressor before my next trip.  Of course, with no auxiliary power, I'd be blowing the mattress up manually this time anyway.  I realized it was really dark, so I cranked my wind-up lantern, slipped off my wet jeans, and started nesting.  The winds continued to pick up and the sound of the rainfall pounding the top of the tent grew louder.  Within minutes, I was under the full rage of the storm.  The wind blew between the rain cover and the vented top of my tent and swirled inside around me, making for a strangely comfortable breeze.  The thunder was as loud as I had ever heard. The tent was being hammered by winds from one side and then the other as if trade winds were taking turns testing my planning and the anchoring stakes.  Suddenly, one corner of the tent rose up tossing the helmet and leathers that had been placed there to hold the corner down into my lap.  The thin metal stake had loosened in the soggy ground.  Then the opposite corner lifted up and I found myself sandwiched like shivering meat in a flimsy vinyl and nylon taco.  I tossed the helmet and leathers back into the corner hoping to regain some stability.  No dice.  I briefly considered crawling out of and dropping rocks on the corner like I did the other guy's tent.  At that instant, a huge series of flashes illuminated the inside of my tent providing a strobe light effect that allowed me to clearly see the violent shaking the tent was receiving. The lightning was followed almost instantly by enormous, seemingly endless claps of percussive thunder, telling me just how close the strikes really were.  Another corner of the tent let loose.  My attempts at replacing the items into the corners were fruitless.  I stretched out, lying flat on the tent floor extending my hands and feet as far into each corner as I could reach in an attempt to hold them down.  The wind was howling, thunder was clapping, and lightning seemed to dance indiscriminately just outside my little two person tent.  I was lying there wondering how long I would have to hold that awkward position when my yank and crank lantern died.  Darkness.  I considered crawling out and running to seek shelter in the office.  I considered putting on my helmet. I considered how stupid I would look if I was found dead wearing a helmet spread eagle in my tent in my underwear, snuffed out by lightning electrocution and/or fright.  I found myself counting the sound of my heartbeats.  Then it struck me that I could actually hear my heartbeat and I realized that the wind and rain stopped as suddenly as it had started.  What seemed like hours was in reality, mere minutes.  I retracted my arms and legs and fought the urge to roll up into a fetal position.  It was dead silent outside and I wondered if this was just the calm between the storms or if it was over.  I unzipped the door to the tent and crawled outside to see the damage.  To my amazement, there was none.  The skies were clear and deep blue and there was a light breeze in the air.  It appeared as if nothing had happened, until I looked at my poor little tent.  It took about twenty seconds for me to shake it back into shape and it popped back into its dome like structure as if it had never been molested by the wind and rain.  Indeed, nothing inside was even remotely moist with the possible exception of the spot where I had been lying holding the corners down.  I glanced down and checked my drawers; no stain.  An older gentleman from one of the campers walked over and asked if we were OK.  Standing there in my underwear, I replied that I was alone, that the other tent was unoccupied, and that I was fine.  I've always joked that I wear black underwear to hide the skid marks.  In this case, it was no joke.  I checked Hester and she was still parked on her center stand with her vinyl rain cover still in place.  The straps I had placed around her and the tree were unnecessary.

I was hungry.  No, I was starved.  I couldn't remember when I last ate anything other than peanuts and Slim Jims.  Even the fish offered to me the night before in Greybull was starting to sound good.  People were stirring down on the street across from the RV park.  I decided to go find a real meal.

At a traffic light, I was once again greeted by the same pickup truck with the same dog in the back.  This time, there was no passenger staring me down from the side mirror in the cab and the dog in back who had seemed so happy a couple of hours earlier, was now slumped over, dripping wet; his dusty bandana soaked and dripping.  Unlike before, both of his ears were drooping and his nub of a tail was tucked tight against his speckled rump.  I reached out to him like before and he just laid his head on the side of the truck bed.  Apparently, he was as afraid of the storm as I was, but I had shelter from it that he apparently did not.  I thought of my dog Zeus and how as fiercely protective as he is, he's still terrified of thunder.  A strange but somewhat familiar feeling rumbled inside me and it wasn't hunger.

I settled in for a steak at a place called Rosco's and I rode up to incredulous stares from the staff there.  "Did you ride through that storm?" the hostess inquired.  I replied that I had ridden it out in a tent down the street, which only generated more stares.  "You're not from here, are you" she commented.  I asked "Is anybody?"  She said that there were a few, but they knew better than to risk exposure to a storm like that" as she walked me to my table.  I thought to myself "they had a choice".  The waitress arrived and offered me a menu.  I told her all I wanted was the largest steak they had - cooked medium rare, a salad, and a glass of tea.  "Don't you want to see the prices?" she asked.  I replied that I didn't care; I just wanted food.  It occurred to me that my appearance might not be its best, so I hit the men's room.  I was right.  I was a mess. My hair looked like Albert Einstein stuck his finger in an electrical socket, my face was dirty, and I needed a shave.  I was reminded of the look I got from the hostess at Fast Eddie's seemingly eons ago in Tok, Alaska.  I shaped my hair down using my fingers and water from the sink and then washed my hands and face.  I still was far from pretty, but it was an improvement.  As I looked in the mirror, I could see that she shape of my face had changed.  My belt was tightened to the last hole and my pants were still drooping.  I looked like a homeless guy with a really cool Harley.  The steak was OK; Sizzler quality at best.  But it was much-needed sustenance and I scarfed it and the mixed veggies down using the bread to sop up the juice.  The plate looked as if it hadn't even been used.

The cook came out and sat across from me in the booth.  "Didn't like it, huh?" he joked.  "No. Can I send it back?" I replied with a grin.  He told me that he had been in the Army, stationed in Texas and had come to Sturgis for a rally twenty years ago and never left.  Even compared to me at that instant, this was a rough looking character.  His faded do-rag covered his sparse grey hair and reached down over his forehead, almost touching his unibrow.  He had old piercings in both ears that appeared to have closed up years ago.  One looked as if an ear ring had been torn clean through the ear lobe.  Strangely, he had no tattoos; at least none that I could see in his short sleeves.  His face held deep cracks, surrounded a cauliflower nose that appeared to have been broken more than once, and bore no facial hair.  He had scarred hands with thin rings on several fingers and on one thumb.  His fingernails looked as if they had been nervously chewed way too far down.  His dark, narrow eyes seemed to lighten and widen a bit as I described my trip; where I had been and where I was heading.  He asked for details about all my stops and seemed genuinely interested in my response.  As we talked, I considered the other people I had encountered in Sturgis.  Everyone there seemed like voluntary inmates in some sort of Twilight Zone prison camp without walls.  It occurred to me that their entire lives revolved around ten days in August.  I remembered the old woman in the window back at the Hot Spot on the Dalton Highway in Alaska.  She was stuck in the middle of nowhere.  But these people could drive thirty minutes to the east or to the west and be in a world that had a purpose year round.  It seemed to me when I spoke with them that they secretly relished their voluntary vassalage, yet they intentionally projected a sense of emulous despair to people like myself who were only passing through.  It made me glad to have a home to go to.  I realized that this as-of-yet unrecognized feeling that had been developing within me over the last two or three days - was me starting to miss it.

One exception to the depressed Sturgis residents was the park manager. She and her husband were retired snow birds who lived in Florida during the winter and managed the RV park through the summers.  She was a gracious and kind woman who seemed genuinely interested in the Alaskapade and for my safety after the storm.  She had the appearance and demeanor I expected from the voice on the phone the night before.  If I ever go back to Sturgis, I will stay at this RV park.

I saddled up on Hester and rode back to the RV park. The ground was dry and there was no evidence whatsoever of the violent storm that had rocked these grounds less than two hours before.  The summer sun was setting to the west, but it was still bright out.  This struck me as a stark contrast to the seemingly absolute darkness I had encountered only hours before.  The skies had faded from a deep blue to a warm orange, which made the few clouds that dotted the sky seem even more voluminous and closer to the ground, yet peacefully harmless.

When I arrived at my tent, I felt a peculiar sense of security.  I felt like I was in a familiar place.  It wasn't home, but it was strangely common and comforting.  I was again reminded of my dog Zeus.  He always felt at home wherever his bed was.  My tent was my comfy, familiar dog bed.  As euphoric as I found myself feeling when I rode through mountains and scenic landmarks each day, every night that I had to seek a place to camp generated an uneasy sensation in my gut.  It was an insecure feeling to which I was not accustomed.   I felt homeless.  I had money for hotels, but I wanted to stick to my plan and more importantly, I needed to stick to my budget.  The uneasy feeling seemed to dissipate almost instantly whenever I secured a place to sleep;even if that place was just a cut-out on the side of the road.  I have yet to put my finger on the exact reason for my insecurity in this regard, but the feeling was as deep as any other emotion I had experienced on the Alaskapade.  Needless to say, I was happy to be back at hotel Hester in the Sturgis RV park.

I saw a bike and realized that the other tent's occupant had returned.  I wondered where he had ridden out the storm.  He saw me and came walking over.  We introduced ourselves and made smalltalk about the weather.  Ed was retired from the utility industry in Florida and was on a long bike trip across the country, riding a Triumph Rocket III.  He rode out the storm at a card table in a casino down in Deadwood.  I mentioned that I tried to put his things back where they were before the storm.  He was appreciative, but I think he still wondered how his camp survived.  Ed and I talked quite a while and the topic turned to where we had been and where we were going.  He said he planned to ride the Spearfish Canyon scenic loop, to the Chief Crazy Horse monument, and to Mount Rushmore the next day, which was Sunday.  I said that I planned on breaking camp in the morning and heading to Rushmore myself before starting the final 1,200 mile ride home to Texas.  Ed mentioned that we could ride it together if I wanted. We talked more about our respective journeys and I was somewhat taken by Ed's relaxed demeanor.  It occurred to me that I was in no real hurry to get home and that I enjoyed Ed's company.  I decided on the spot to stay through tomorrow and ride with Ed to all the places he mentioned.  I would drop by the office in the morning and pay for another night.

Ed From Florida

Ed and I talked a while longer and I decided I needed to charge up my goodies and try to get on line to update this blog.  The Sturgis RV park had an excellent WiFi network.  Earlier in the afternoon before the storm, I was geeking out looking at the antenna array with its directional patches broadcasting to the various camping areas and the backhaul antennas that connected their signals between the network equipment and the antenna towers.  I wanted to ask the hostess if I could get a look at the network gear, but I figured she already thought I was weird enough as it was.  In the background, a band could be clearly heard playing in a bar across the street.  I considered walking over to give them a listen as I love live music. Hearing all the great classic rock tunes made me really miss playing my drums.  I blew off walking over, electing instead to enjoy the music from a distance.

I sat back in my tent with all the flaps open, letting the light breeze blow through.  The air was scented with a fresh, clean-smelling post-rain fragrance.  It was if I was living in a TV ad for fabric softener.  The bright orange sky gave up its battle against nightfall and darkness fell over the camp.  Sturgis had a great starscape.  The clearly visible constellations in the deep black night sky reminded me of camping trips I took with my uncles when I was a kid.  My uncle King would point at stars and make up ridiculous stories about them, all of which I believed wholeheartedly.  It struck me that in less than an hour, I had experienced an emotional 180.  I had a comfortable, safe place to sleep without the threat of finding wildlife, derelicts, or dog shit outside my tent the next morning.  I was relaxed, confident, and looking forward to a full day of relaxed riding with absolutely no agenda.

My belly and my heart were full and my spirit was recharged.  I quickly fell asleep staring up at the new moon through the open tent flaps.

Eastbound and Down

Frank's Hero Wall With Mom's Friend Mary Anna

After what seemed like a quick nap, Hester and I were awake and ready to head east toward Sturgis and into the Black Hills.  I arrived rather late the night before and didn't have time to catch up with my mom's friend in Oak Harbor.  I decided to not set an alarm and just wake up when I felt like it.  I needed to exchange my Canadian currency and give Hester a much needed bath.  I was also meeting Mary Anna for a late breakfast, so I was in no hurry.  I hadn't had a real breakfast in weeks and I was looking forward to it.  We met at a diner called Frank's Place and I pigged out.  I had a bad habit of not eating on the Alaskapade and would sometimes go for two days without a meal.  The massive pile of cholesterol, protein, and carbohydrates placed before me by the waitress was a welcome sight. The owner Frank is a former Marine and his diner is loaded to the hilt with military decor, including his Heroes Wall out front.  There is a small Navy station on Whidbey Island and Frank's Place caters to the active duty sailors and the many local retirees.  After scarfing down a much needed breakfast and asking about a defibrillator, I mounted up and headed for the Mulkiteo Ferry.  I had considered taking the scenic highway 20 route across Washington, but since I was getting such a late start, I decided to take the ferry to the mainland and slab it across to Idaho.  I had seen plenty of mountain passes over the last two weeks and I was somewhat excited to get to Sturgis.

There Was Some Animal Shape When I Took This

Camp Cataldo

Shrug at the Borrowed Camp Fire

After a twenty minute ferry ride, I made my way onto 90 and rode east towards Spokane.  The mountain passes into Idaho and around Cougar Lake made for a nice break from the flat concrete slabs I had ridden from Seattle. The bright beams of sunshine played hide and seek with the scattered clouds that dotted the otherwise bright blue sky.  As I listened to Atlas Shrugged, I found myself getting distracted by the animal shaped clouds and briefly reverted back to that childhood game.  I rode through the center of the Idaho panhandle, past Coeur d'Alene to a little town called Cataldo.  There, I found a nice little camping area nestled along some river (that appeared to have no name) where Hester and I could bed down for the night for just $10.  The thought of being able to set up camp in the daylight was appealing, so I pulled in.  There was a nice pile of cut fire wood in the fire pit.  A roaring fire on a cool night of camping next to a quietly babbling river would be perfect.  The only thing that could have made it more perfect would have been something to actually light a fire with.  I thought a moment and remembered that I had a gallon of gas in Hester's starboard saddle bag.  I thought better of it and decided to forgo a fire.  I wandered the campground to get a closer look at the river and noticed a huge camper with a roaring fire.  Now I really wanted my own fire.  I decided to take some of the wood from my fire pit over to the camper and offer it up.  The guy who was staying there had a truck bed full of cut wood, but graciously accepted my unburnt offering and invited me to sit with him.  His kids were grown so he had sold his home and was living out of his camper, which was probably as large as my house.  It had pull-outs, slide-outs, pop-ups, a satellite dish, and I could see a huge flat screen TV through the oversized side window.  I wondered to myself how many gallons per mile it took to pull the thing.  He commented that he was staying at this site in Cataldo for four months and would pack up and move somewhere south when cooler weather sets in.  We sat and chatted for a couple of hours.  It made for a great night, but I forgot to eat again.  I had worked hard the six months prior to the Alaskapade and had lost over forty pounds.  Even still, I could tell I had dropped more weight over the last two weeks.

I packed up camp and headed further east on 90 and then took 287 south at Three Forks, Montana bound for Yellowstone National Park.  I'm not sure what possessed me to go to Yellowstone.  I think the scenic loops there were recommended by some fellow riders.  It was on the way to the Black Hills, so I figured why not.

The ride into Yellowstone was pretty uneventful.  I arrived at the west gate Friday afternoon, paid the entry fee, and went looking for Old Faithful.  I rode up to another biker and we found ourselves stuck in bumper to bumper stop and go traffic.  The park was littered with huge camper trailers with RENT ME emblazoned across them which were full of tourists who I suspected couldn't coherently drive their cars, much less these behemoths.  Much of the park road loop speed limit is 35 mph.  That's annoying enough until you add the campers' snail pace of 20 mph.  My skin was crawling off my back and Hester's paint was boiling.  Maybe I was spoiled by all the close-up wildlife I had seen in Alaska and Canada, but I grew increasingly annoyed with these people stopping every two minutes to jump out and shoot pics of every squirrel and deer they saw.  I wanted to shoot the drivers.  I saw steamy water and a huge crowd of people, and pulled over.  It turns out that there are are dozens of geysers in Yellowstone and this was just one of them.  I got back on the road and realized I was now again behind all the campers I had managed to pass in the previous hour. I finally found the Old Faithful area, which was actually difficult to miss.  All one needs to do is look for the largest collection of poorly parked campers on the planet and you're there.  I shared a parking space with another bike and walked what seemed like a mile past the education center, toilets, gift shops, and park ranger offices to the geyser area.

Old Shrug at Old Faithful

The geyser had apparently just erupted because the parking lot was a mess of campers and minivans all trying simultaneously to get to the single exit and back to the one lane park road.  Horns were blaring and drivers were glaring.  It was a stalemate.  Somebody probably saw a squirrel.  All these tourists who had sat for hours trying to get into the area now had a carload of screaming kids who were less than impressed at the sight they had just waited hours to see and were now forced to wait in more traffic.

I wandered up to the geyser and had no idea when the next scheduled eruption would be.  One would think based on its name that the geyser would be more predictable.  Apparently, it's not that simple.  Of course it wasn't because I was there.  The height and duration of the previous eruption dictates when the next one will take place.  The interval can be anywhere from thirty to ninety minutes.  I sat around and waited for a while and noticed the constant flood of campers still piling into the already overstuffed parking lot.  It was about 5:30 and this might be the last eruption before nightfall.  It occurred to me that when this thing finally goes off, I would find myself smack dab in the middle of the next round of camper mass exodus.  I promised myself that I'd look at it on line and headed back to the parking lot to get out while the getting was good.

Shrug's Shadow & Hester at the Continental Divide

I was heading out to the east gate and fortunately, most of the traffic was heading back to the west from where we all came.  I was surprised to learn the east gate was about fifty miles away.  I fought the temptation to blast on the wide open roads through the park.  This was a good thing because Yellowstone has many cops and I saw several drivers were pulled over receiving citations.  The ride out took Hester and I over 8,000 feet up and included countless waterfalls, rivers, lakes, and canyons.  It was strange riding past snowy hills with kids sliding down them on sleds after having just been in sweltering heat the morning before.  It was even stranger seeing huge lakes like Yellowstone Lake sitting at elevations higher than 7,700 feet.  That altitude and all that water made sense of the snow and cold temperatures I was feeling.  I caught myself being spellbound by the hundreds of small impromptu waterfalls I passed.  The snow was melting and the resulting flows were very picturesque.  The loop to the east gate took me north around Yellowstone Lake and then an additional forty miles before dumping me out on highway 20 in Wyoming.  Getting out of Yellowstone took me much longer than I expected.  When I considered the time spent there and the $20 it cost me to ride through, knowing what I know now, I wouldn't bother with it again.  I'm probably just spoiled.  The scenery is probably amazing to anyone who hadn't just seen all that Hester and I had ridden through in previous days.

Cody Wyoming - Named After Buffalo Bill Cody

I followed 20 eastbound into Cody, WY and got there just in time for the Cody Stampede!  I thought rodeo was big in Texas.  Wyoming LOVES its rodeo.  The highway ran right past the arena where the rodeo was taking place and was completely blocked by local officials.  I pulled up to the barricade and was told I needed to turn around or come back later.  Turn around?  Where the hell would I go? I thought to myself.  Actually, I said it out loud to the guy.  Oops.  I changed my tone quickly and explained that I was heading east to the Black Hills and then lied and said I had a hotel reservation in Cody.  The official asked which one.  I lied again and replied "Holiday Inn" figuring that was a safe guess.  Apparently it was.  He called ahead to another official on the other side of the barricade to let him know I was passing through.  I was hungry and tired and actually considered stopping at a hotel.  I grabbed a can of Monster Energy and filled Hester's tank while searching my GPS for campgrounds nearby.  It indicated a place about 50 miles away and listed the phone number.  I called the number and asked if they allowed tent camping.  They did and I told the lady I was less than an hour away on a motorcycle in Cody to which she replied a late arrival was no problem.  She had the softest, sweetest deep southern drawl and told me to ride safe and she would keep the coffee hot for me.  She added that all the restaurants (the only one, I learned the next morning) were closed, but that she had left over dinner if I was hungry.  It was like talking to grandma.  I couldn't wait to get there.

I followed the GPS directions to the campground.  I use the term "campground" loosely here.  The address on the GPS took me to an old, wooden frame house with a large back yard where an old pickup truck camper was parked.  My back yard is larger than this campground.  Better yet, my back yard doesn't back up to a railroad track through which trains seemed to pass multiple times each hour.  I went to the porch that looked into the office/living room and rang the bell.  It was one of those old doorbell buttons that was backlit, but the cover was broken.  I pressed it and got a slight shock, jerking my hand away quickly. The place reminded me of an old I Love Lucy episode.  It was the one wherein the Ricardo's and Mertz's were on the their way to California and had stopped at a "luxury hotel" in the middle of nowhere, which turned out to be a dump night next to the railroad.

Chloe on Guard

Towards the screen door approached an oddly shaped frame with a face that looked like a crumpled up piece of paper topped with white hair stuffed inside a clear plastic shower cap.  It was wearing a man's wife beater t-shirt and no pants.  As it approached, I thought it might be a woman.  My fear was confirmed when she reached up to unlatch a lock at the top of the door.  Not wanting to get caught staring at her face, I looked down.  My gender suspicion was confirmed when her t-shirt was pulled upward by the upward reaching of her arms.  Her pendulous breasts hung in front of her ample stomach and looked like flattened, inverted bowling pins.  I snapped my head up and probably snapped three vertebra in the process.  At that point, the crumpled paper spoke - and it had the softest sweetest, southern drawl. I gathered my wits and smiled shaking my head as she said "I'm glad you made it. Did you eat in Cody?".  "I saved you some fish".  Fish.  Shrug doesn't do fish.  I paid her $8 and not having the heart to say no, took the paper plate of fish and okra she offered me.  I love okra, but the fish juice had run allover the plate and the smell was starting to make my stomach turn.  As I walked down the steps toward Hester, I was greeted by a very large and very happy blonde Labrador retriever.  "Don't mind Chloe." the crumpled paper said.  "She loves people. She'll ask, but don't give her a bite of fish.  It gives her the shits" she added.  All I could muster was "Yes ma'am" as I sat on Hester and balanced the soggy plate on the gas tank.  I set up my tent and didn't bother to dump the day's photos and video to my hard drive.  I was beat.  The smell of the fish took care of my hunger.  I chugged down a package of peanuts and fed the fish to Chloe who had parked herself outside my tent.  It was warm enough out that I didn't even bother to unroll my sleeping bag.  I stretched out fully clothed on my air mattress and was out before the train near the yard finished passing by.

Back Into the USA

As with each day on the Alaskapade, morning arrived early.  It's funny how no matter how utterly exhausted your mind and your body might be after a long day's ride, you still wake up at the crack of dawn ready to ride.  Waking up in the hotel in Prince George was no different, except that I wasn't alone.  Scot and I packed our gear and readied ourselves for another day in the saddle.  Scot was heading to his home near Seattle today and I was going to visit a friend of my mom on Whidbey Island, northwest of Seattle.  The previous day's ride had been a slow-paced tour of the Cassiar Highway, which yielded numerous opportunities for us to stop to photograph the abundant wildlife and the seemingly endless majestic scenery.

We decided on this morning that we would concentrate on the road and would dial down the tourist mindset a bit in an effort  to try to get "home" with some daylight left.  The route was pretty much a straight shot south on the Cariboo (their spelling, not mine) Highway that would deposit us into Sumas, WA after we cleared U.S. customs.  It was that simple.

Actually, it wasn't.

Top of the 99 Loop

The morning started out with reasonably clear weather and moderate temperatures.  There was only a mild threat of rain, but I donned my rain gear anyway.  I found that in most cases on this trip, I spent more time on the side of the road putting on and removing my rain gear than I actually spent riding in the rain.  It was easier to just wear it since the temperatures were so low.  An added benefit was the fact that the non-porous rain suit fabric blocked the occasional blast of cold air we would ride through in mountain passes and water crossings.  Scot and I had a great time navigating the Cariboo and taking it all in.  There was little traffic to deal with, gas was abundant, and the roads were in great shape.  This would be a relaxing ride, culminating with our triumphant return to the USA.

Alexandria Tunnel Entrance

We had stopped for a quick lunch at a Subway in Hat Creek and were saddling back up to leave when a woman in a car asked us if we were traveling south.  Scot answered in the affirmative whereupon she warned us that the previous night's heavy rains had washed out a bridge along our planned route.  She advised we take the scenic highway 99 loop, then catch highway 12 into Lyson.  I was up for another scenic loop, especially if it meant I wouldn't have to sit in a long line of frustrated cagers.  We backtracked a few miles to the 99 junction and headed west.  The word "scenic" was an understatement for this loop.  This was an awesome ride offering stellar mountain and canyon views, switchbacks along and a thousand feet above roaring rivers, steep climbs, steeper grade drops, and numerous tunnels that dissected the mountains.  Entering and exiting the old tunnels gave me a strange feeling of power.  It was as if I alone had some super power over physical matter which allowed me to burrow through mountain rock that was as timeless as the earth itself.  Whenever I exited a tunnel, I looked back at the mountain through which I had just passed and pondered the man hours it took to complete the structure and marveled at the accomplishment having been performed so long ago without the aid of AutoCAD and Google Earth.

GPS View of the Road Ahead

Our plan from the start of the morning was to concentrate on riding and get through the 600 miles to the US border.  The 99 loop was so picturesque that we couldn't help ourselves.  We probably added an extra two hours to our riding time over the course of the additional 41 miles this loop threw at us.  I think Scot would agree that it was worth every minute.

Highway 99 merged back into 12 and 12 into 1 and we found ourselves back on track on our intended route.  We were relieved that we were able to bypass the washed out bridge and the resulting traffic snarl that went with it.  The series of tunnels eventually came to an end near the town of Hope in the southern end of British Columbia.  We were on a riding high, having just come through roads many bikers only dream of riding and the U.S. border was less than an hour away.  Suddenly, the bottom fell out of the sky and a torrential downpour started.  We were suited up for the rain and didn't let it bother us. We just exercised additional caution on the winding roads and kept an eye out for clueless cagers.  Then, we came upon what appeared to be a long line of cars crawling along at a snail's pace.  We motored along in first gear feathering the clutch and doing that super slow biker crawl, weaving back and forth in our lane trying to see how slow we can go without putting our feet down.  Riders know what I'm talking about.  

Old School Gas Stop Deep in British Columbia

Chiliwack Mud Pack

Eventually the snail pace gave way to that of a Louden Wainwright III tune topic.  We were sitting dead still and in the middle of the road and the rain was pouring.  Cages were ahead of us and behind us as far as we could see.  The road wasn't wide enough for cars to turn around and even if they did, there was nowhere to go.  We were stuck.  So close and yet so far.  A road construction worker was making his way along the line of cars explaining what the problem was to the drivers.  He told us that the Trans Canadian Highway 1 was blocked in Chiliwack by a mudslide and that all traffic would have to be re-routed.  I thought to myself "re-routed where?"  We've spent the entire day dodging washed out bridges and closed roads and this was our only way out.  The worker asked where we were heading.  I told him "Dallas", which caught him off guard a bit.  He said we could stay on the road we were on for about eight miles and offered up a detour from there to get us back on to highway 1.  Eight miles was nothing.  Eight miles in traffic like this in heavy rain was a pain in the butt.  Eight miles at zero mph in this rain was eternity..  The worker looked at our bikes and at the shoulder of the road and said "The shoulder's wide enough if you wanna chance it."  I think Scot was a bit hesitant.  I was not.  I rolled over and slowly rode along the narrow shoulder trying not to piss off the cagers sitting dead still just inches to my left.  Most of them didn't seem to care., but a few made an obvious effort to block us by pulling over to the right.  I just smiled as I gingerly negotiated the muddy slop to the right of the shoulder.  Scot's BMW just sailed through these spots.  Hester is a fat bottomed girl and as such, remaining vertical at such a slow pace was a challenge to say the least.  The thought crossed my mind that after negotiating Destruction Bay and the Dalton all the way up to the Arctic Circle and back, in the blink of an eye I could dump Hester into the mud and lose her in the flooded drainage ditch below.  Despite that possibility, I motored on.  I checked my rear view mirror and saw that other bikes had joined in our little train.  We had to force our way back into traffic briefly to cross bridges with no shoulders, but over time, we covered a great deal of ground all things considered.  Along the way we saw herds of campers, numerous overheated and otherwise stalled cars, a few minor rear end collisions, and some dead eighteen wheelers.  The rain had mercifully slowed to a light drizzle and by now, some of the camper occupants had given up on making any forward progress and were setting up camp right there on the road.  Kids were playing about and waving at at the slow rolling biker procession training by them.  I had grown somewhat comfortable with the sloppy, narrow lane I was navigating and rolled by a Mack truck who blasted his air horn as I was right to its side. I think I actually crapped my pants a little and was reminded of my impromptu trip into KFC back in Dawson Creek.  That seemed so long ago and so far away.  We rode up on a traffic circle that was fed from four sides, all of which were stalled completely.  Scot and I carefully made our way around the circle and back onto highway 1. The entire thirteen mile detour took us about three hours to negotiate.  The road and the skies simultaneously cleared and we could practically smell the U.S. border.  After a quick gas stop and a chance to burn off more Canadian currency, Scot and I discussed the little remaining route we had left before we would go our separate ways.  We saddled up and before we knew it, were facing the U.S. border.

The border crossing was wide open when we arrived.  Scot and I simultaneously took separate lanes and with a few quickly answered questions, were back in the States.  The Customs agent looked at Hester and asked what the Alaskapade.com logo was all about.  I explained briefly and he commented that that explained why I had the dirtiest Harley he had ever seen.  His comment didn't bother me at all.  Hester's filth was well earned.  Scot and I rode together for a short while until I peeled off to head for Whidbey Island on the scenic highway 20 and he headed further north towards his home.  As we waved each other off, I mulled over how much I enjoyed the two days we spent riding together.  What were the odds that two strangers could meet in the Arctic Circle and part ways only to meet up again days later and thousands of miles away?  Scot was a class act and a solid rider who like me, answered the call from Alaska and rode solo to the Arctic Circle.  I respected the guy as much as I liked him.

I was in a state of deja vu as I rode into Oak Harbor on Whidbey Island.  I had been here a year ago having made the 2,300 mile journey from Dallas in 2.5 days on Hester with my mom.  Crossing the bridge over Deception Pass was much easier this year than it was last time.

My mom had owned a small retirement place in Oak Harbor and one of her favorite pastimes was collecting rocks from the nearby beaches and placing them in a small rock garden in front of her place.  While at the Arctic Circle, I found a rock I thought mom would have liked and since my route took me so close to her after re-entering the US, I took it to her best friend in Oak Harbor whose home I was planning to stay the night before heading home.

Tomorrow would be Thursday.  I had ridden over 6,700 miles and still had 2,300 to go to get home.  I had never been to such legendary riding spots as Sturgis, Deadwood, the Black Hills, Spearfish Canyon, Yellowstone, Mount Rushmore, and the Chief Crazy Horse monument.  I had to ride southeast to get home.  I figured I would just ride east to South Dakota and Wyoming and then south to Texas.  I could milk the Alaskapade for a few more days.

Day ??? ( I Lost Track) Into Prince George, BC

This day started like many others on this adventure.  I awakened staring at the bright orange inside ceiling of my tent.  After a brief moment of complete disorientation, I realized where I was and thought about the events of the previous riding day.  What a long day! What an adventure! What an idiot!  What kind of fool takes a chance like that?  On the one hand, I rode a thousand miles, I did it alone, and I did it not on a highway slab, but across some of the worst terrain imaginable and in the worst of weather conditions.  I was proud of that.  On the other hand, I rode a thousand miles, I did it alone, and I did it not on a highway slab, but across some of the worst terrain imaginable and in the worst of weather conditions.  It was a pretty stupid move.  It was pointless to ponder the rationality or stupidity of it all. The manly man in me still thinks it's kinda cool despite the abject fear I felt for a while.  The rational part of me thinks...well, I tend to just ignore that part.

1,011 Mile Roadside Hotel

I rolled up my sleeping bag, deflated my air mattress,  and packed everything I could before I even exited my tent.  I crawled out and saw an older couple a few feet from me bent over examining something in the dirt between their camper and my tent.  They looked over at me, said "good morning" and turned back to look at whatever it was.  Naturally curious, I wobbled over, still shaky from the previous night's dead still sleep to get a glimpse.  There on the ground between our two camping spots was the biggest turd any of us had ever seen.  I'm not talking about a big plop like a cow drops or a pile of nuggets like from a horse.  This was a fully shaped, tubular turd with tapered ends that was loaded with twigs and what appeared to be unchewed berries.  It was coiled up into a pile and was the diameter of a tennis ball can and about twice the length. The man said "I thought dinosaurs were extinct."   I looked up at the woman and said "Did you do that?"  The coffee the man had just began sipping spewed forth like projectile vomit and he doubled over in laughter.  She laughed and replied that she was about to ask me the same question, pointing at their camper and reminding me that they had a toilet. As bad as I wanted to, I couldn't bring myself to take a picture of it in front of the couple.  I wanted to ask them to take a pic of me knelt down next to it.  The thrill of it all was quickly overshadowed by he hoard of flies and merciless smell, so we stepped away and did the usual morning introductions.  They were on a driving vacation across Canada and were on their way back to Vancouver.  I packed the rest of my gear and hot the road.

River Stop Where I Met Scot

Scot From Seattle

A few miles down the road I saw a hotel, gas, and a small store.  I had stopped in desperation the night before because I figured there was nothing ahead of me.  Had I seen that hotel, I might have tried to get a room.  As I rode by it, I saw a guy loading up a BMW Adventure bike and did the usual biker one finger down wave.  A few moments later, I rode up on a cool piece of river rapids that winded itself up right next to the road.  I pulled over to get a quick pic and as I was getting back on the bike, the BMW rider I had seen mounting up at the hotel up the road rode up to me and said "Hello Scott.".  "Hey Scot" I replied.  Scot and I had met briefly at the Arctic Circle monument three days prior.  When I was up there, I saw a group of BMW riders arrive  together and Scot was among them.  I thought he was part of their group. I was wrong.  Like me, Scot was on his own and was also heading down to the Cassiar Parkway.  He had left Fairbanks on Sunday and made a couple of stops before we ran into each other here at Deese Lake in British Columbia.  When he mentioned he was riding the Cassiar to Seattle with a planned stop in Prince George, I said that I was too and we decided to ride the 1,200 mile route together.  After the harrowing night I had just experienced, riding company was a welcome sight and any guy willing to go it alone like I had was probably a cool guy.

Houston, We have a Problem

Highway 37 eventually gave way to Highway 16 (the Cassiar Highway) in a little town called Kitwanga.  I had heard great things about the Cassiar and I have to say that it delivered.  Scot and I spent the day carving corners, crossing mountains, climbing hills, and diving into steep drops.  Our riding pace was pretty much the same and we seemed to have a similar mindset for stopping to snap photos and take in the scenery.  Despite the rainy weather, the 600 mile ride to Prince George would be child's play compared to my ride yesterday.  

The Cassiar also delivered when it came to wildlife.  Scot and I stopped numerous times to watch bears and moose.  We saw a mama bear with three tiny cubs in tow.  It's hard to believe something so cute can be so dangerous.  I was really psyched to see a huge bear right next to the road.  I caught a glimpse as I rode by and turned Hester around to get a closer look.  Sadly, this huge bear was dead.  It didn't look as it had been hit by a car or attacked by some other animal.  It was just dead...and it stunk!  The sound of the flies hovering around it was reminiscent of my military days in Central America.  I snapped a quick pic and raced to catch back up with Scot.

Our southbound route took us through numerous small towns with no apparent industry or other community sustaining infrastructure.  There would just be a collection of houses or trailers in the middle of nowhere.  We stopped for lunch and gas in a place called Bells.  The bed and breakfast there was quite nice.  The bacon cheeseburger and fries were even nicer.  I met a couple there who were up from Texas.  I was in the middle of nowhere in Canada and still meeting people from home.

At another gas stop, Scot and I noticed two really old motorcycles parked out front.  One was an Indian and if memory serves, the other was a Triumph.  The riders were a father and son who were attempting to make their way up to Alaska from San Francisco.  They said their pace was about 45 mph and that they were obviously in no hurry.  I thought I had balls riding a Harley to Alaska. I admire their effort, but I don't think I could take such a slow pace.

As the day wore on, the clear British Columbia skies and crisp air morphed into some pretty serious rain.  There were low hanging clouds as far as we could see and the darkness came early.  I had been camping most of my trip and while Scot had camping gear, he had been hoteling it.  I mentioned that I planned to camp again and Scot agreed.  After riding in the rain for what seemed like hours and finally arriving in Prince George in the dead of night, we both decided to just find a room.  Setting up camp in the rain sucks and packing up wet gear the next day is awful.  To make matters worse, we had both just rode up on a horrific accident north of Prince George.  A van struck a huge moose and there were parts everywhere.  It was a gruesome scene that had apparently taken place immediately before we rode up.  People behind the van were scrambling out of their cars as emergency workers weren't yet on the scene.  Scot and I rode by slowly and stopped at the first open station to top off our tanks.  We confirmed with each other that what we thought we saw was really what we saw.  We also confirmed that neither of us wanted to pitch a tent and decided to split a hotel room.  I informed Scot that I was not in the habit of going to hotels with strange men I just met, but that in his case, I would make an exception.  We found a clean place with Internet access, two beds, and a shower.  After a much needed hot shower, I laid in my bed and considered the timing that took place back at the scene of the moose strike.  Had we been at that intersection when the moose was in our lane, that could have been us on the road.  Some say timing is everything.  I think luck has a lot to do with it too.  Tomorrow, we would cross back into the United States.  Scot would go home and I would stop to visit my mom's friend and deliver a rock.  I still had over 3,000 miles to ride to get home.

And So Begins the Long Ride Home

I arrived back in Fairbanks around 10:30pm.  The ride in was relaxed; almost solemn. Suddenly, the most important event in my life, the focus of most of my attention and energy, and almost the very reason for my being over the last eight months - was over.  I was exhausted.  I had been on the road for 18 hours.  I felt numb in parts of me I didn't know existed.  I was unloading Hester in the parking lot when my friend Jeff showed up to congratulate me.  As sore, tired, and completely spent as I was, I was also almost ecstatic.  Jeff and I talked about the ride for a bit before I went to bed.  While I laid there, I was torn between my body's begging me to let go and drift off and the unwillingness to allow the moment to end.  Some part of me rationalized that as long as I stayed awake, it wasn't over and that yielding to the euphoric exhaustion was to acknowledge the end of the very chain of events that created it. The exhaustion won and I slept like the dead.

I knew when I planned this trip that if I simply rode straight home after reaching the circle, I would dread the entire ride back.  So, I planned to make the return trip as interesting as possible with planned stops that would only add a few days to my itinerary.

I awakened at 4:30am with much less enthusiasm than I had when I departed on the Alaskapade and when I started my Circle run.  I was awake nevertheless and took a few moments to review my planned routes.  I had been relying heavily on my Garmin Zumo GPS and it had been very accurate, even along the Dalton.I knew that I would have to backtrack along my inward route almost as far as Watson Lake in the Yukon Territory.  I knew also that that route included the dreaded ride through Destruction Bay and Haynes Junction where I almost bit it on the way in.  Short of riding south to Anchorage and taking a ferry into British Columbia or the States, there was no alternative.  I had paid tremendous prices to plan and execute this journey.  This was one more price to pay.  I am one of those people who at times will allow himself to dwell on the bad in things to the point that they will almost depress me.  That horrible road was all I could focus on and I found myself dreading the return trip because of that one stretch of terrain.  If there's a benefit to such stinking thinking, it's probably that the event which I dread so much never usually turns out to be as bad as my mind had convinced me that it was.  This was the case with the Destruction Bay ride.  Maybe it was because I had ridden it before and had an idea of what to expect.  Maybe it was because it hadn't rained and the surface was dry.  Maybe it was because I didn't have 600 miles under my butt immediately before I attempted it.  Maybe it just wasn't that bad in the first place.  Whatever the reason, the southbound ride through Destruction Bay wasn't nearly as bad as my mind had psyched me out to believe it would be.  Don't get me wrong; It sucked bigtime and I never want to ride anything like that again; not on a Harley anyway.

Burwash Landing Welcome Center

The hell that is the road through Destruction Bay ends traveling southbound in the Yukon Territory at Burwash Landing on Kluane Lake.  Burwash Landing is little more than a sign and an abandoned airstrip in the grass.  Kluane Lake is an enormous, picturesque expanse covering over 150 square miles.  It's glass smooth and reflective surface provided Hester and I with a tranquil welcome from the pounding we had just taken.  It was almost as if God was offering an olive branch as a reward for completing what was arguably the worst ride Hester and I had ever taken.  I would find out later that God was only kidding and the worst was yet to come.

 

Hester Enjoying Kluane Lake

I stopped aside the lake to rest a moment and to look Hester over for loose nuts and bolts.  I also adjusted and re-tied my gear.  Everything had slipped to one side and while it was tied down tightly and wasn't going to fall off, it made it difficult to ride vertical and it just looked stupid.  I noticed my right saddle bag was hanging low and upon examination, learned that the bolt attaching the mounting bracket to the frame had vibrated loose and was missing.  That was nothing a few zip ties couldn't fix.  Once back in the States, I could find a Home Depot and replace it.  Until then, I would keep an eye on it.  I mounted up and motored on.  Once I hit Haynes Junction, I knew I was out of the woods.  The roads north of Haynes were under heavy construction and there were several stretches were vehicles had to be led by a pilot truck.  The waiting point was usually manned by a cute girl; much too cute to wear a hard hat and reflective vest and be standing out in the middle of nowhere with a stop sign on a pole.  They always waved motorcycles to the front of the line and they always asked where I had been.  When I replied "the Arctic Circle", the response was always "on that?!"  After negotiating all the construction zones, one's natural tendency is to speed up; not to make up time, but because you're tired of going so damn slow for hours on end.  This is the perfect place for cops to sit and rake in the dough from unsuspecting motorists like me.  I suppose the availability of officers is limited up there because the only cop car I saw was the infamous fake police car made of painted wood.  From a distance, it looks real enough to fool most anyone and it certainly fooled me.  I laughed when I saw it on my way in and laughed even harder when it fooled me again on the way down.  I had to sop and get a pic.

Haynes Junction gave way to Whitehorse, which made for a good gas stop.  Getting gas in Canada was actually trickier than getting gas in Alaska.  My GPS had a listing of fuel stations along my route, but it was woefully inaccurate.  I learned on my way up that if I had less than half a tank of gas and saw an open station, that I had better stop and top off.  My general rule of thumb when traveling is to never buy gas at the first station that appears in a small town.  Their prices are usually higher because they snare all the suckers who are desperately low on fuel and have no choice but to stop there.  I had to remind myself that at only six gallons, a few pennies per liter were insignificant.  I didn't have to remind myself on the way down that in the remote parts of Canada, that first station might be the only station.  Even if there are stations, their schedules seem to be based on whenever the proprietor feels like being there.  Even though I stopped regularly, there were several times when my fuel gauge read empty and the miles remaining indicator dropped below ten miles and read "Lo".  I was carrying a spare gallon of gas in my saddle bag and the knowledge that it was there and the additional forty miles if afforded me offered a great deal of comfort. I was pondering the fact that I had not had to use it on Hester when I rode up on a BMW sitting alone on the opposite side of the road.  I saw its rider about three miles ahead of me and stopped.  He had run out of gas and was walking back to the nearest town near Teslin in the Yukon.  Tesln was only a couple of miles away.  I wondered why he doidn't gas up there.  Maybe there was no gas.  Nevertheless, I unloaded some gear on the side of the road, took him back to his bike, and gave him my gallon of gas. He rode up to me as I was repacking Hester and I followed him to Teslin to make sure he got there.  He was on his way to Alaska also and had a thousand questions.  We talked a few minutes as he filled up and then took off to the north.  Even after all that, I debated topping off Hester's tank, but did so before I left.

At this point, I needed to start thinking about finding a place to sleep. I wasn't tired yet and I knew the sun wasn't going to go down this far north.  I looked at my odometer and considered the possibility of making this a 1,000 mile Iron Butt day.  On my way up, I rode over 900 miles two days in a row.  I was pretty beat after those days, but how much worse could another 100 miles be? I decided to find out and so that I wouldn't wimp out on myself, I sent a message from my Spot Connect telling the world of my plans.  Now, I was accountable and had to to make it happen.  I had motivation, I had conditioning, and I had a case of 5-Hour energy shots.  I could do this.  The only potential obstacle that stood in my way was the availability of fuel.  My route would take me across Hwy 1 (the ALCAN) and would snake its way in and out of British Columbia and the Yukon Territory and across the Canadian Continental Divide before hitting highway 37 south towards Prince George.  If I couldn't do a thousand miles, I at least wanted to make it to the highway 37 junction.

Up to this point, the weather had been perfect.  It was cool enough to wear my leathers, but not really cold.  I had once again settled into that riding zone where man, machine, and road became extensions of each other.  That zone can be a difficult place to reach, but just like when I reached out and actually touched the Arctic Circle sign, once I got there, the feeling was worth the effort.  I had finished "The Pillars of the Earth" and "We The Living" audio books and by now was knee deep into listening to "Atlas Shrugged" again.  At 67 hours of unabridged audio, Atlas would probably carry me all the way home.  As I rode and listened, I couldn't help but notice the daunting clouds ahead of me.  Every serious rider knows that feeling one gets when the streaks of rain can be clearly recognized in the horizon.  You hope against hope that there's a clear path for you to ride through it, but you know you're going to get wet.  Just hours before at Kluane Lake, the skies had been an indescribable color of blue.  The magnificent display before me was of multidimensional clouds that were flat on bottom as if willingly yielding a view to the mountain peaks beneath them.  Above the clouds, the crystal clear horizon seemed to reach infinitely into space.  I felt like this might be what astronauts saw from above.  Like the an astronaut, I felt freed from gravity.  It was as if I had no origin and no destination.  I was just on the move and had this amazing view to infinity in front of me as a backdrop to wherever my destination might be.

But now, the clouds had closed their ranks and there was no more blue sky.  Occasionally a crack would appear and laser-like beams of sunlight would pierce through to the ground.  Such light would normally offer inspiration to the prospect of better weather ahead.  In this case, it served only as a reminder of just how bad the rest of the sky looked and perhaps as a warning of what was in store for me ahead.  I continued my east by southeast route toward highway 37, counting the miles as I rode.  I passed bears, moose, buffalo, bighorn sheep, and foxes along the route.  On the way up, I stopped and took photos.  This round, I was focused on missing any rain that I could and hitting my 1,000 mile Iron Butt goal. 

Eventually, mercifully, the ALCAN/ gave way to highway 37 south.  I was running low on gas again and it was after 9:00pm.  I had decided that if I didn't find an open as station at the 37 intersection, I would ride the additional forty miles on to Watson Lake.  I knew there would be no open gas station there, but I knew also that I had enough fuel to get me to the camp site at which I stayed when I was riding up.  Watson Lake is not a friendly town and I felt a sense of threat there when I rode through the first time.  My camp site was about five miles past town, safely away from the derelicts I described on an earlier entry.  I figured that worst case, I could camp there again, get gas in the morning and backtrack to highway 37 south.  Hester's luck held and I found an open station at the ALCAN/37 intersection.  I pulled in as the owner was walking out and locking up.  The look of exhaustion and desperation on my face must have been sincere because his wife felt sorry for me and convinced him to let me in to buy gas.  I asked what was ahead of me on 37 and he said nothing for a couple of hundred kilometers.  I thanked them profusely for staying and selling me the gas and sat on Hester looking at my GPS and paper maps.  Highway 37 leads to the Cassiar Highway, which is said to be one of the most scenic routes in the Yukon.  Scenic or not, it was the route I had to take.  Recent severe rains in the area took out a bridge somewhere between Watson Lake and Dawson City.  37 south was my only route home.  As I sat looking over my maps, an old man who looked like a western gold prospector asked me where I was heading.  When I told him south on 37, he replied "Watch out for the shroomies.  They're out thick tonight".  I replied asking what a shroomie was.  The store owner said that mushrooms grow rapidly after hard rains and that groups of gipsy like people go out in droves to collect them.  He added that they are very territorial and are not to be messed with.  I didn't (and still don't) know if these mushrooms are the dope kind that get you high or if they're just food.  I didn't intend to find out.  I had an agenda.  In about 100 miles, I would hit my 1,000 mark and I could find a place to sleep.

I headed south on 37 as the rain started pouring pretty heavy again.  I noticed a tent on the side of the road with a sign on it that read "I BUY MUSHROOMS".  I thought to myself that maybe the shroomies were just an odd looking arm of legitimate commerce and that these were indeed food mushrooms.  I didn't stop at the tent to ask.  Within minutes, the pavement on highway 37 gave way to graded dirt roads.  I thought to myself, oh great!  I'm back in Destruction Bay.  It was like Déjà vu all over again.  Honestly, I think Destruction Bay was easier than this.  I was riding this time in the rain, after 900 miles, and it was dark. Dark?  I thought to myself, why is it dark?  During my thousand mile ride planning, I had failed to consider that I had traveled far enough south that there was no more midnight sun.  The clouds that had been so inviting, so high and proud above the horizon earlier today had now descended into a brooding ceiling of fog which seemed to hover just feet above my head. Randon fingers of fog draped down to the ground like depressed gray columns  in the dungeon of an ancient castle. They seemed so thick that I actually found myself steering around them and fighting to remain vertical on the gravel road.  At one point, I saw an opening to the sky that yielded a prism of colors reminiscent of the Pink Floyd album Dark Side of the Moon.  It wasn't a rainbow.  It was a vertical wall of color; difficult to describe.  I had to stop and get a picture.  I was focused upward at the colors when I heard voices.  I pulled the camera down and saw a group of people working in the field below the prism. They were wearing tie-died shirts, knitted caps, and shorts and were carrying bags.  I thought to myself  that these must be the shroomies the guy at the gas station mentioned.  One of them dropped his bag and came walking toward me.  I dropped my camera and turned to ride away.  As I got back onto the main dirt path, I noticed a few of them hopped in an old pickup truck.  I twisted the throttle and screamed away as fast as Hester would take me.  For miles, I swear I kept seeing headlights behind me.  Perhaps I was just being paranoid.  In my mind, I figured they saw me taking pictures and thought I was spying on them.  Nevertheless, I ran Hester like I stole her and after about fifteen minutes, no longer saw headlights behind me.

I continued southward and while I was relieved that I was no longer being pursued (If I ever really was) I was more concerned now with wildlife.  I bet I saw more bears that night than on the entire trip leading up to it.  Seeing bears in the wild is exciting.  Seeing bears in the same wild where you're looking for a safe place to camp is a different kind of excitement.  In Canada, you can pretty much pull into any open space in the wilderness and pitch a tent.  In previous days, it had been little effort to find places to sleep.  Tonight was different.  I could barely see the sides of the road, so finding a clearing was a challenge. Add to that the fact that I was numb from head to toe (except for all the parts that hurt), I had been on the road for 18 hours, I was cold, wet, and I hadn't eaten in 36 hours, and there was one other feeling I couldn't shake.  I couldn't quite put my finger on it then, but looking back, I recognize what it was.  I was afraid.  I haven't been genuinely afraid in over twenty years.  Genuine fright is a powerful emotion.  I suppose in my case this time, it motivated me to just keep moving.  I had plenty of gas.  I knew I could just keep riding till dawn if I had to.  Finally, I saw a clearing where two camper trailers were parked.  I grabbed a handful of brakes, swung Hester around, and nestled in between them with each camper about twenty feet on either side of me.  I noticed when I was setting up camp that as my flashlight beamed into the woods, I could see the reflections from multiple pairs of eyes staring back at me.  These woods were full of foxes.  I saw several of them hovering around as I was setting up my tent.  Foxes are strange animals.  They trot about and have a gate like dogs, but they sneak around like cats.  I didn't know much about fox behavior, but I knew I didn't trust them.  They seemed to be working cooperatively, planning against me.  Like I said, I was really tired.  For all I know, there may not have been any foxes, bears, or shroomies.  I finished setting up my tent, transferred the day's pics and videos to my hard drive, and wasted no energy fighting sleep.