Last night when the sun was still shining at 11pm local time, I took a picture of the mountains with the sun shining on them. It was something to see.
When I woke up this morning I looked out at the mountains and there was fog all over the tops of them. I happened to be looking out the window when a Harley rider pulling a trailer got started up to go over to the gas station across the street with his buddies to gas up. He just got on it and backed up from his parking space and started forward to head out of the hotel parking lot and plop, the Harley fell over. It took he and his buddy to lift it back up and over to the gas station he went.
Since the restaurant where I was staying didn't open until 9am and I wanted to be gone long before that, I walked over to the gas station to see if they had any donuts and tea. I asked the Chinese guy if they had donuts and he said "not at this store" so I got some tea and walked back towards the motel. As I was walking back, I saw a sign that said "Bakery" and it pointed down a road. Back to the hotel, jumped on the bike and went "in search of". I found the neatest little Deli/Bakery over by a National Forest. It was owned by a German lady and she made the most scrumptious cinnamon rolls you have ever tasted. I got a dozen and headed back to the hotel and had a cinnamon roll with my tea.
After finishing off my one cinnamon roll, (did I say I got a dozen?, I meant I wanted to get a dozen, but only got one) I got the bike loaded up, went over to the same gas station, gassed up and headed out of town. But, I forgot one important thing. I forgot to read the highway signs. The problem with Garmin Girl is, if you have the sound turned off, it will just think you want to go somewhere via a different route. So I'm looking at the screen and it says "go 11 miles to unpaved road". I'm thinking "unpaved road?", I'm supposed to be on the Alaska Highway and it's supposed to be paved. Then I switch to the compass screen and it says I'm heading South East. I'm thinking, I should be heading North West and then it hits me, I took the highway straight ahead from the direction I was going in last night and the Alaska Highway makes a sharp right at the intersection where I spent the night. Quick U turn and head back to Haines Junction and take a left on the correct road and off I go for the second time this day. I was hoping nobody had seen me start down the wrong road and then return shortly after I left and took another road. Fortunately I had only gone three miles before I discovered my mistake. :)
Now the road from Haines Junction to Tok Alaska is in pretty bad shape. That probably is an understatement to say that. Bill Wing said I shouldn't take it. He said I should take the highway to Haines Junction and then the highway from Haines Junction that connects back with the Alaska Highway farther North. I thought, no way. I need to get to Fairbanks as soon as possible. I went for the normal Alaska Highway route.
I discovered "Frost Heaves" on that section of highway today. And no, it isn't what happens when you eat too many Wendy's Frosties at one time. It's what happens to roads in the far North when the ground under the highway freezes and thaws and freezes and thaws. The road moves up and down. It causes big "roller coaster" bumps to appear in the road. In Canada, every place one of these occurs, they put a small red flag on the stick in the ground on the side of the road. I was cruising along pretty good and hit one of these and it was like I bounced in the air. Quite exciting! There had to have been at least 500 of these on that stretch of highway. I think some of them were so bad that both wheels came close to coming off the ground. I was following a couple of cars pulling trailers and I could see the trailers just bouncing up and down like crazy. Makes for slower travel for sure. I didn't get up near my normal speed on this highway. If Sharon had been with me and we were riding the Harley, she would have been saying OW! every two or three minutes. Plus, we would have bottomed out the Harley suspension on just about every one of these bumps.
I also discovered "Pavement Breaks" on this stretch of highway today. When frost heaves make the road so bad that it has to be repaired, they spread dirt and gravel all over the road and smooth it out. They call this repair area a "Pavement Break". And it can be something else too. I have another name for them.
There is a lake not too far from Haines Junction where the Alaska Highway follows the lake for about 5 miles. About half way around the lake, the construction starts and some of the dirt they are putting down is a little wet so, you guessed it. Grease on the road. I managed to stay upright but it was a struggle in some places. Plus, I didn't have a whole lot of room to slide around, so it got even more exciting when traffic was coming from the other direction.
Then, about five miles before you get to the Alaska border, there is a U.S. Customs stop point for trucks. Just after that I encountered another road repair area and this one they spread the dirt down and put a thick layer of large gravel on top. Man ! Was this exciting! I was ALL OVER the road before I got to the end of that section. After the gravel has been down for a while, all the trucks going over it will pack it down so it isn't near as bad to ride through on a motorcycle. But when they first put the gravel layer down, it is unbelievably difficult for motorcycles.
When I got through the U.S. border check, there was more construction but it had been down for a while so it wasn't too bad. At the end of that stretch there was a little gas station/restaurant and I decided I was tired of the construction and needed something to eat. After my late lunch, I hit the road again feeling pretty confident. I went about five miles through several more short "pavement breaks" and then came upon a sign that said, "Road Construction Next 47 miles". I thought, well it can't be too bad and plus I did put my entry in for Dakar next year so I should be able to handle anything they can throw at me. Boy, was I in for a surprise! Why? Because it started to rain. And then I wasn't near as confident as I was just a short while ago.
The first construction area I hit after the rain started, was one they had just put down the dirt. It was a mess. I was all over the road again and came the closest to losing the bike as any time I can remember. Ever!. It was going over due to the front end washing out and somehow I was able to get the tail end to come around and catch up with the direction the bike was going. I don't think I would have been hurt or the bike would have been hurt because there was so much mud and I was probably only going 15-20 miles per hour at the most. I was really breathing fast by the end of that "Pavement Break" though. I can tell you now, if it is raining, I am NOT starting up the Dalton Highway towards Prudhoe Bay. NO WAY! With somewhere around 400 miles total of dirt roads, I'd have to be insane to think I could make it up there and back without any problems when the whole thing was mud.
Well, it continued to rain and now I'm really nervous about construction and the next 40 something miles. I go through several more of these areas expecting to wipe out any moment. I was sliding around a lot in those areas but nothing like the first area. So we have stretches of regular highway and then one of the "Pavement Breaks" and then more regular highway. I'm on the regular highway part, trying to see clearly what's coming ahead through the rain on my face shield and I see a sign coming up. It says, DANGEROUS CURVES. Just shortly after this sign, I see another sign. You guessed it, "Pavement Break". Well, you can imagine what I'm thinking. Definitely not something a person can quote in an email.
I go around the first curve on the regular highway part and then I see a long downhill stretch that continues around a curve at the bottom and it is ALL dirt and gravel. Now the dangerous part of this is that almost at the bottom of the hill there is NOTHING on either side of the road. The dirt and gravel goes up to the edge and then nothing but space and lots of it, down to the bottom, which I am too busy to see how far down that is. So, I REALLY slow down and go slipping and sliding down the hill towards certain doom, thinking it's a good thing my life insurance kicked in the first of July.
I made it ok but I'm hyperventilating by the time I get to the bottom. And this presents an additional problem. The more you breath, the more your face shield fogs up and I'm way too busy to take one hand off the handlebars to open the shield more. My bell must have scared off all the demons because there was not one car coming the other direction the whole time I was on this hill. It's a really good thing too because I was all over the other lane before I got to the bottom. Now, I'm thinking, I wonder if there's a penalty for withdrawing from next years' Dakar?
When I finally got to Tok, Alaska, it's still raining so I pull into the first place to get a room and get off my bike and I feel it's leaning a little too much where it is so I decide to put it on the center stand. Now on pavement, it's fairly easy to do because you can feel the correct balance point on the center stand pretty easily. This was gravel and it's sometimes hard to feel that balance point. Well, I started raising it up on the center stand and the bike was off balance and plunk! It's laying on its side in the mud. I can't believe I've gone almost 4,000 miles on this trip and now I plopped my bike in the mud. As I was taking my helmet off, a guy who was in his car waiting for his wife to come out, jumped out of his car and came over and said "do you think we can pick it up?". I said I don't know but we can try. Well, we lifted it right up and I left it on the side stand. I couldn't thank that guy enough for his help. I would NEVER have been able to pick it up by myself. Not a mark on the bike. Just a little more mud. Boy, that thing looks rugged right now. All the mud the trucks have thrown up. It's a disgrace to the BMW name.
As I was going in to check if they had rooms, the Harley rider and his wife from Illinois, who I had been talking to when I was also talking to Bill Wing day before yesterday, came walking out of the hotel/restaurant. They told me this place didn't have any rooms and also the next three places didn't have any either. They told me they got a room down the road a couple of miles and they thought they still had some rooms left. While I was talking to them, they said they came through the same construction I did, and also while it was raining. He said that when they came to that "dangerous curves" construction area that he told his wife that if the bike starts to slide, she should bail out and not try to stay on the bike because it was probably going to go over the side. He didn't like the "Pavement Breaks" any more than I did. He said there was no way they were going any further in the rain. I told him that's exactly how I felt.
There's an older couple I keep seeing on the road riding a Honda Trike pulling a fairly large trailer. They were also at the hotel/restaurant where I first stopped to check for rooms and they ended up here at the same hotel I'm at. I got a look at their trailer and on the back of it is written "North to Alaska, to Key West and Back North to Alaska". They are on a SERIOUS bike ride. That's got to be in the neighborhood of 10,000 to 15,000 miles or more. I'll have to see if I can talk to them some tomorrow to see what their story is.
Anyway, this was enough excitement for one day so I'm going to bed and hope like heck it isn't raining in the morning. If it is, I may just stay here until it quits. :) .
I may have talked the Illinois couple into coming to the BS rally this year. He acted like he really liked the idea. Plus, he probably talked some to Bill Wing about it. I think Bill talked to every rider that came in to either of the two hotels there where he was staying. He and Les were still in the parking lot when I left to go to bed at 11pm that day. I hope they made it to Hyder, Alaska ok. He said they were going there to get "Hyderized". That's some kind of drinking ritual that the bar in Hyder puts the tourists through, I think. I'm not sure. I've just heard some stories.
When I next talk to Bill Wing I'm going to be sure he knows that he may have ridden the bad road to Tok but I rode it in the RAIN.
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