D2D Day 20 Dawson Creek, BC to Hinton, AB 278 Miles

Greetings Friends,

We're getting down to the last few days of our adventure ride to Canada and Alaska. We rewarded ourselves with a late wake up this morning, that is to say we slept in, as we had less than 300 miles to Hinton, Alberta, Canada, about 45 miles east of Jasper. Hotels in Jasper start at about $250 per night with two-night minimum. Hinton we'll just say is considerably less expensive.

Departing Dawson City and heading south, the terrain is very similar to Minnesota, green rolling hills with farms, lakes and trees. It brought back fond childhood memories of spending many summers at my grandparent's farm and lake home in Minnesota.

After leaving Dawson Creek we crossed the British Columbia border and entered the province of Alberta, we also lost an hour on the clock.

Eighty two miles to the southeast of Dawson Creek we pulled into Grande Prairie for gas and a morning comfort break, good bye coffee, and then headed south on Alberta 40 for Grande Cache, some 119 miles to the south. The scenery slowly changed from rolling prairie and farms to thick forest.  

Western Alberta seems to be rich in natural resources. The route was strewn with natural gas wells and piping. Furthermore, the area is a logging haven with evidence of acres of clear-cut harvesting. We also passed a coal mine where huge powered shovels are devouring the entire side of a mountain.

The Later in the afternoon, we arrived in Grande Cache where we gassed up and had lunch at Milos, a Greek and Italian restaurant.

The next eighty eight miles between Grande Cache and Hinton is a game preserve with a warning sign, "Caution, wild animals on the highway." Before getting too far we saw two dead deer on the highway. A short time later we saw a flat-bed tow truck picking up a car with front end damage and a dead deer lying on the side of the highway. The chances of surviving a large animal hit on a motorcycle are dismal. Constant vigilance and reasonable speed are the rules for survival.

Not all of the animals we saw today were dead. We saw a Red Fox, no relation to the late comedian, one lonely Black Bear, a few individual deer and a young buck deer with the fuzz still on his antlers and his young doe bride, very cute.

The weather was pretty good today, temperature between 68 and 72 degrees under partly cloudy skies, some wind but not too bad. All in all it was a nice day for riding.

We pulled into Hinton about 4:30 pm and checked into a new Holiday Inn Express hotel. Thirty minutes later we were using the Jacuzzi and pool, the first ones we have encountered since leaving Olympia, Washington.

Tomorrow, we're off the Jasper, AB and Kamloops, BC.

As usual, here are a few photos from today's ride:

D2D Day 19 Fort Nelson, BC to Dawson Creek, BC 278 Miles

Greetings from Dawson Creek, British Columbia, faithful blog followers,

Today, we were up early and anxious to get to Dawson Creek, the official beginning (Mile 0), or as I have stated before, the official end of the Alaska Highway, for us. After an included buffet breakfast at the hotel, we loaded up our bikes along with a group of riders from Michigan. They had just successfully completed a ride up the dirt Dalton Highway (AKA the Haul Road) from Fairbanks, AK to Deadhorse, Prudhoe Bay and the Arctic Ocean and were on their way back home.

One of the Michigan riders was lamenting the fact that they had successfully negotiated the Dalton without mishap; however, yesterday one of their riders dumped his BMW 1200 GS in the loose gravel on some road construction on the Alaska Highway. He was alright but had some bruises, not to mention his male ego. I was a little dicey for us as well, but we managed to keep the shiny side up.

The weather and road conditions were perfect for riding today, as you can probably see from a couple of the attached photos. We just rode today, no sightseeing, hence not many photos, sorry. It was really an easy, low-mileage jaunt. We stopped for lunch in Fort Saint John, BC, at A&W Root Beer, which are very prevalent in Canada. Papa burgers all around please.

I think we have also shopped just about every Wal Mart in British Columbia, Yukon and Northwest Territories buying motorcycle oil for the KLRs. Aside from the radiator problem we had with Lane's bike in Chicken, AK, the little bikes have performed flawlessly with one exception. Stock KLRs are known for high oil consumption, especially at freeway speeds. We're using a quart of oil every 1,000 to 1,500 miles on average. I don't think it's burning the oil, it seems to just blow it out past the rings at higher speeds. Kawasaki knows about it but they haven't fixed it. There is a retro-fit aftermarket 685 cc big-bore kit available to resolve that problem. I think I'm going to look into it upon my return home.

We pulled into Dawson Creek in the early afternoon and made the obligatory stop for photos at the Start of the Alaska Highway sign and visitor center/museum, the brown grain elevator building. The family photo is not my new instant Canadian family; it's just a local family who has never visited the museum before. They were kind enough to take our picture. The little girl with the bonnet wanted to see the motorcycle, so I sat her on it and they wanted a photo. Nice folks.

We left the visitor center and checked into a brand new Holiday Inn Express Hotel. Later, we enjoyed a very nice supper with wine at the new FIXX Urban Grill.  It was excellent; we recommend it.

Please stay tuned. Over the next two days we'll be in Jasper, Alberta, and Kamloops, BC, before returning to the US. 

Here are a few photos. That little dot between Lane's silver helmet and his orange camera strap is me.

D2D Day 18 Watson Lake, YK to Fort Nelson, BC 335 Miles

We departed Watson Lake, BC, after a quick breakfast and headed south on the Alaska Highway for Fort Nelson, BC. About 50 miles into the journey we arrived at Contact Creek where the WWII soldiers constructing the Alaska Highway, known then as the ALCAN Highway, working from the south and the north met connecting the highway.

We're always keeping an eye out for critters on the highway for two reasons, we enjoy seeing wild animals and they represent a hazard to vehicles on the highway. Regrettably, we saw a dead Black Bear alonside the highway this morning. A short time later, we also saw a dead Moose on the side of the road, presumably both occurred during the previous night. Very sad.

On the bright side, we also saw several live Black Bears feeding alongside the highway today and a family of Brown Bears just south of Liard Hot Springs.  There were warning signs at Liard Springs that there was a family of Brown, also known as Grizzly, Bears in the area. We consider ourselves fortunate to have seen them. Brown or Grizzy Bears can generally be discerned from Black Bears as they are generally larger, have a small hump between their should blades and have a more distinct nose as where Black Bears have a sloping nose from their forehead. Both Black Bears and Brown Bears can be almost any color from black to blond. The bottom line is stay away from all bears.  And, the mantra here is "A fed bear is a dead bear--don't feed the bears."

Liard Hot Springs is an interesting location. After a short 1/4 mile walk on a boardwalk, you come to the hot soaking pools of Liard Hot Springs, heated naturally by the Earth. Before you reach the soaking pools, your nose tells you that you are close. The sulfer smell cannot be ignored. Unfortunately, we didn't take time to soak, but it sure looked inviting. Maybe next time.

Just south of Liard Hot Springs is the very scenic Muncho Lake in the Munch Lake Provincial Park. It is unique in that the water is a very pale green. There is a very nice log lodge/hotel and float plane operation there taking sightssers and fishermen to remote mountain locations.

We stopped for lunch at theToad River Lodge. Tourists coming in reported seeing a Moose in Toad River adjacent to the lodge. Some of us were too hungry to go out and look.

We passed through Summit Lake and Steamboat and rolled into Fort Nelson around 5:30 pm. We checked into the Fort Nelson Hotel, most likely one of the original hotels in the town. We were met by the new owner Byron, who said that he just purchased the hotel and was making several improvements, which were in evidence. The decor is early 70's with Tiki God motif. The hotel had one of the few swiming pools that we have seen in the north country; unfortunately, is was closed and somewhat resembled Muncho Lake, at least as to the color, pale green.

Lane was craving Italian food and inquired as to the best Italian restaurant in town.

D2D Day 17 Whitehorse, YK to Watson Lake, YK 324 Miles

Finally Friends, we’re leaving Whitehorse. Don’t get me wrong, Whitehorse is a nice place to visit, but we’re on a motorcycle ride.

We got up this morning and walked into town for a light breakfast at Tim Horton’s, a Canadian donut chain, and then returned to the hotel to throw in a last-minute load of laundry. Lane called the motorcycle shop about 10:00 am to inquire about the progress on his radiator repair. They said that they had it back together and the tech was test riding it. We beat feet to the shop right away.  After paying the $307 tariff the bike was ours again. We rode back to the hotel, grabbed our laundry out of the dryer, packed our bikes and hit the road for Watson Lake, YK, via the Alaska Highway at about noon.

It was a bit of a late start but it’s great to be back on the road again. We stopped at Teslin for gas and lunch. Lane and I have been having soup and been splitting a sandwich for a nice light lunch lately. Departing Teslin we had to cross the dreaded Teslin metal surface five-span bridge again.  It’s always very unsettling, but we managed to conquer it again successfully. At least it wasn’t raining.

Farther down the road we came across a couple of bears eating alongside the highway and stopped for a few photos, with the motors running of course.  It’s reported that bears can run more than 35 MPH and we were not interested in becoming a Canadian version of meals on wheels.

We made pretty good time today under fair skies and cool temperatures and pulled into Watson Lake, home of the signpost village, around 5:00 pm, checked into our hotel and walked to a nearby family-owned restaurant for the homemade meatball special.

We made an interesting observations on this trip that bodes well for the economy overall. In 2008, we saw very few recreation vehicles on the Alaska Highway, presumably the result of the economy going in the tank. This year, quite to the contrary, the highway is alive with RV’s, motorhomes, truck and campers and travel trailers, many of them rentals. People are spending money and traveling this year.

PS - The radiator is still holding water, yea!

Here are a few photos we took today:

D2D Day 16 Whitehorse, Yukon Territory -- All Day

Greetings,

We got up early this morning and were waiting at the front door of Lister's Kawasaki when they opened in an attempt to get Lane's leaking radiator repaired. We were informed that they couldn't help us; they wouldn't even look at it. We were told that it was "marine week" and they were two weeks behind in their shop work. They also service boats. We asked how long to get a radiator, if we ordered one and put it in ourselves, "three or four days." What can you do for us? "Nothing, try Yukon Motorcycle Center."

We left and went to the recommended shop where we were greeted warmly by the owner, Dean Philpott, who said that he heard from Dona Novecosky, owner of the Klondike Rib & Salmon restaurant that we were having motorcycle trouble and might be by. Phil assured us that he understood our dilemma and would do everything he could to get us on our way. "There is a radiator shop right around the corner," he said.

It looked like we were going to be in Whitehorse another night. So, we returned to our hotel and found that they were booked. We would have to move. Fortunately, they found us another hotel in close proximity.

We walked downtown and had an excellent Salmon burger lunch at Dona's Klondike Rib & Salmon restaurant and thanked her for "greasing the skids" at Dean's motorcycle shop.

Following lunch, we walked down to the south end of town where the Klondike sternwheeler museum is located. For $6.50 each we took the guided tour of the dry docked paddle wheeler. The Klondike was constructed in 1929 to transport cargo, silver/lead ore and a few passengers between Whitehorse and Dawson City. The downstream run took 36 hours with two wood refueling stops along the way. Upstream took longer. The ship burned two cords of wood per hour. Unfortunately, the Klondike ran aground in 1936 and had to be rebuilt. It remained in service until 1955. The paddle wheel alone weighs 22 tons.

Retuning to the hotel we called the motorcycle shop and were told that they had not received the radiator back from the radiator shop, but they would call when they had more news.

So, we walked into town for supper and enjoyed a good Mexican dinner at Sanchez' Mexican restaurant. En route to dinner, the motorcycle shop called and said the radiator has been repaired but the epoxy they used to repair a split in a cooling tube would need to cure overnight. They will reinstall it in the morning.

We enjoyed a couple of adult beverages in town and called it a night. Tomorrow, we will be anxious to get underway.

Here are a few pictctures: