Day 16 Whitehorse to 90 miles east of Whitehorse

July 7, 2014
60 miles

The moral for today is: Always eat enough food.

I skimped on breakfast and had to stop for lunch after only 12 miles of riding. I Then ate almost all my snacks, which were supposed to last for 3-4 days. I should not have made fun of Nick for buying what I thought was too many snacks in Whitehorse.

I made a promise to never ever deny myself food. I will not be ashamed to eat 2,000 calories in one sitting.

People:
We met Tony, who is traveling to the guy we stayed with from Warm Showers. Since we knew he was coming our way, we freaked him out by calling out his name when we saw him approaching. He's from Victoria, Brittish Colombia, so if we go through there we will call him to meet up later. Right now it's not on our route, but maybe we will detour.

A woman from an RV also came up to us while we were getting water and snacks at an RV park. She seemed either crazy or drunk, and because she is from Wisconsin I must conclude that she is both. She found out we were from the surrounding states, and started talking about the Lions and the Vikings. Instead of seeing her situation as futile and just shutting up about Wisconsin and the Packers for one moment, she instead became even louder and more boastful. I could not care less about football but she was fulfilling the worst stereotypes I have about people from 'sconny, so I told her that Rogers will come around and end up with the Vikings, just like Favre. That really got her going.


It's beautiful out here.



We're also a ways from any towns or services.

That's kilometers. 10 km = 6.4 miles

Day 15 To Whitehorse

July 6, 2016

50ish miles

Good morning from outside of Whitehorse!

Once again our big city plans were foiled by people who are remembering the Sabbath and keeping it holy. Today is a Sunday, the bike shop is closed, so I will have to make do with my ill-fitting chain for another..... who knows how many miles?

But I did get a new rainjacket! So now I am ecxited for some rain. I can't believe we made it all the way from Tok to Whitehorse without getting rained on while riding. 

People:

Grocery Store Cuties:

It's been too long since I've talked to an attractive woman.... some of you may know how ugly that can be. 

At a grocery store, two women came up to me and asked if they could "geek out over" our touring bikes. They started talking about how they were thinking about doing a tour, and I don't really remember much else other than not being able to form a coherent response to what they were saying other than "Yeah, it's fun."

I was happy when they went away.

Warm Showers Host:

We made plans to stay with a guy from Warm Showers. It was our first time using the website to find a host, and I am glad we did. Our host was a very interesting dude. He's been touring in the Yucatan, the Phillipines, Morocco, and does all sorts of cross country skiing tours. We stayed in his canvas tent bunkhouse and guesthouse/sauna that overlook the lake.He homesteaded the place in the 60's and designed the buildings himself and built them with some help. It was really cool.

And he had a dog.

Double duty bunk house/sauna

The canvas walled bunkhouse:

Got to wake up to this the next morning:

I was also relieved to see a man over 60 still going out and doing adventures because now I know I don't have to do everything before I'm 30. You just have to know what you want and then go and make it happen. 

Day 14: between Haines Jct and Whitehorse

July 5, 2014
55.8 miles
4:17 ride time

When it rains, we sleep in. So we slept in.

Our campsite is on the old highway that is beside the new highway. It is overgrown with moss and plants now, and is a little creepy but really fun. We rode down it for a little bit, but bear danger and the slow pace forced us to the main highway.

We avoided yesterday's rain by staying at the bakery, and we managed to stay dry today as well by sleeping in. So far I have been lucky without my rain jacket.

People:
Two Canadians, Enam and Julia are on their first tour through the Yukon. We asked if they saw Shawn, and they have! So we are pleased to know Shawn is alive and making progress.

We met our first Americans! Two middle aged Alaskan men are making their way back home. Why don't more Americans do this type of thing?

The ride: 
Very little water on this stretch of road. Only small streams, so if you take this route, take advantage of the streams as frequently as possible. Like at this culvert:

50k to Whitehorse! Easy day tomorrow.

Day 13 Kluane Lake to Haines Junction

July 4, 2014
78 miles
6:52 ride time

Woke up at 5:00 am to clouds rolling over the tops of the mountains and then evaporating. Were on the road by 7:00 to help us get a long day of riding in.

People:
Two Austrians are putting in 200-230 kilometer days on their trip from Anchorage to Calgary. That's like 120-140 mile days. They have 3 weeks to make it to Calgary, and I don't know if that's total, or from today. At any rate, I was impressed. They ride race road bikes and are packed ultra light. Good luck!

We also met a man riding from Chicago to Anchorage. He had an unusal accent, so I'm not sure if he is actually from Chicago or some other country. Who knows?

The ride:
We had some fun fun downhills. We rode for 7 miles without pedaling, and rarely going under 20 mph, which is a good speed for bikes, especially fully loaded. 45.8 mps is also a good speed (lower left corner of computer)

On one section of downhill we saw Shawn's beanie hat. We wonder: Did it fly off from the wind going downhill? Did he get killed or mangled? Or could he not bear the weight of his hat and threw it on the ground?

The scenery is great, and we are happy to have long, gentle descents through the mountain valleys.

Places:
We stopped at a bakery in Haines Junction, which is one of hte only food places between destruction bay and Whitehorse. They had delicious bread, so I at a loaf and bought two more. All day I had been imagining that the mountains were a chocolate ice cream sunday with white chocolate and coconut drizzled over the top. So I couldn't resist buying one when I saw Nick's bowl of ice cream. It was perfect.

Haines Junction is a neat place, with music events and the like happening.

We also had our first flat tire of the trip. Not bad.

Day 12: to Destruction Bay (Kluane Lake)

July 3, 2014
56 miles
4:45 ride time

Today was the day of bears!

We saw 3 grizzly bears in a span of less than 2 hours of riding.

First one we saw was about 50 meters away, munching on some plants on the near side of the road. Nick got a couple pictures, but we didn't stick around long. As we biked away, he looked up at us and we locked eyes.

Second bear was munching on something very large and brown. Perhaps a fallen tree or a dead moose? I don't know enough about bear diets and we didn't stop to look closely.

Third bear was about 200-300 meters away eating dandelions in the ditch, dangerously close to the road. One man coming hte opposite direction stoped to warn us. Then he offered to scare it away, so he drove back and honked at the bear, but it didn't move. It just sat there contentedly munching away.

He drove back and said flatly, "That's one hungry bitch. You boys have bear spray?"  Yes. "You need a shotgun." He was a man of few words.

I figured if all the bear wanted to do was eat, it wasn't going to bother two cyclists passing by. So when the bear went to the far side of the ditch, we went for it. We gained a whopping 15 mph and slowly, but with much effort, passed the grizzly in the grass.

We made it.

We camped at a boat landing on Kluane Lake. It's a gorgeous lake nestled between mountains. It's like living in a postcard. And the lake goes on forever, we've been cycling by it for maybe 10-15 miles and aren't even half way around it.

I have no pictures from today, sorry. My camera is dead and I haven't gotten the pictures from Nick.

Day 11: Koidern to Kluane Ranges

July 2, 2014

Goodmorning from the Yukon!

There is never a dull moment riding with Shawn. Here's a small, small, sampling of the things he did:

• Rode on the left side of the road so he could see bad drivers coming at him and jump off if he needed to (We made him ride on the right side while with us, for the safety of everyone on the road)
• Left his helmet on the side of the road to save weight.
• Replace his belt with a piece of string to save weight.
• Carried almost exclusively canned foods: Ravioli, Spaghetti-Os, and the like, despite his obsession with being light weight. For those of you who don't know, canned food is super heavy to backpack or bike pack with. 
• Threw the lid to an opened can of ravioli into the bushes. (I got angry and made him give it to me so I could throw it away.

And that brings me to our free spirited moment of the trip: Skinny dipping in the Yukon! Haven't missed a state/territory for skinny dipping yet. We will see how far this trend lasts.

Check out the backdrop on this swimming hole:

 And while we were skinny dipping, RVs passed on the bridge overhead, but they couldn't see down. But one RV pulled over, and a couple got out. I have to stress how improbable it is for an RV to stop. There isn't a lot of traffic up here, maybe a couple cars each minute. And there aren't a lot of places they ever stop, and certainly not at this random river in the middle of nowhere where there are plenty of other random rivers to choose from. But this couple happened to stop at this river, at this particular moment while we are splashing around, naked, in the water.

Fortunately it's the Yukon, and nobody cares. Remember: there aren't any laws up here.

Nick and I got dressed on the banks where we left our clothes like normal people. Shawn, on the other hand, chose to undress himself at the top of the bridge on the opposite side of the river from where we swam. Meaning, he had to get out of the water, climb up some challenging boulders, past some thorny bushes, step over the guard rail, and then walk across the bridge, all while naked, and all while an elderly coulple pretended not to notice while they looked away, just to put his clothes on.

The couple started talking to me and Nick while Shawn dressed himself. Turns out they are from Alaska, and came to the river to pan for gold.  Who knew the river we decided to swim in also had gold?

When we stopped to set up camp that night, Shawn decided that he would keep on going. Oh to be young and have that youthful vitality that lets you keep on going and going.

And so while Nick and I sat down to heat up some water, Shawn, in his own idiosyncratic way, walked into the setting sun, uphill, pushing his bike as he went along.



Oh yeah, we also reached 500 miles!

Some pictures:

Day 10 Deadman Lake to Canada

July 1


HAPPY CANADA DAY! And we got to spend it entering Canada with a Canadian. What more could you ask for?




Interesting things:
Talked to Steve from Anchorage, who was photographing and birding in Tetlin National Wildlife Refuge, where we camped. He gave us some good advice, and made me more excited to go on the Cassiar Highway through Canada.

Good morning from Tetlin National Wildlife Refuge!

As we approached Canada, Nick wanted to stop at the restaurant/store just before the border. It was a good thing because we converged on 3 separate adventurists at the cafe.

Steve
Steve is a German who is suddenly freed from the burdens of having a child at home, and is taking advantage of his time to bike across the Yukon and Alaska.

Cho
Cho is from Japan, and he is pulling a cart across Canada and Alaska. He said something about Dawson, and is heading North. I'm not sure if he started in Dawson Creek, or is ending in Dawson, Alaska, but he's going a long ways for sure. And he is hiking in a pair of Nike dunks. Way to go, Cho! He doesn't speak much English, so I'm not too sure what his full story is. But he is clearly in good spirits and excited about his trip.

Steve is on left, Cho is on right in this picture.





Shawn
Shawn is a Canadian traveling from Fairbanks, AK to Newfoundland, Canada. We will be travling with him until Whitehorse. More on him later, he is a fun character.






While we were stopped a tour bus of people came and checked out our bikes. They took pictures, and at one point one of them asked Steve about them. It didn't take long before Steve realized they were Swiss, and so he started talking in German. Suddenly the small crowd grew to a large crowd as everyone on the bus circled around us listening to Steve explain what each of us were doing. I didn't understand a word that was said. They gave some thumbs up to us, and especially to Cho. It was surreal.

But we made it into the Yukon! Happy day!

Our joy at making it through customs was short lived. Two miles after passing through customs, I realized I didn't have my shoes. They had fallen off my bike when I unstrapped my bags at customs to take out my passport. So I went back and found them in the road. Then,  during a sudden downpour, I realized that I did not have my brand new, super nice rain jacket that I had waited so long to find because it was perfect. Although I am not usualy the most material person, I have to say that I did love that jacket. I thought it was just on the other side of customs, like my shoes had been. So I got the officials to let me walk around hte building searching for my jacket. I searched to no avail.

When I got back to the store (see picture below) where Shawn and Nick were waiting, they had watermelon. Some woman bought a bucket, but only wanted a few slices or something like that so she gave the rest to us. There was a lot. It helped to numb the pain of losing my jacket. With 700 miles until the next sporting goods store, it's more than sentimentality that is the problem: with the weather we've been having I could be in for a great deal of discomfort if it keeps raining like it has.

We got to talking, and as fate would have it, Shawn had seen my jacket. Some woman had found it on the side of the road and picked it up. While driving north, she saw Shawn and asked if he lost/needed a jacket, to which he said, "No." So the mystery is solved, and my jacket is now in the hands of some woman who really doesn't need it because she has a car, which she can comfortably ride to her house, and in all that time she likely won't be exposed to rain for more than 10-20  seconds as he walks between the two.

But, really, the watermelon helped, and I'm happy to be in Canada.

Sorry about the sideways pictures, I should not have bought a chromebook. It can't do anything useful. I'll figure it out.