Bicycle Alaska 2008: Introduction

BICYCLE ALASKA, 2008

by

John Berry


INTRODUCTION:

There are always many reasons why one attempts a strenuous journey or any other activity that taxes one's physical or mental abilities. In the extreme it can be to prove that the thing is possible: more often it is merely to prove that you yourself can do it. It can be to create space away from people and mundane worries to meet a spiritual need. It can be because you really enjoy the activity, or because one needs to live "on the edge". It may be that you have always wanted to go to a place, or that there are people you want to visit there, and travel by air seems to spoil the point of a journey, which is largely in the going. The project in question may also be part of a larger, longer term, project. In the case of a long bicycle tour, it may also be that you want to save money, though I think that touring by bicycle is not really cheaper than doing the same journey by car. What you save in gasoline you spend on huge meals and for accommodation.

All these reasons apply to my tour of Alaska and the Yukon this summer: my brother Ted lives in Alaska, as does my best friend in the Geology program at the University of Pennsylvania, Milt Wiltse. Ever since I passed through the State on my way to Ice Island T-3 in 1963 I have wanted to see more of Alaska, and ever since I read the poems of Robert Service and "The call of the Wild" by Jack London I have wanted to see what the Yukon really looked like. Also, this is the second leg of my bicycle journey across the entire accessible continent of North America.

Therefore I prefer to think of this summer's adventure not as a long bicycle tour, but as a tour of Alaska and the Yukon by the best means available, including aeroplanes and the Alaska Marine Highway (ferries), as well as standard gauge and narrow-gauge railway lines, followed by a bicycle journey home. Incidentally, during the latter I crossed the only two Canadian provinces that I had not previously traveled in, as well as briefly visiting the only American state that I had not yet seen – North Dakota. An overview of my route is shown on the map below

There are seven installments in this account. At the moment (15 Sept, 2008), Sections 3 and 7 have no content. Section 3 will detail my visits to Barrow and Bethel by air, as well as the train trip from Fairbanks to Anchorage, and Section 7 covers the trip southwards from Winnipeg to Austin.

I have tried to write for both my friends at home and for my fellow cyclists. For the accounts of some of the latter see:

http://members.tripod.com/gohike/bikeak.html: describes a trip made by Dave Brock in 1987.
http://crl.ucsd.edu/~buff/alaska/: photos by as guy called Bob from a supported 1998 trip.
http://alaskabikeblog.blogspot.com/: blog by Tim, a year-round Anchorage biker. Lots of links.
http://www.cyclingaroundtheworld.nl/alaska/ie_alaska.htm this is an information site with links to many others.

For this reason I do not describe just the road and the events of the road, but also give details about the things that interested me: the geology, industry, history, the people that I met, and as much about the vegetation as I am competent to write. Most of the research for this I have done on the web.

This is a first draft, and one section is still more-or-less exactly as I sent it by e-mail. The other sections have been expanded on and cleaned up. I am sure that some passages will be tedious to many people, and that I will sound by turns pompous and wimpy, depending on whether I am spouting science or complaining about the weather. However, I hope that my readers will get a feel for what it is like to cross a continent by bicycle, and perhaps also a feel for the variety of landscapes and people along the way.

Figure 1: My bicycle journeys across North America. 2008 trip in red.




Compared with my trip north from Texas to Labrador four years ago through the eastern part of the continent, this trip involved more mountainous terrain and was shorter (5,000 miles vs 6,300 miles) and more hurried (105 days vs 154 days). On that trip my average daily ride was 63 miles; on this trip it was 74 miles, representing an additional hour of actual pedaling each day. On the last trip I rode every inch of the way, even though I embroidered the main thread with some loops in hired cars when the weather was unpleasant. During this trip I accepted or cadged several lifts for a variety of reasons: my health (I am now 67 years old and suffer from Atrial Fibrillation), mechanical problems with the bicycle, or dangerous road conditions. All of these were enhanced by the fact that I had a fairly tight deadline, so that waiting out an episode of "A. Fib." or waiting for bicycle parts did not seem like smart options. However, on this trip I made no loops by car but did use trains for three very pleasant stages in Alaska. Both journeys involved extensive voyages by ferry, because along the intricate coastlines at both glaciated extremities of the continent there are many communities and places of interest on peninsulas and islands that can only be reached by sea. These ferry trips were some of the best parts of each trip, in terms of the scenery, the wildlife seen, and the fun and interesting people I met.

The statistics of this summer's trip are summarized in the table below:
.......................................................Miles .....Kilometers

Total Distance Ridden ...............5018 .......8030
Days on Bicycle ...............................68
Average Daily Mileage ...................74 ...........118
Longest Day's Ride (July 25th) ..113 ...........181

Total Nights ..........................Number .........% of total
.....Under Canvas ......................38................. 36%
.....Hotels/Motels .....................36................. 34%
.....In Hostels............................. 16................. 15%
.....With friends and relatives. 15 .................14%

Tires and Parts Replaced: Number

Number of Punctures: ................3
No. of tires replaced:.................. 3
Other parts replaced: Rear Wheel
.........................................Front derailleur

Bicycle Alaska 2008: Instalment 4

BICYCLE ALASKA, 2008

by

John Berry


Instalment 4: Fairbanks, AK, to Dawson Creek, BC

Dear Friends and Family: This will be very brief. The last messages were sent out while I was staying with my brother Ted and his wife Pam in Bethel, Alaska. We had a wonderful time together for a week, and then I flew back to Anchorage and rode down the Kenai Peninsula to the very end, at Homer. I spent one night freezing on top of a pass, at an abandoned state campground 1 mile short of the real one. Then had two flat tyres the next day. I had to hitch- hike one 20-mile section of the road as there was very heavy holiday traffic and no shoulders on a two-lane winding road. At Soldotna I heard Hobo Joe, the reigning monarch ofAlaskan Country music, perform, and at Ninilchik I attended Saturday evening service at a beautiful Russian Orthodox Church. The Priest and most of the confgregatiuon were Native Americans. From Homer I took the ferry to Kodiak and back, seeing many Humpback Whales and Sea Otters on the way. This is a very pretty trip, and Kodiak Island would be worth a longer visit. I returned to Portage, near Anchorage, on a little bus, and then got a lift through the rail/road tunnel to Whittier. This is a very unique town: 90% of the population live in one big block of flats, and the other 10% live in another smaller block. There are many more businesses than residences. From Whittier the ferry goes to Valdez, making an excursion through a field of icebergs to look at the toe of the Columbia Glacier on the way. This was beautiful, in spite of cold and dull weather. At Whittier I met a young Dutch couple on bikes, and we stayed in the same campground at Valdez. They left early in the morning but I toured the Museums and tried to get the forks of my bike tightened. I then cycled over the pass out of Valdez (2720 feet high) and again met the Dutch couple at a campground, along with two young Americans going to Valdez. The Dutch couple and I stayed together until after Glennallen, where they went straight on to Denali and I turned right for Tok. At Mentasta Lake Lodge I woke up to pouring rain and discovered that there was a bus into Tok, so I took it, knowing that I was going to have to hitch-hike tothe Canadian border. At Tok a gold-mining couple named Brooks offered me a lift to Chicken, the road to which is very steep and winding and partially unpaved. After a night in Chicken a Swiss couple offered me a lift to the border. From the border I cycled the Top Of The World Highway to Dawson City. This was the high-point and the low-point of the trip so far. On the one hand I was high, about 4500 feet above sea level, and enjoying beautiful views in all directions across the treeless tundra. On the other hand the road, shown as blacktop on all maps, had mostly been torn up, and was in fact gravel of varying depths. Then, about half-way through the 65 mile ride, it was clear I was going to be caught in rain. Make that lightning and thunder and VERY heavy rain. Nowhere to shelter, nowhere to lean the bike (no trees), nowhere to stop, and lightning all around. I cycled on through mud and fog and rain and dark, noticing at one point a new forest fire (by this time I was out of the tundra) off on my right. By the time I got to Dawson I was one big mud-lump and so was the bike. My last pair of shorts had torn and was flapping forlornly down my leg, my hands were yet again frozen and I was hypothermic. Adding to my troubles at the end I had to stand and wait for half an hour for the ferry to cross the Yukon River to take me into town. Before I could get a shower I had to hose the bicycle and all my panniers, as well as myself, off with a garden hose. I took the bike to Circle Cycle next day and found that my forks, a worry since the beginning of the trip, were easily fixed, but that the grit from the previous day, added to normal wear and tear, had scalloped out the rim of my rear wheel: Tim recommended having one built in Whitehorse while I wason my way there. Also, we found that my speedometer/odometer was not working, because the sensor head had filled with water. After a day and a half in Dawson I set off for Whitehorse. The first night I spent at Beaver Creek, where I met a very interesting group of geologists. The next night was at Pelly Crossing, a very dirty campground patrolled by an Arctic Fox. There I met Hiro, a Japanese cyclist also headed toward Whitehorse, a German cyclist headed up the Dempster Highway to Inuvik, and an Australian/Swiss couple headed in the opposite direction. In the middle of the night either the fox or a porcupine ate the leather handle of my rear pannier, and I didn't get this fixed until Fort St. John. The next day I had bad A. Fib., but still managed to get close to Carmacks. However, I was offered a lift by a couple from Ontario who were at a lay-by talking to Hiro when I rode up in bad shape. They dropped me at Carmacks but also offered to take me into Whitehorse next morning if I needed it. Next morning I woke with very prominent heart beats, still feeling"woosy", and also realized that if they gave me a lift I would be in Whitehorse in time to pick up the rear wheel and medications that Ingrid had sent to me at General Delivery before Canada Day, so that is what I did. Spent Canada Day as a rest day in Whitehorse at the "Jekyll on Hyde" hostel, which was full of people who had just completed the "Yukon Challenge" canoe race from Whitehorse to Dawson. An interesting, very international, group. Left for Watson Lake on the 2nd July, and had an uneventful though strenuous trip, meeting with a young lady who was headed down the Cassiar Highway, and also with another crew of geologists. Much rain on this leg, and attended the Anglican Church in Watson Lake soaking wet. Further uneventful riding down to Liard Hot Springs, which are a wonderful oasis of sybaritic pleasure in the wilderness, and which have wonderful scenery around them. After Liard Hot Springs the road crosses the Northern Rockies, and there are six very steep and long hills. I did the first and second of these, arriving at Muncho Lake just as some very violent weather hit. By this point I was feeling beat and beginning to realize that I would have trouble getting back to Austin in time unless I speeded things up. The next morning, when Jim MacGregor, an Alaska Highway employee, offered me a lift in his pickup to Steamboat Summit, about 80 miles away, I accepted. We passed through some sections of highway that would have been very difficult for me, and I was able to relax and enjoy the magnificent scenery! From Steamboat I cruised into Ft. Nelson, where I had another drug shipment (this one my heart medicine) awaiting me, and then cruised right out for Fort St.John. This section was again strenuous riding, since Fort Nelson is the lowest point on the highway, and Trutch Summit, some 70 miles south, the second highest. However, I managed all the big hills, and spent one more night in the bush. At Wonowon, with Fort St. John almost in sight, I found that my chain was damaged. Since this was at noon on Saturday, I decided to ask for a lift the last 30 miles into Fort. John so that I could get it fixed before the weekend. Ferris Fast cycles did an excellent job, and I bought a new chain there just in case: an irony since I had sent home my spare chain from Fort Nelson because the chain on the bike had been new in Whitehorse and I had assumed that I would not need to change it again - a spare chain is a heavy object to lug around! The last major obstacle on the Alaska Highway is Taylor Grade, a few miles south of Fort St. John. The Peace River here flows through fairly flat country but is deeply incised below it. The grade reaches 10% in places, and I knew that even pushing the bike up it would be a huge effort. An old German chap at the Visitor Center in Taylor offered me a lift, and I took it. From the top it was a relatively easy day into Dawson Creek, mile zero of the Alaska Highway. This morning is a wet morning, apparently long needed, in Dawson Creek. It sounds as if most of this trip was hitch-hiking, but I actually have ridden all but about 150 miles of the Alaska Highway (3 lifts) and all but about 70 miles of the Klondyke Highway (1 lift). The other lifts were to avoid unpaved sections of the highway from Tok to Chicken and the Canadian Border. At my age I have no shame in accepting help! I am also aware that I am behind schedule, and will probably have to take a bus (or other form of transport) for about 300 miles in order to be back in Austin before the end of August, unless everything goes perfectly and all winds are favorable. Hope that all of you are having a good summer.
John