I've wanted to go to Alaska for years. When I was a kid my Dad would load Mom, myself, and a friend of mine into his blue pick-up with over sized camper, and we would drive all over the western United States. At first the trips were just week long reconnaissance missions of the California, Oregon coast; we were living in L.A. and Dad wanted to move. Then later he started taking two weeks, and the drives got very long, as a teenager it was two weeks of sleeping. But Alaska was the place Dad really wanted to see. I remember him studying maps with a magnifying glass and comparing campground books by lamp light sitting in "His" chair. Unfortunately as the years went by my dad's once passable driving got to be pretty scary, and there was no way in hell mom was driving to Alaska with him, and so the dream ended. As far as why I wanted to see Alaska, that's easy. Alaska is a vast empty region of immense landscapes, it is a place that challenges our perceptions of our very significance. And why ride a motorcycle to Alaska? If you want to see Alaska then drive your car, truck, motor-home. But if you want to experience Alaska, its changes of mood, temperature, and smells, then ride a motorcycle.
The first five days of riding are just hot. When I make it to Bend,
Or that first day its hovering around a hundred degrees. My friends Dean, and Yumiko are there visiting Dean's mother Doris. I get a swim in a pool, a barbecue, and a good bed to sleep in. All the comfort and good company are hard to leave the next day, but I've got a ton of miles to cover and am starting to feel the pull.
From Bend I head north up Hwy. 97, I planned on staying the night somewhere along the Columbia river but when I get there I'm so disgusted that I pass right through, and keep riding north. I've spent a good portion of my life in river canyons, and have seen dams, and the man made infrastructure used to move electricity, but nothing I've seen could prepare me for this crime. At Biggs, where I cross, the river is bisected by 97, and paralleled on the south bank by Hwy. 84. At the intersection there is a truck stop with mini marts, fast food, and a few rundown hotels. It's blazing hot, and the place is jammed with trucks and cars vying for fuel and a slurpy. On the north side of the river are railroad tracks, and above that is the Lewis and Clark Hwy. It's like naming the reservoir behind Glen Canyon Dam, Lake Powell. And above the highway, along the rim is dozens and dozens of wind turbans. At the bottom of all of this lays the impounded waters of the Columbia, barely moving between the John Day dam, and the Dalles. The body of water between the two dams is called Lake Celilo. A reservoir that buried the falls it is named for, and a once thriving fishing village. I get fuel but no slurpy, cross the bridge to the north and continue. Maybe only twenty-five miles further and the highway starts to ascend into the pines, the temperature cools, and I come across an oases with just what I'm in need of, coffee. While I'm there enjoying an iced mocha and a piece of baklava, I remember a scene from a family trip. We are driving along a highway in Oregon that my dad really liked because of the thick forest that bordered both sides of the road. We had driven this stretch the year before, but now something was wrong. Dad kept peering left and right, then right again. Then with no announcement he pulled off the road into a turn out, got out of the truck, and walked back into the forest, I followed him. We walked through a thirty yard band of trees and then entered a clear cut. For as far as we could see the forest was gone, stripped. In its place was the tracks of machines, and the piles of discarded tree branches. Dad didn't say anything, he just stood staring for a fair amount of time at the destruction, then turned, and we walked in silence back to the truck. I know now how he felt. Later that afternoon I make it to Yakima. The temperature on a bank reads 102 degrees.
The next day I cross into Canada and am rewarded with some comic relief.
"Passport."
"Yep here you go."
"Take off your helmet."
"Where are you going."
"Well through Canada, the Yukon, and then into Alaska."
"Do you have any firearms, or bear repellent."
"No."
"Do you have any fruits or produce."
"Nope."
"Your sure you don't have a gun."
"Err no gun."
"Where are you from."
"Reno, Nevada."
"Do you own a gun."
"No"
"YOU DON'T OWN A GUN."
"Nope"
"Okay, pull into lane three, leave room for others to pull in behind you, and give your passport to the officer inside. NEXT."
Huh, well that went well. Thirty minutes later I'm given the okay and set free in Canada. It's hot, windy and I still have over two hundred miles to go, but I'm north of the border and the trip is starting to feel real.
The next day, my fourth, is another day of what I would call utility riding. For sure the scenery above Cache Creek, BC is beautiful. A broad open agrarian landscape with a hint of the mountains that await me further north, but my first goal of the trip is one more day away.
On day five I make it to the junction of the 16 and 37, the Cassiar, Hwy. and turn north. Immediately there is a change in how the road feels, its much more narrow, and there is a sign about entering grizzly bear habitat. The next ninety-eight miles to the Stewart cut-off are thrilling. The mountains have grown, and there is no doubt that even though I'm traveling on a highway, I have entered a wilderness. Step off the road to the west and you would cross the Coast Mountains. But leave the road to the east and you will not hit another road for hundreds of miles. Between Hwy. 37 and Hwy. 97, the Alaska Highway, is the Skeena Mountains, the Stikine Ranges, and the Omineca Mountains, along with untold numbers of rivers. When I make the left to the small communities of Stewart and Hyder I have to stop just to slow my emotions down. I'm grinning from ear to ear and laughing in my helmet. I ride the thirty-eight miles to Stewart slowly. The air is cool, but not cold, and though it's windy it doesn't seem to have any strength to it. I pass the Bear Glacier then enter a narrow ravine with signs that say Avalanche Zone, No Stopping Any Time. I crane my head around to the left, above me is a huge gash in the mountain and at the top of it is a hanging glacier with a hundred foot face of ice that leans out over the gash. Anything that falls from that will certainly smash the road I'm on. I speed up. Once in Stewart I get a room then head back out to explore and to see the Fjord, The Portland Canal.
From Bend I head north up Hwy. 97, I planned on staying the night somewhere along the Columbia river but when I get there I'm so disgusted that I pass right through, and keep riding north. I've spent a good portion of my life in river canyons, and have seen dams, and the man made infrastructure used to move electricity, but nothing I've seen could prepare me for this crime. At Biggs, where I cross, the river is bisected by 97, and paralleled on the south bank by Hwy. 84. At the intersection there is a truck stop with mini marts, fast food, and a few rundown hotels. It's blazing hot, and the place is jammed with trucks and cars vying for fuel and a slurpy. On the north side of the river are railroad tracks, and above that is the Lewis and Clark Hwy. It's like naming the reservoir behind Glen Canyon Dam, Lake Powell. And above the highway, along the rim is dozens and dozens of wind turbans. At the bottom of all of this lays the impounded waters of the Columbia, barely moving between the John Day dam, and the Dalles. The body of water between the two dams is called Lake Celilo. A reservoir that buried the falls it is named for, and a once thriving fishing village. I get fuel but no slurpy, cross the bridge to the north and continue. Maybe only twenty-five miles further and the highway starts to ascend into the pines, the temperature cools, and I come across an oases with just what I'm in need of, coffee. While I'm there enjoying an iced mocha and a piece of baklava, I remember a scene from a family trip. We are driving along a highway in Oregon that my dad really liked because of the thick forest that bordered both sides of the road. We had driven this stretch the year before, but now something was wrong. Dad kept peering left and right, then right again. Then with no announcement he pulled off the road into a turn out, got out of the truck, and walked back into the forest, I followed him. We walked through a thirty yard band of trees and then entered a clear cut. For as far as we could see the forest was gone, stripped. In its place was the tracks of machines, and the piles of discarded tree branches. Dad didn't say anything, he just stood staring for a fair amount of time at the destruction, then turned, and we walked in silence back to the truck. I know now how he felt. Later that afternoon I make it to Yakima. The temperature on a bank reads 102 degrees.
The next day I cross into Canada and am rewarded with some comic relief."Passport."
"Yep here you go."
"Take off your helmet."
"Where are you going."
"Well through Canada, the Yukon, and then into Alaska."
"Do you have any firearms, or bear repellent."
"No."
"Do you have any fruits or produce.""Nope."
"Your sure you don't have a gun."
"Err no gun."
"Where are you from."
"Reno, Nevada."
"Do you own a gun."
"No"
"YOU DON'T OWN A GUN."
"Nope"
"Okay, pull into lane three, leave room for others to pull in behind you, and give your passport to the officer inside. NEXT."
Huh, well that went well. Thirty minutes later I'm given the okay and set free in Canada. It's hot, windy and I still have over two hundred miles to go, but I'm north of the border and the trip is starting to feel real.
The next day, my fourth, is another day of what I would call utility riding. For sure the scenery above Cache Creek, BC is beautiful. A broad open agrarian landscape with a hint of the mountains that await me further north, but my first goal of the trip is one more day away.
 |
| Bear Glacier |
On day five I make it to the junction of the 16 and 37, the Cassiar, Hwy. and turn north. Immediately there is a change in how the road feels, its much more narrow, and there is a sign about entering grizzly bear habitat. The next ninety-eight miles to the Stewart cut-off are thrilling. The mountains have grown, and there is no doubt that even though I'm traveling on a highway, I have entered a wilderness. Step off the road to the west and you would cross the Coast Mountains. But leave the road to the east and you will not hit another road for hundreds of miles. Between Hwy. 37 and Hwy. 97, the Alaska Highway, is the Skeena Mountains, the Stikine Ranges, and the Omineca Mountains, along with untold numbers of rivers. When I make the left to the small communities of Stewart and Hyder I have to stop just to slow my emotions down. I'm grinning from ear to ear and laughing in my helmet. I ride the thirty-eight miles to Stewart slowly. The air is cool, but not cold, and though it's windy it doesn't seem to have any strength to it. I pass the Bear Glacier then enter a narrow ravine with signs that say Avalanche Zone, No Stopping Any Time. I crane my head around to the left, above me is a huge gash in the mountain and at the top of it is a hanging glacier with a hundred foot face of ice that leans out over the gash. Anything that falls from that will certainly smash the road I'm on. I speed up. Once in Stewart I get a room then head back out to explore and to see the Fjord, The Portland Canal. |
| The Portland Canal |
