Wednesday, September 23, 2009

25 August 2009, Fairbanks, Alaska
















I got up about 8:00 a.m. because I worked on my blog half the night. I looked outside and it was another dreary day with no rain. I showered, packed my bags, loaded my motorcycle and adjusted the chain. I about fell over dead when I started my motorcycle. Matilda woke up like it was another day on the job! I checked all her functions and everything was working. Imagine that! Matilda is truly a mysterious woman. I then went and did a little souvenir shopping. I was hoping to buy a Harley-Davidson t-shirt. It was the end of the season and all they had left were smalls. I needed a medium to have it fit right. I walked around to a few other stores but found nothing of interest. I was in Dawson City in 1995 with my 1989 Harley-Davidson Softail Standard. Mostly all the roads were paved and pretty much looked like a small rural town. When I drove in from the Dempster Highway I didn’t really recognize anything. The city had a face lift. All the buildings were repaired, fixed up and painted to look like they were out of the early 1900’s. The only paint colors allowed were the colors used in that timeframe. The blacktop was removed from all the streets and left as dirt/gravel. Sidewalks were removed and replaced with boardwalks. If you ask the town people, they say the tourists really love the look. Of course they never fail to say it’s really dusty during the summer. The only building I recognized was Diamond Tooth Gerties. I went back to the hotel, ate breakfast and checked out. I went back to my room and put on all my riding gear. I rode around the city taking some pictures of different buildings and found the ferry landing. Then I oiled my chain, gassed up and got ready to leave. I was just driving out of town when I drove past two guys I waved at up on the Dempster Highway. I stopped and talked with them a while and got their take on driving the Dempster. They said they wanted to drive up to Inuvik but didn’t want to get caught in the rain. The only had street tires on their bikes and feared crashing if they were caught in the rain. So they only drove up to the Arctic Circle. One guy drove a BMW 650cc Dakar and the other had KTM 1000cc. Both motorcycles were dual purpose bikes. As we were talking the guy that took my picture at the Arctic Circle sign walked up and said hi. He was the French speaking Canadian. He said his photography is only a hobby and that he may sell six pictures a year, which is hardly enough to live on. He asked if he could get a group picture of us three and everyone agreed. We all had to get going so we shook hands and departed. I drove down to the ferry and waited a few minutes before driving on. I took a few pictures while on board, then I drove off and took a few more. I zipped up and started driving toward the Yukon and Alaska Boundary driving the Top of the World Highway (Hwy 5). It would have been more scenic if it hadn’t been raining. I arrived at the border and the Customs Agent came out and asked me if was carrying any guns, narcotics, or contraband etc. I said no and he asked for my passport. As I was digging for it I asked him if he had a roof I could stand under so when I unzipped everything wouldn’t get wet. He said no and that he also had to stand in the rain. He also mentioned yesterday it was raining harder than today, so stop complaining. He went and ran my passport, stamped it, gave it back and said I could go. I asked him if I could put myself back together under the roof of a nearby building. He said yes. I went and buttoned myself up out of the rain and left. It sure was bloody cold. As soon as I was a mile/2 kilometers from the border it stopped raining and the sun came out. I drove until I came to the small town of Chicken. I pulled in and headed for the restaurant. This four building town hasn’t changed much since 1995 when I was here last. I ordered a chili dog with American fries. It all was served in a plastic gold panning dish; a huge helping and I was hungry enough to eat it all and a piece of blueberry pie with ice cream on top of it. A tour bus came in with about 40 retired people looking for ice cream and pie. Marvin, a gentleman from Naperville, Illinois sat down with me and told me about their tour from Prince Rupert, up the coast on a ferry, then on a tour bus to the Yukon Territory, to Fairbanks, Alaska. The whole tour takes an airplane ride over the Arctic Circle and then flies out of Anchorage, Alaska to their homes. I was getting ready to leave and it started raining again. I was going to take pictures but couldn’t because of the rain. I was unhappy about this. So off into the rain I go and one mile/two kilometers down the road it stops and the sun comes out. I continue driving the Taylor Highway (Hwy 9) to the Alaskan Hwy. I then turn north to Tok where I got gas and then stopped again in Delta Junction, the end of the Alaskan Hwy. I took a picture of my motorcycle at the sign post and gassed up again. I drove the last 100 miles/161 kilometers in the dark which I don’t like to do but I wanted to get to Fairbanks, Alaska for the night. Matilda showed the way to the Alaskan Hotel where I stayed. The Asian lady running the hotel was kind of funny. I told her I lost my glove from my motorcycle at the front door and didn’t know where it was. So we both went outside to find it. It fell between the stairway and the building behind some bushes. She crawled under the stairs and retrieved it for me. Two ladies walking by asked her what she was doing under the stairs in the middle of the night. They told her it’s too late to be gardening. I got my motorcycle put up for the night and I crashed. It was after 11:00 p.m. and I was beat to death by the rain and the cold.

No comments:

Post a Comment