On a cloudy morning I made it to the start of world’s famous Alaska highway waiting my turn after many Winnebago's and RV’s to pass the traffic circle. Being alone I was content to just take a picture of it and film it with my helmet camera. But as luck had it, I saw approaching a man and woman and I happily handed my camera when she agreed to take pictures of me. Notice her comments on visiting Dawson City on the summer solstice day.
The scenery started to subtly change from endless plains to more entertaining hills and forested areas. Rain alternated with sunshine often. As I was riding along, music playing in my helmet from the MP3 player, I approached a motorcycle that was moving constantly but steadily at 65 mph and I started wondering how can he maintain such disciplined speed given the open road ahead of us., Mind you, the speed limits are set rather low to 90 Km/hr and sometimes 100 if I recall, but they seemed more of a suggestion because everyone was travelling at 70 or more mile per hour. I had settled in at 70 – 75 mph as I found this was a perfect cruising speed for me that also yielded economical gas mileage. This guy was riding at exact maximum speed limit permitted as marked and this intrigued me. As I approached the motorcycle I was able to read “Alaska or Bust!” on a large plate hanging on his rear luggage rack. A huge smile could be seen from a bearded face under the open helmet as I passed by, waving and smiling myself. The 600 CC Honda Shadow license plate read “Kentucky”. My heart jumped with joy at the realization that I was indeed not crazy for taking this trip alone, that there were others.
Later in the day, while having lunch in a small gas station restaurant, a gentleman riding a BMW R1200RT from Indiana had given me his well worn out Alaska Milepost large paper map along with welcome advice on places to see and routes to take once in Alaska, having just experienced it all recently in his trip from which he was returning home.This was the beginning of many interesting travelers I was going to meet along my route from here and all the way up to Alaska and back. The fact is, everyone going to or coming from Alaska travels pretty much on same routes and sooner or later you meet everyone.
The goal was to make it to Toad River, a rustic mountain lodge in the Rockies. The further I rode the better the road and scenery became. Mountains, rivers and alpine lakes were replacing the flatlands becoming now the backdrop of this epic road trip and I could not stop from admiring the scenery and enjoying the twists of the road. Evening found me close to the planned place to stop, after negotiating an exciting set of mountain twisties and passing through some more great scenery, however temperatures were hovering below 50 F, even below 40 in certain spots. Finally I arrived at Toad River Lodge finding what appeared to me a deserted settlement. There was not a soul around the gas station and in the lodge office. Of course it was past midnight although there was still plenty of light which messed up my already delayed sleep instincts. Since I could not get gas I tried to at least book a room as I wasn’t quite up to camping in the bitter cold night and I haven't seen any tents nearby either. An Indian woman came out accompanied by a barking dog in response to my yelling around to see if anyone was there. She asked me what do I want and why am I making all the noise. I explained that I need gas or a room to stay for the night. She said that gas pump will only be open in the morning and to just go pick a room that’s not already taken (hint: check door and make sure no one’s belongings were inside) and I shall pay in the morning. This video was taken around 1 AM, notice how scary the place is :) Apparently the name Toad river came from someone misspelling “Towed” which was frequent occurrence for travelers here in the past, due to bad road conditions. The misspelled word stuck and remained the actual place name, it wouldn't’ be the last one I would encounter in these northern territories.
As I had not had any food since morning and no perspective of finding anything at this hour here, I used one of my few emergency dry packs of food preparing it on my little stove. While I was eating two women showed up in a little beat up car; they both looked as if they had few drinks more and were very happy to have conversations. While this was unfolding another motorcycle approached followed closely by a Winnebago. To my surprise it was none other than the Kentucky rider I passed earlier in the day. With a 2.9 gallon tank running fumes he wasn't going anywhere further at this time I reckoned. Turns out the car was driven by a local who followed him out of courtesy in case he would completely run out of gas, then took off shortly thereafter. he was also thoroughly frozen by the temperatures I had just passed through, and without a heated vest. Since I had already occupied the last room, I agreed to allow the man to sleep on the floor on his air mattress. That would likely never happened back in New York but out here there is a totally different attitude everyone has toward each other, especially when help is needed, and it’s contagious. Robert (his name) proved later to also be a very persuasive old man in his late 60’s and demonstrated an amazing ability to strike up instant sympathy with first time acquaintances, it must be something to do with the Southern charm, I guess. To my mind, also these place’s solitude and lack of population seems to make everyone a lot more friendly and easy to approach than people normally are in urban areas of the US East coast.
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