Day 25 -130 km

     We destroyed the breakfast buffet at the hotel.  Put four cyclists in a buffet and all the food will soon be gone.  The lady who was replenishing the food at the buffet got mad at us after a while and kicked us out.

     We packed up and left Fort Nelson.  There were a lot of semi trucks in Fort Nelson because the oil and gas development industry was booming there.  There were a lot of fuel plants and tanks right outside town.

     We had sunny weather with no wind.  The road was relatively flat and the riding was easy.      

     We camped on a dirt side road in a broad grassy valley that I had located back in Anchorage using Google Street View.

     I cleaned the cooking pot with a tortilla.  This method worked well and assured that we wasted no food.  My plastic spoon-fork broke in half.  We purified water our of a culvert near our campsite.  It was a little bit brown when we drank.

     Paul was feeling a little bit sick in the evening.

My leg.

Here comes Kosuke.

I'm following Kosuke.

Kosuke says "let's go."

Blue sky.

Day 24 - 107 km

     We had several long climbs during the day that caught us by surprise.  We though we were done climbing since we had just passed Summit Lake.  However, as it turned out, the worst part was the descent.

     We near the top of a mountain and it was cold, rainy, and windy.  We had a headwind as we went downhill.  The hill was 18 km long, wet, and winding.  I was going 55 km per hour (30 mph) and rain drops were hitting my eyeballs.  With that much weight and the triler in tow, braking can be tricky.  Plus on a long hill like that too much braking can burn up your break pads.  Cars passing me going downhill made for intense moments.  The worst part was the coldness.  I wasn’t wearing my helmet; I was wearing my hat because I was cold.  My hands were so cold I had no dexterity.  Finally I reached the bottom and wrung the water out of my socks.  My shoes were waterlogged and my feet went numb.

     We came down out of the Rockies and into farmland.  As I was riding I saw a bunch of small birds sitting in the right lane of the road.  I was riding on the right shoulder.  A semi truck came from the opposite direction and I watched all the birds start to fly away but they changed direction and flew right across the path of the truck.  One bird was too slow and he got hit by the front of the truck.  Its body then hurled back and was hit by one set of the truck’s tires.  Then it was thrown into the tires on the trailer.  The body of the bird skidded 60 ft on the road and came to a stop.  It all happened right in front of me.  It was sad to watch.

     I saw another black bear and I took some pictures.  I rode with Kosuke through some farm country until we finally reached Fort Nelson.

     We stopped at the visitors center in Fort Nelson and had free coffee while we used the internet.  I contacted Russ, a CouchSurfing host in Fort Saint John who agreed to host Frantz, Kosuke, Paul and myself.

     I treated myself to chocolate milk and I ate at a local pizza shop.  Frantz and Kosuke reserved a hotel room, so they let me take a shower in their room.  Then I searched around town for a small amount of laundry detergent.  I bought a 15 pack of Keystone Light beer for $25. 

     We watched TV, did laundry, and drank beer in the hotel room.  We all enjoyed watching the TV show Man vs Food (where the host tries to eat large quantities of food) because we were all hungry so often.

A black bear.

Pizza at Fort Nelson.

The hotel room.

Day 23 - 104 km

     I woke up at 6:15 and it was cold outside.  I retrieved our food, made breakfast, purified water, cleaned the dishes, and took down the tent.  Paul said he was really cold and he didn’t help.

     We met Frantz 2 km down the road at the Toad River roadhouse and ate cinnamon rolls and used the internet.  The roadhouse had a collection of miscellaneous hats on the ceiling.  There must have been over 1,000 hats.

     We rode up to Summit Lake, the highest point on the Alaska Highway and Paul went for a swim in the lake.  A guy from New Hampshire was there and he gave us some water and granola bars.  

     We had nice weather descending from Summit Lake.  We rode about 30 km in tee-shirts with very little pedaling.

     We stopped for cinnamon rolls in the afternoon and met some people from Vancouver Island.

     Frantz suggested that we all camp at the Testa River campsite.  Kosuke was ahead of us and climbing a long hill so Paul unhooked his trailer and chased after him.  Paul caught Kosuke and told him to come back down the hill to camp.  Kosuke was sad because he had just climbed so far and had to turn around.

     The campsite wasn’t worth the $17 we paid for all of us to stay there.  The only real advantage was having access to an outhouse. 

Cleaning and lubricating my bike.

Servicing my bike.

Kosuke, Paul, and I in a cutout at Toad River.

Cinnamon roll at Toad River.

Blue sky.

Paul and a mountain.

Me and a mountain.

More hills were climbed.

Summit Lake.

Paul went for a swim.

Summit Lake.

Three Bob trailers.

Open road.

Drying out the sleeping bag.

Day 22 - 117 km

     We woke up early and started riding in good weather.  We soon got into the Northern Rocky Mountains.  We climbed hills through Muncho Lake and made it to the Toad River area.  Paul and I were both tired having stayed up late at the hot springs the previous night.

     We made camp near a gravel pit beside the highway.  As we were setting up our tents we saw two bears dart from the bushes about 40 feet from us and run into the woods.  We ate pasta for dinner and we hung our food up on a telephone pole to keep it away from bears.

Riding in the mountains.

Feeling good after Liard Hot Springs.

A lake.

Some caribou.

Striped mountains.

Crossing a river.

Strange looking mountains.

Dinner.

Hanging the food on a pole so bears can't get it.

Day 21 - 79 km

     We woke up at 6:30am and took some time to clean the grime off our bikes.

     I guessed it was less than 40^oF in the morning and we were looking forward to reaching Liard Hot Springs.  

     It was a half-day ride to the hot springs in nice weather.  We stopped at Coal River to use the internet.  Frantz met us there and we soon headed out together.  We saw a lot of buffalo.  Some buffalo held up traffic by standing in the road.  I saw a black bear about 20 feet from the road and I took a picture as I rode by. 

     We paid for a campsite at the hot springs and decided to camp there.  We went to the springs and got into the hot water.  We took turns going to the hottest end of the pool and touching a rock where the hot water came out.  We all hung out in the springs for about an hour and then we laid on the pool deck and took a nap.

     We went back to the campsite and ate dinner.  Frantz told us how he had found a nice place to camp the night before.  He had missed the rain storm that caught us and he had been given beer and smoked salmon by a guy in a motorhome where he made camp.

     We got a fire going in the campsite.  Frantz reported that there was a cute girl working in the convenience store across the road.  I went over there to check it out.  She invited me to go out to the hot springs later that night with her and a friend.  The Paul and I went to the hot springs at night and found a party scene.  Some people were lighting off fireworks in the hot springs.  It was neat and we stayed there until 2am.

We camped here out of the rain.

Going to Liard Hot Springs.

Kosuke, Frantz, Paul, and me at Liard Hot Springs.

Day 20 - 143 km

     It rained a little at night and I woke up at around 6am.  We ate breakfast and left the campsite at 8:30am.

     We met another cyclist named Paul who was touring on a Wal-Mart bicycle.  He rode the Top Of the World Highway in Alaska and Canada and by the time he was done he needed to take his bike to a shop.  They told him there was a lot that needed to be fixed so he threw the bicycle away and bought another one at Canadian Tire (similar to Wal-Mart).

     I bought a 2 lb bag of bananas that was marked down.  I also bought some dinner rolls, pastries, margarine, and brown sugar.

     This was a memorable day of riding.  It was mostly sunny and the terrain went from flat grassland to rolling hills with some spruce trees.  We stopped at a lookout place and enjoyed the scenery of mountains and a river.

     We dropped down out of the mountains and into a forested area and we noticed large anvil-shaped rain clouds in the distance.  Paul and I were almost out of water so we were looking for a water source to purify from.  

     We noticed a buffalo on the road and it started running from us.  As we rode behind it we could hear its hoofs galloping on the asphalt.  Paul spotted some water and we stopped to fill our bottles.  

     The buffalo was still in front of us when we got on our bikes with the intention of finding a campsite.  We looked behind us and the huge storm cloud we had seen earlier was close and coming straight at us.  We tried to out run the storm cloud but it caught up.  Soon it was pouring rain, lightning was cracking above our heads, and it was really cold.  I hadn’t prepared for rain so my hands were exposed.  

     We saw a sign: Fireside 14 km.  We decided to go there.  I thought we were in trouble because we were so wet and cold, it was getting late, and the rain was so heavy.  I stopped in the downpour to put on gloves and a fleece shirt.  It wasn’t pleasant but it was worth it.

     I met Paul and Kosuke at Fireside.  There was an abandoned roadside diner and motel.  We pitched our tents on the front porch under the cover of an awning and sheltered from the rain.  Kosuke and I agreed that our hands were useless.  Our grip was weak and I was unable to fasten the hooks on the tent poles when we set up the tent.

     I cooked dinner of Chinese-flavored rice, with instant rice, added salami, cheese, and dinner rolls.  The food lifted our spirits and we were ready for sleep.

     Over the course of the day there was an emotional progression from happy-go-lucky to fearful concern to gracious relief.  That made this day memorable and one of my favorite days of the entire trip.

Kosuke spilled his breakfast on the ground.

We camped here with Kosuke and Frantz.

My trailer packed.

Eating pastries.

I bought bananas.

The sign forest.

The sign forest.

I'm going to Arizona.

I'll go though Portland.

Riding along.

Paul and a mountain.

We were happy at this point.

Watch out for those rain clouds to the right.

Day 19 - 109 km

     We woke up at 6:30am and started riding at 8:30am.  The weather was mostly sunny and the terrain was mellow and made for easy riding.

     Paul and I were low on water in the morning so I took the water filter and rode ahead to purify water from a river.

     We took a break when we reached the Cassiar Highway junction.  Kosuke fed a small bird a the parking lot where we stopped.  The bird was not afraid of people and it nibbled Kosuke’s finger.

     Frantz passed us just before we reached Watson Lake and we met him at the grocery store.  We all decided to stay in a campground at Watson Lake so we bought some beer, meat, cheese, and bread and had a nice hang out session.  We did laundry and I washed my hair in a utility sink.

We camped right next to the highway.

Me at Watson Lake.

We hung out with a bird.

Passing the junction to the Cassiar Highway.

Kosuke on a bridge.

Entering Watson Lake.

Nice sunny weather.

The sign forest in Watson Lake.

At a campground in Watson Lake.

Drinking Canadian beer.