Sunday June 7th marked the beginning of our adventure. We set out from Fairbanks on a 15 passenger van that shuttled us from Fairbanks to Cantwell. It was probably the longest 5 hours of my life... 8:45 we got on the bus, made a couple more stops in Fairbanks (including the airport to get a bag someone had left or lost and someone's house to pick up a buddy of the driver's to accompany him on the ride), then headed very slowly south on the highway, listening to your favorite music and mine, hard rock scream-o sounds. Carrie said the one positive thing about the horrible station on the radio was that at least she wouldn't know any of the songs so they wouldn't get stuck in her head. Funny, true, but I'm not sure it was worth the aural agony.
After a lunch break in tourist-city Denali, we finally reached the gas station at Cantwell where we loaded up the bikes and set out on our highway. How cool we are. :)
The first few miles of the road were paved, but not too long into our ride we hit the gravel road, which would be our pathway for the following 100 miles or so. There were some pleasant and not so pleasant places on the road. Some parts were gravelly...
Some parts were more packed down and smooth (save for a few bumps in the road)...
(That's me in the road up there.) And some parts were pretty aweful. I don't know what genius decided that fixing the road included putting pieces of inch to inch and half size rocks all over it, but s/he was definitely, definitely wrong. All it does is cause skidding, in case you were curious, particularly when going downhill, and all I could imagine in some places was me tumbling down the rocky slope in front of me. So although I was a pretty strong biker and going a fair speed, I am a total woos going down hills. I have no need-for-speed bones in my body, at least not that kind, so I pretty much rode my brakes the whole way as Carrie flew down ahead of me.
But our adventures were not bound to the biking part. Between the hills and the pedaling were hours of camping adventures. Carrie hauled the trailor with our camp gear (tent, her clothes and bag, basic camp needs) and I carried two back paniers with all the food and some smaller camp needs, and my clothes bag. We started our trip from Cantwell on Sunday afternoon around 1:45pm. From there we biked 31 miles to Brushkana campgrounds which sits near a small river. Not wanting to pay to camp, we biked about 3/4 of a mile ahead and camped at a nice spot off the side of the road.
After setting up camp we headed down to the river to take advantage of the view and, of course, to "ice" Carrie's knee. She figured some really creative ways to get just her knee into the very cold water. I was pretty impressed. And if you're wondering why people do yoga, think of moments just as this, and you might reconsider joining a local class. :)
I'm just glad she didn't fall in. It would have made for a chilly night... Anyway, we went back up to camp and started the dinner process. We picked a nice spot far away from our tent, picked our yummy packaged meal for the night - Beef and Hash - and set up the stove.
Unfortunately, as Carrie was showing me how to use it (since I've never used one before), she realized that it was actually leaking. Initial frustrations aside, we began gathering wood to build a small fire to heat our water instead. Surprisingly, it didn't take very much wood to make a big enough fire just for boiling water (although, by the end, we pretty much settled for "hot" water, not wanting to wait that long to eat). We considered going down to the campgrounds to see if anyone had a spare of the part that was broken on the stove, but then decided that we were pretty cool for going fuel-less and starting a fire, like we are real survivors, and we could go without the stove for the remainder of the trip. So we did. We built a fire every morning for breakfast and every night for dinner. (Okay, no fire on Wednesday morning - but having a granola bar instead of oatmeal, I could definitely tell a difference.)
So starting and maintaining a fire became a team effort, and although we are both capable of it, it was kind of fun to watch each other. I have to admit, Carrie is still better at the whole thing than I am, but she was impressed with my "direct blow" skills to get the fire going again when it got temporarily doused.
She took advantage of the moment to make fun of my funny lip face while recognizing it's effectiveness. Just saying. I don't remember who taught me these mad skills, but it sure worked. Plus, it was nice to have a fire for a little while to keep the bugs away. Though we still have our fair share of mosquito bites everywhere...
After solving that first big issue, things began settling into place. It was good for me to have this time of camping before NOLS, a practice and reminder that, when camping, there is pretty much always something to do (make and break down camp, set up for dinner because in the time it takes to make it you'll be hungry even if you aren't now, take off and hang wet clothes and put on dry ones, make sure nothing can get blown away, etc.) and always something to think about (do we have bear spray handy, how far away is our food, do I have everything in the tent that I want for the night, when was the last time I drank water, and so forth). But I don't mind it - keeping my mind busy, as it really hasn't been while on vacation - and besides, I'm pretty sure the idea of a room with a view can't be beat when camping out in Alaska wilderness. You don't fool around with AK, because it doesn't fool around with you, but it sure is lovely! I really noticed a difference in just the sounds of being out there, how quiet it was, between when it was just us on the road and when cars went by, between camping in our own spot at Clearwater and camping at an official campground at Tangle Lakes with other people around us.
Monday morning we woke up and prepared for our long day. By the end of the day we had to complete 50 miles to get to our next spot. It is amazing the perspective of what 10 miles is. Before the trip, that seemed like a really long way. Now, 10 miles is a fraction. We did 20 miles on Monday morning and stopped for lunch at this really nice spot by a river I can't remember the name of. Right as we were pulling in, my gears started acting funny, but we thought we'd deal with it after we ate. So we did, we ate and sat and rested for a little while. As we were finishing, we saw two men on a raft coming our way. They were actually getting out right where we were, so we chatted with them a little. Then the one helped us as we tried to fix the issue with my bike. Unfortunatly, I don't know what happened, but it's all messed up, so I had to deal with what I had for the following day and a half. It turned out not so bad, and everything was fine. After lunch we headed out for the next 30 miles. This was probably the hardest stretch, as it seemed like every turn produced a new daunting hill.
The views of the mountains that we saw the whole way, however, made every mile worth the effort. This mountain below, whatever it's called, was my favorite. This was a really pretty stretch, mostly flat, really pleasant packed down road, and it ended with an amazing downhill bridge that led us to our lunch stop. Nice. :)
Along the way we stopped randomly for pictures. Many of them are at the top of a significant hill. There was one hill that was about 6 miles long - seriously, completely uphill, no breaks, just up. It took us a while... At the base of it is a bridge, at which we stopped for pictures, water, and anything else we could think of to put off biking up that thing.
But an hour and a half later, we got to this.
Some other top-of-the-hill shots include:
and
Tuesday was a 33 mile ride, and we camped at a place called Clearwater. There are toilets and a river - that's it. This was a nice spot, I thought. We saw lots of moose droppings, but no moose.
Actually, we did see moose and other wildlife along the way. Carrie saw more than I did - we learned on this trip that I am not very observant... We would break, and she would ask me, "Did you see that lone caribou?" or "Did you see the mile marker?" or "Did you see that big enormous sign telling us where we are?" Pretty much every time I would have to admit that, uh, no, I did not see that. I did see a couple moose, an eagle, and a ptarmigan (at least I think that's what it was), and some squirrels, and lots of mosquitos. No bears (thank goodness). Carrie saw porcupine. I missed that one - made me kind of sad.
Tuesday night we camped at Tangle Lakes, which is about 21 miles out of Paxson, all on paved road. This is a more popular campground with official campground spots and more people. We weren't alone that night - there were lots of people camping in other spots around us. It was a pretty spot, however, and it would be fun to go back there at some point to play on the water, do some hiking, and so forth.
It's called Tangle Lakes because the lakes are basically tangles of water wrapped through the hills and patches of land. It's kind of cool to look at, and it'd be a fun place to really explore and boat around in. Andrea, a friend of Carrie's, met us there that evening and camped overnight with us. The next morning she met us in Paxson to drive us back to Fairbanks.
Wednesday morning we completed the last 21 miles of paved road, which felt very nice on our poor seats. There were still some good hills, and the first 7 miles we were basically going right into a nice (sarcastic) headwind, which meant even on the downhills we were working. We got to one hill in the wind and I was so tired I thought I was going to fall over and cry. But I gave myself a little pep talk and made it up just fine. It was interesting - there was a group there, some kind of tourist thing I guess, that was biking the highway as well. I just saw them, but one of them biked with Carrie for a few minutes up the hill (which, really, who talks to someone WHILE they're biking up a hill??). We were glad we did not run into the group later on in our ride.
We made it to Paxson a little before noon where we met Andrea, packed the car, and headed up to Fairbanks. We made a stop in Delta, though, for a yummy buffalo burger and a milkshake - and deserving we were of that. It was basically the best milkshake I've ever had.
All in all, it was a great, refreshing trip. Thanks, Carrie, for making it so awesome! I am planning on continuing to bike this week and next so that hopefully I can maintain what fitness I have gained from all this for my NOLS course which starts in just 2 weeks. I'm getting excited! From June 25 to July 25 I will be out in the wilderness somewhere kayaking, backpacking, camping, and completely out of touch with the world. I can't wait.
Here are a few more pictures from the trip:
2 comments:
WOW! How beautiful! I love reading your comments and seeing the gorgeous pictures. Thank you! Love Mom
hi! interesting blog!! n_n"
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