Coming home to a place he'd never been before...

We have two Siberian (or as we refer to them: Suburban) Huskies. Both are rescue pups and one is aptly named Yukon (the other is Bentley). We brought them along for the great ride north and so far they are surviving probably better than Sophie and I. Thus far they have been enjoying the cooler temps and have yet to start shedding.if we were still in Denver they'd be living up to their nicknames of fur balls because as soon as the heat starts the fur starts flying. Most folks have the occasional dust bunny lurking under the bed; we have enough fur to keep a sheared sheep toasty warm.

Huskies are not wolves, or even wolf dogs but everywhere we go, especially up here in the Yukon, people come up and ask if they can pet our wolves. Yukon and Bentley are as gentle as dogs can be and Bentley especially loves nothing more than to give lots of puppy kisses to his adoring fans.

We named Yukon for the Yukon Territory  which is where we've been for the last week or so. We spent several days in Whitehorse, the territorial Capitol. Whitehorse is also home to the Yukon Quest sled dog race which heads out every year in February and covers the distance between Whitehorse and Fairbanks, Alaska. Every other year it starts in Whitehorse,  the other years it begins in Fairbanks.

Yukon  (right) coming home to a place he's never been before

In the winter Yukon and Bentley pull a very small sled just for fun but I have a lot of respect for anyone who can take a sled team of 12-20 canine athletes through some extraordinarily difficult terrain.

We stopped by the Yukon Quest offices to say hello and yes we did bring Yukon and Bentley in to woof their hi's as well. We met Beverly who was very friendly and seemed genuinely happy to put hand to paw with our two pups.  Thank you Beverly, for being so gracious!

While Yukon had never been this way before it really did feel like a homecoming for him as he finally got to visit his namesake. I think it may be tough to drag Yukon, and , Bentley, home when the trip is over but it was special to have them along for the ride.

Yukon came into this world an itinerant traveler having been abandoned as a puppy to a small town in Kansas of all places. Having found his forever home with Sophie, Bentley,  and I he's still traveling. The only difference being he'll  never worry about where to lay his head at night or where his next hug will come from. Welcome home Yukon.

Of flats and men

"This is the law of the Yukon, and ever she makes it plain:
Send not your foolish and feeble; send me your strong and your sane"
The law of the Yukon, Robert  Service

In my last post I mentioned Paul, the caretaker of the Watson Lake Campground. Paul hales  originally  from Vancouver, British Columbia. A friend who was moving to the Yukon asked Paul to drive up with him while the friend drove the U-Haul. Once at their destination, the friend would buy Paul's  plane ticket home. Once they arrived, however, said friend lacked the financial wherewithal  to get Paul  home. Paul was 18 at the time and was now well and truly stranded. He found a job and fell in love with the place so decided to stay. As Paul proudly informed us, that was just 40 years ago.

Meanwhile, out on the road yours truly is changing flat number two. It took about an hour of cussing and fumbling to handle flat number one but it's successor was the beneficiary of that prior roadside school of hard knocks (aka the learning curve) and the old faithful donut was mounted up ready for duty in about 15 minutes. Mind you, Whitehorse was still more than 200 miles distant. You might ask, why not head back to Watson Lake and pick up the delightful match to my wonderful new snow tire. Sorry, but there was no way we were going back. North to Alaska! Well, at least somewhat westerly  to Whitehorse it would be.

To make a long story, or at least a long,slow drive, short, we ultimately arrived in Whitehorse which is actually the Capital of the Yukon Territory. There are not all that many folks who actually call the Yukon home but apparently about 90% reside in Whitehorse. Still, the population of Whitehorse, heck - the population of the entire Territory, is substantially  less than that of my hometown of Littleton, CO which is just a suburb of the much larger Denver area.

What Whitehorse lacks in population it makes up for in amenities. Remember those two most critical words that can appear on a road sign - TIRE REPAIR? Whitehorse boasts several real tire centers including a Canadian Tire store as well as - dare I say it? - a Walmart. I can hear your gasp of giddiness and I was in TIRE REPAIR  heaven.

Yeah, right.

The illustrious  snow tire that saved our bacon in Watson Lake  turned into somewhat more of an albatross  than it already was. Turns out you're not supposed to drive a vehicle with just one snow tire regardless of the season. The tread of the snow tire is so much more aggressive than that of a normal touring tire that the tire stores wouldn't mount a mismatched set of tires. The plan had been to buy three new tires in Whitehorse as one of my Denver  tires was still in great shape. Two new tires would go on the front of the van, the good Denver tire would go on the rear along with the now infamous snow tire ( ye  of the aggressive tread) and I'd  be good to go. I was also planning on buying a rim for the 3rd new tire so I'd have a full size spare.

Hah!

Two hours later I'm now the most proud owner of a matching set of 4 snow tires. Bring on the Yukon winter with its massive snows and forty below Temps. I'm ready for you! The upside of course is that I'm now another inch elevated away from the gravel thanks to the deep, aggressive tread gracing all four wheels. You'll be proud to know I did also get that full size spare.

Buying tires in the Yukon - priceless. For everything else, there's  Mastercard. As if they gave these tires away. Priceless my...

"This is the law of the Yukon, that only the Strong shall thrive;
That surely the Weak shall perish, and only the Fit survive."
Robert Service

Watson Lake: Twas the best of times; Twas the worst of times

They warn you about the roads. You try to come prepared. It is a paved road mostly but don't let that fool you.

The road into Watson Lake, home to the very famous and now very large 'Sign Forest' is as I mentioned for the most part paved. For the other part it's gravel road made up of some of the sharpest, bone-jarring, car-rattling, tire-eatiing lack of pavement  you could wish for. And did I mention the dust? They have signs, which you quickly learn to dread, telling you of upcoming "loose gravel" sections and warning you of "Extreme Dust Conditions". If you've ever seen YouTube videos of Arizona Hoodoos or other assorted dust storms of Armageddon you have only to double the intensity of E.D.C. You can't see anything when a big rig passes from the other direction but you feel the dust (and rocks aka  'gravel') hitting your car. And you'd  better have rolled up all of your windows and turned your vents to recirculate interior air -either that or don a scuba mask or hazmat suit if you plan to breathe until  the dust clears just in time to see the next semi truck hurtling toward you from down the road.

Our van had good quality tires in good condition when we left Denver. Alas, they were no match for the Alaska Highway. First flat came about 180 miles out of Watson - in other words literally in the middle of nowhere. My mistake was a) believing the road was paved b) thinking it couldn't be that bad and c) not investing in a full size spare tire.   Oh, and d) not having refreshed myself on where the good folks at Toyota went out of their way to hide the little donut spare that came with the vehicle. I can't really be blamed for all of this as I had never experienced  a flat on this car in 90,000 miles. By 90,100 I would have experienced this joy not just once but twice. I consider myself lucky; locals talk of roads up here ( the Dempster Highway is held in awe) where people may experience 6 or 7 flats in a single day.

Watson Lake known for the "Sign Forest"

So on goes the little donut spare (rated for about 90 miles and recommended speeds of no more than 50 mph). Reading the instructions which emphasize the spare is "for temporary use only" we set off for Watson Lake which is not only the closest town but the ONLY town within several hundred miles that boasts those two magical words: TIRE REPAIR.

Of course driving at 50 mph for 180 miles guarantees in particular one thing - you will arrive shortly after the TIRE REPAIR facility has closed up shop for the day. So it's off to find a place for the night. There is an RV park but it doesn't look very inviting (picture row after row of RV'S parked like sardines in a can). Up the road there is a campground so we head out of town and down, you guessed it, another gravel road until we reach the Watson Lake Government Campground and at 2 o'clock  in the morning (which is dusk in these parts) finally put an end to a very harrowing day.

I titled this post the best of times and the worst of times and the Watson Lake Campground was definitely the best. While in town all those RV'ers were listening to their neighbors snores we were tucked into a beautiful pine forest with one other camper in the entire campground. The next morning we met Paul, the gentleman who maintains the campground who couldn't have been friendlier  or more helpful.

First up on the agenda was making good use of the TIRE REPAIR facility which of course couldn't actually REPAIR  the tire but might be able to replace it if they had the right size in stock. They were nice enough to ask if I wanted a new or used tire. I graciously declined used having had my fill of one very used and very FLAT specimen. Thankfully (and I mean down on my knees praise be to God thankfully) they did have one in the right size and as an extra bonus it was a full fledged snow tire (I passed on having it studded what with it being only June). Since beggars can't be choosers I told them to mount that snow tire up and $194 lighter off down the road we rolled.

32 miles later, on the 256 mile drive to Whitehorse, our next destination, on came my tire inflation light and the flat fairy had struck again. But that's a tale for another blog so stay tuned!

For those who see

The wild rose abounds in this great northern land
Cultivated not by the touch of human hand
Can there be beauty where man does not see
Is there sound from an unheard falling tree
Reading Robert  Service into the late solstice night
Walking his trail in morning's  first light
The beauty surrounds you if only you see
The wild rose and the unheard tree

Manna from Heaven

Campsite etiquette  dictates not leaving food out but every year the list of things to keep tucked away gets longer and longer. It's easier to remember that about the only thing you can leave unattended at your Campsite are your camp chairs and even they are on the endangered list.

This is all done of course for the protection of bears. "A fed bear is a dead bear" is camping mantra as bears that learn to associate humans with happy tummies are bears apt to get into serious (as in 3 strikes and they shoot you) trouble.

Sophie and I know all this but occasionally we make a mistake. Last night we pulled into the campground in Dawson Creek (even the names of the towns are starting to harken of the far north) aptly named Mile Zero because  Dawson Creek is the start of the Alaska Highway. The campground is actually in town so this morning when my wife Sophie got up before me to head to the showers ahead of the crowd she left our food bag out in plain sight thinking no bears were nearby. Technically it wasn't "unattended" as it was being watched very carefully by yours truly and two reliable Siberia huskies sleeping most soundly in the camper.

Upon Sophie's return she discovered our food bag had been torn asunder with several delectables now missing including one bag of Grape Nuts cereal. Grape Nuts as you might know is rather high in fiber so the nefarious beast that took it was at least eating a nutritious breakfast.

All in a panic we quickly secured the errant foodstuffs before sitting down to our own healthy breakfast of oatmeal and strawberries. Keeping our eyes peeled for any urine neighbors we did spy a very fat raven circling overhead. Hmm, could this perchance be our food robber?

We'll never know for sure as we never did see an actual bear and I don't have any proof that it was in fact Mr. Raven that had absconded with the Grape Nuts. If it was Mr. Raven be forewarned if you ever visit the Mile Zero campground to keep an eye to the sky because as well fed as this Raven appeared to be you never know what kind of manna from heaven may fall.

12,500 Paddle Strokes gets you where?

Maligne Lake on a sunny, warm, non-binding day is one of the best places on planet earth to be. Don't believe me? Then come see it for yourself. You can take a very nice boat tour every half hour or so that takes you down this gorgeous  lake but being stupid I much prefer to work for my reward. So 12,500 paddle strokes  for me was the price of admission to one of the most spectacular lakes in which to wet your oar.

Spirit Island is what the tourists come to see on their hour long boat tour but as I mentioned in a previous blog for me the journey is as important as the destination. Spirit Island is 8.84 miles from the kayak put-in. You can do the math round trip but either way it's as long as paddle as I care to do in a day. Trying to be efficient I set a compass course of 120 magnetic and headed point to point quickly easing in to a cadence of fifty paddle strokes per minute.

The tour boats are very courteous slowing to wake speed as they pass hand powered craft. Still,the boats are big enough to send out some nice rollers of waves which distracts from the quick reintroduction to paddling and the realization that I haven't been out in the boat often enough this year. But that always seems to be the case. The lake's surface, in between tourist boat wakes. Is so smooth it's hard to think I'm moving at all. Looking over the side of the kayak the water vanishes as all I see is fluffy white clouds and stunning mountain Vistas reflecting back at me.

Two hours and six minutes later (thank you Garmin GPS  bike computer which is just at home on the water as on my handlebars) I arrive at Spirit Island. The tourist boats all stop here but your technically  only half way down the lake. There are only a couple of places to camp on Maligne Lake - Spirit Island is one and another is at the far end of the lake. We've amped at Spirit Island before but next time we're  up this way we'll  take a couple extra days and include a paddle of the entire lake.

For today Spirit Island is the planned turnaround but having been here before I know a secret. Another half mile paddle around a point of trees and you are in a section of the lake that I can only call one of nature's  cathedrals. I'm not religious in the traditional sense but coming round the point and having the lake all to myself made me at peace in the moment like I too seldom get to experience. Resting the paddle on the deck of the kayaks I just sat and absorbed my surroundings. Not a breath of wind to disturb the surface of the lake and not a sound at all to disrupt a perfect spot at one of its most tranquil  moments. Far from feeling like a visitor I felt at one with the world  around me. Before we started this trip  my wife Sophie had given me a new sweatshirt with John Muir's timeless words "the mountains are calling and I must go." I don't know if John Muir  ever sat in a canoe in a place such as this but his words were meant for Maligne Lake on a day like today.

Of course I still had to paddle back and ultimately I spun the kayak's nose around and headed  back the way I had come.

Maligne Lake is about 30 miles from Jasper and the drive alone is worth the time. You're perhaps getting tired of hearing about our bear sightings but on the drive back to town we did see another bear. Actually two, a momma and her baby cub, high up in an aspen tree eating it's leaves. As many bears as we have seen this trip that was pretty special. All in all a perfect end to a perfect day...

Ice fields to Sunny (finally!) Days

After a couple of days in Banff we finally gave up on the cloudy rain-soaked skies knowing the sun couldn't hide forever. Or could It?

While in Banff we did have the chance to ride the Bow Valley Parkway which is a beautiful stretch that goes to Lake Louise. The Trans-Canada highway is used by those in a hurry to get to places north but for the tourists, animal watchers, and yes, lowly cyclists, the Parkway is a slower and more relaxed path. The rain was with us for parts of the ride but it didn't dampen spirits as we reached Lake Louise. Much like the Maroon Bells outside of

Aspen, Lake Louise is a gem albeit with a five star resort attached. While we didn't have time this trip there is a wonderful  series of hiking trails that takes you from one teahouse to another as you climb higher and higher above the lake.

Next up was the Ice Fields Parkway where at the top you can take massive tundra buses up and onto the Athabasca Glacier. While politicians debate the nuances of global warming the receding glacier makes the tundra buses have to drive further every year just to reach the ice.

There are signs as you approach the glacier marking where the ice started year by year and you walk for what seems a mile or more passing all the signs standing as testament to the vanishing ice. When we were in Glacier National  Park  they were forecasting there would be no remaining glaciers in the park in as little as 10-15 years. Will they have to rename the National Park at that point? And where will the tundra buses go when there is no more ice?

On down the road we finally reach Jasper and though it might jinx me, the sun actually made an appearance and all of a sudden people weren't dressed in their Nanook of the North outfits. The bears too seem to relish basking in the sunshine and we saw another three black bears doing whatever bears really do. Tomorrow  we break out the kayaks for an excursion on breathtaking  Lake Maligne. That name might not ring a bell but odds are you've seen pictures on calendars, greeting cards, etc. You can take a tour boat down the lake or do the 16 mile round-trip in your own human-powered  vessel. Weather willing (hopefully no wind) it should be about a 4-5 hour paddle. On our last trip we kayak- camped down the lake and it's pretty remote and lonely once the last tourist boat finishes up at 4 p.m.