Jamul To Alaska 08-08

I continued on I5 north to Medford OR, then headed north and east on Hwy 62 to Hwy 230 to Hwy 138 to Hwy 97 north through Bend. The roads after Medford were all two lane roads winding through the mountains and valleys. These are my favorite roads as there is less traffic and more beautiful scenery. My KTM was handling the curves very nicely. Somewhere along Hwy 97, I took a pic of the Cascade mountains. I'm not sure which ones they are, but the Cascade mountains all seem cone shaped and are semi dormant volcanoes - remember Mt St Helens? It's part of the Cascade Mountains. Some of the first pics I took are a little blury. I had my camera attached to my handlebars and took the pics while moving. After the camera mount broke, I had to stop to take pics, but they looked better...

When you get about 50 miles north of Bend, the land changes from big mountains to flatter farm land with smaller pine covered hills. Most of the valleys throughout my trip in CA, OR, WA, ID, Canada, and AK, looked very similar. There are a lot of hay and animal farms - mostly cattle, but some sheep, lama, elk, bison, etc.

I stopped for lunch at Biggs OR right on the Columbia river. I stopped to gas up, and the gas station also served food, so I grabbed a piece of pizza and a gatorade. My KTM holds 5 gallons of gas and gets approx 38 to 40 miles per gallon. During the trip, I would usually ride between 120 and 150 miles then stop for gas and a bathroom break. This worked out to about 2 to 3 hours on the bike depending on the roads. It always feels good to stand up after a 2 or 3 hour stint on the bike. After lunch, I turned east on Hwy 84 following the Columbia river gorge. Here's a pic of the John Day Dam.

I followed Hwy 84 to Hwy 82 to Hwy 395 to Hwy 90 North and into Spokane WA. We took a trip through Spokane about 15 years ago. The town has grown a lot, especially heading east towards Coeur d'Alene ID. Once I got through Spokane, the traffic came to a dead stop on the Hwy. I followed another bike and split lanes for about 3 miles until we passed the accident, and was back to full speed. Once I hit Coeur d'Alene ID, I turned north on Hwy 95. It takes forever to get through this city, as there is probably about 20 traffic lights you have to go through. Just before Sandpoint you pass over lake Pend Oreille. It's a big beautiful lake that butts up to the pine covered mountains that surround Sandpoint. Here's a pic of the lake when crossing over the bridge.

I continued through Sandpoint and met Dennis for the first time. I was thinking about this first meeting all day while riding - Would we get along ok? Would I be able to hang out with him for 2 weeks? I know now that Dennis was thinking the same things. But once I met Dennis and his wife Judy, we got along great. They own a property that has 3 buildings: a 3 bedroom house, a one bedroom house, and a garage/apartment building. They are planning on travelling more, and decided to rent out the 3 bedroom house they used to live in. They have always rented the one bedroom house. They moved into the garage/apartment building and were still in the middle of construction of the apartment portion. Since they only had one bedroom, Judy set up a bed for me in the living room. She cooked a great dinner and we just hung out getting to know each other a little better. Dennis is a real outdoors person. He has travelled all over the world with volunteer groups making the lives of others better. He also took his daughter on a 210 mile hike through the mountains, and took his son on a bicycle ride from Mexico to Canada. It was very interesting reading the newspaper articles and seeing the pics from his trips.

The reason Dennis decided to ride to the top of Alaska, is to finish the ride he started 1 1/2 years ago. In 2006, he shipped his 1989 BMW GS 1000 to Argentina, and rode from the southern most point of Usushia Argentina to his house in Sandpoint ID. This trip would complete his ride from the southern most point in South America to the northern most point in North America. Here are a few pics of Dennis and Judy's property in Sandpoint. They have a big garden, 3 ponds, and at least an acre of grass. I hate to cut grass - I don't know how Dennis does it. One interesting note - there is a double set of railroad tracks near their house. The double tracks allow North and Southbound trains to pass each other. All the traffic controls come from Texas... and there are 50, yes FIFTY TRAINS PER DAY, that pass by on these tracks. I had no idea that many trains came to the US.

Whenever I'm on the road, I sleep with earplugs, and I slept very good this night. Day 3 ended after 12 hours and 698 miles on the bike.

Monday morning, Day 4, started with beautiful blue skies, crisp clean air, and the smell of pine trees. We got an early start and Judy took pics of us before leaving - check out Dennis's license plates.

We hit the road heading north on Hwy 95 towards the Canadian border and ultimately to Deadhorse AK. It would take us several days of riding to reach Deadhorse. We decided early on that we would not make any hotel reservations for the entire trip. We would ride until we got tired or felt like stopping, then camp or stay in the nearest hotel. Dennis led to the Canadian border from his house.

The Canadian border crossing was a piece of cake. There was one car in front of us and all we had to do was show our passport and we were in - it only took 2 minutes. At this time, Dennis wanted me to lead as I had our routes loaded into my GPS. The road had little traffic and was a twisty 2 lane road towards Banf National Park. We turned on Hwy 93 heading North and East into Banf National Park, then North through Jasper National Park. The National Parks encompas the Canadian Rocky Mountains that contain many lakes, rivers, and glaciers. The Canadian Rocky Mountians are very majestic with jagged rocky peaks above the tree lines and many snow packs and glaciers. The ride through both parks was awesome!!! Beautiful scenery and twisty tree lined roads. I think British Columbia Canada was my favorite place during the entire trip. I told Tammy we will have to come back to BC for a future vacation.

Here's a video riding into Banf National Park: (press the back button on your browser to return to this page after the movie plays)

Riding into Banf National Park

I missed the first turn in the park and pulled to the side of the road to do a u-turn. After Dennis stopped and I told him we needed to backtrack and go the opposit direction, I looked down and there was a black bear about 10 feet from us eatting berries off the plants. He had a collar, so the bear must be well known and used to people. This was the first of many black bears we would see on the trip

Here are a few more pics of the mountains in Banf National Park:

The roads were very busy with traffic in the parks. We pulled into Lake Louise to get gas and take pics of this famous lake and glacier. Luckily we were on bikes, as cars had to park about 1 mile from the lake and walk up the mountain road. Dennis has been her before and could not remember it ever being this crowded before. Literally, it was like going to Disneyland, as there were so many people. We were both thinking the same thing - Where the hell did all these people come from? And, this trip to Alaska is going to take longer than we expected with all the traffic. What we later found out, is that Monday 8-4 is a holiday in Canada. And, Canadians, all go to the National parks for their holidays. Once we got outside the parks, the traffic lightened up a lot. Here's a pic of Lake Louise:

After eating our lunch - power bars, jerky, and trail mix, - we continued north through Jasper National Park. This park is adjacent to Banf Nationl Park, and just as beautiful. Here's a pic of the mountains and the Columbia Icefield:

We saw more black bears run across the road in front of us along with a few white mountain goats. But since there was so much traffic, we didn't stop to take pics. We were hoping to make it to Prince George for our first night, but because of the traffic, we only made it to McBride BC the first night. We ate in the restaurant attached to the hotel. One thing we noticed - the cost of everything in Canada was more than the US. They also have high taxes on top of the published rates for gas, hotel, and food. The gas cost us between $6 and $7 US Dollars per gallon - ouch! Before we left Dennis's house in Sandpoint, we decided to eat Breakfast and Lunch on our bikes (Breakfast bars, protein bars, jerky, and trail mix), and we would eat dinner in restaurants so we could have at least one cooked meal each day. We were on the road for 12 hours and 550 miles. Here is the hotel we stayed at: