Alaska and back via plane, bike, and a half million mile Dodge

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I was contacted awhile ago to do a charter trip to Alaska, offering round trip service for bikes to Alaska. I jumped at the opportunity, and as of this posting I am mid transit on my way up.

Several freinds and relatives have asked me to do a write up of my adventures on this trip, so here we go. This initial post will be a bit long, but I'll try to keep additional postings brief, and more pics to come:

The first leg of the trip was to run from my home base of Marine City, Michigan down to Florida and South Carolina to pick up the first group of bikes. The trip down was mosy uneventful, here is my rig for those who don't know it, to give you an idea of my fancy digs. It is a 1997 Dodge Ram Cummins diesel. The truck has been mostly put together by me, it is about 400 horsepower with a 2011 six speed manual, and as of this writing has 544,000 miles on the ticker. My trailer is a 42 foot enclosed unit. Not to get too much ahead, but here she is at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah:

Once I arrived in Florida the real fun began. I happened to show up ********** dab in the middle of Tropical Storm Debbie. Many parts were flooded, and it became impossible to drive in it one night so I spent a sleepless time in a flooded rest stop. The next morning it cleared up, so I went and picked up the first set of bikes in Sarasota. Shortly after that stop I needed to relieve myself, and no bathroom was to be found, so I pulled down an uninhabited road to do my business.

Mid - "business" my legs started to burn intensely. I looked down to find hundreds of red imported fire ants stinging my legs. Too far in to "pinch it off", I was forced to attempt to run, dance, pee, and swat my legs at the same time. I probably looked like a crazy guy having a seizure.

Those stings go a few days with only minor itching, then the burning gets worse, bumps start that turn into boils, which then burst, leak, bleed, etc. It is quite nasty, and my legs are only now starting to heal. Here they are after a few days. I'll spare you the worse of it.

In South Carolina I stopped to pick up another bike. The customers shop was up a steep driveway and the road was angled the opposite way in a decieving angle. Upon approach, the trailer bottomed out in the road and hung up so all six tires were just hanging over the pavement. I was stuck! Fortunateluly the customer had a big floor jack handy and we quickly got the back high enough to back up. Even though it only took a few minutes, it felt like hours in the 100 plus heat, but we soon cooled down to a great lunch of Tilapia and fried okra.

A day later I was back in Michigan and grabbed a friends bike and my own, and did the final packing and such to leave. While working, I was a bit stiff legged from the ant situation, so I ended up clumsily tripping on a chunk of steel, cutting one of my small toes to the bone. With only hours to go until departure, I didn't have time for a ER visit, so out came the tape and gauze. My patch job worked well enough, so I grabbed the wife and kids and off we went. It has been over a week, and the toe is finally stuck back together and looking decent. Fortunately I'm a quick healer.

The first part of our route took us up through the Upper Peninsula where we picked up another bike and visited the super cheesy but fun "Mystery Spot". From there we worked over to North Dakota for another, and swung down to South Dakota.

South Dakota was particularly important to me, as it was the only state I'd never been to. So we celebrated by visiting Mount Rushmore. Here are my kids, they loved it:

After the Dakotas we had a stop in Colorado and then the Lake Tahoe region, a little town called Incline Village. The truck hated the 9 degree and steeper declines and inclines, and we were forced to drive 10-15 MPH most of the way to keep from overheating. Even running downhill in second gear we managed to heat up and completely smoke the brakes (they were fairly new too) by the time we reached Truckee California. So we checked into the very nice but high price Hampton Inn.

The next morning I left the family to enjoy the pool while I limped down the road to Napa. Pulling the rig on a residential side street I pulled the wheels off and got to work. Both front calipers had seized and the pads were destroyed and warped. The rear drums were slighty warped, but good enough. So I replaced everything in the front, and got back to the hotel by 11am to get cleaned up.

We then headed into Truckee and visited the JAX diner, made famous by "Diners, Drive-In's and Dives" and sampled several of their more famous dishes. Everything was great, and I'd highly recommend the pulled pork with Tabasco Onions, Yum!

We then enjoyed a slow but scenic drive over to Redwood National Park where we did the main drive, and stopped at a few short hiking trails yesterday. We had a fun time exploring the forest, and want to go back again when we have more time.

Well, thats it for now. I'll keep posting!

 

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Working our way up to Seattle via I-5 skirting Mt. St. Helens our first excitement for the day was when we heard a loud siren sound from under the hood of the truck. Climbing underneath we found an innercooler boot had popped off. A few minutes with a 7/16 wrench and we were back on the road.

Then, while leaving one of our stops we crossed some very uneven railroad tracks (had no other way around it - one way street) and the trailer fold-a-step was brutally crushed up into the chassis of the trailer. I never used it anyways, so no biggie. It made a great crunch the kids enjoyed!

We then made a bunch of stops around Seattle today and then finally worked our way to mid-Washington to crash for the night.

 

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Sunset over mid-Washinton last night.

 

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The last few days my oil pressure gauge has been acting very hinky. Most of yesterday it read zero. I believe it is the sending unit or possibly the gauge itself, but I'm never comfortable when I see that. Since the trip has already put me 3,000 miles over on my oil change and I've been running her pretty hard, I decided to change the oil. After having a couple shops tell me they won't change it with the trailer on, including a Wallymart with a huge 100 foot long drive through pit, I said screw it and bought a cheap pan at said Wallymart and changed it myself in their parking lot.

 

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The old thought by many is that Idaho is nothing but potatoes. However in the last few months I've been here twice and love it. Lots of neat little towns, gorgeous views, and cool places like this.

 

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Last night we stayed in Moses Lake, Washington. Today we worked our way over to Kalispell, Montana where we have our last stop before heading into Canada. First off, the drive between the two is only about 300 miles, but half is country roads that wind and curve, so the drive took most of the day. Quite worth it however, as the northern Idaho/Northwestern Montana region is gorgeous. The roads are smooth, and I'd have rather done them on a bike.

Rolling into Kalispell we found a big horse event was going on, so after hitting up a dozen places only to find they were booked up, my wife Katie found us a room here:

Unfortunately the pole dancing contest isn't until next week

The Outlaw Inn is a HUGE complex including a casino, pool area complete with padlocked sauna and two cemented in hot tubs (although they left the ladders sticking out of the ground), a boarded up steakhouse and all kinds of other relics. This place was supposedly THE place back in it's day, which I'm guessing was around 1970.

In all honesty the place is kinda cool. Yes, it is worn down and half closed up, but the kitsch is just deep enough with a little imagination you can see the polyester clad bikers of yesteryear smoking Lucky Strikes in the lounges.

The aquatic area was pretty cool. One of the advantages of staying in hotels every night is that my 5 year old daughter has learned to swim. She did several laps down the length of the 8 foot deep 75 foot long pool.

 

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Starting from Kalispell this morning we headed north on 89 and up through Glacier National Park. Although it poured all day, we were treated with some impressive sights.

And

The border crossing took some time. First there was a long wait, then when it was our turn, the officers seemed to have a hard time understanding that this trip was business AND pleasure. After answering the same questions from different angles for a half an hour, and showing them the bikes, they finally let me go.

And we headed up highway 2. Between the breaks in weather we enjoyed the miles and miles of mustard fields. We planned to make it to Edmunton tonight, but several traffic backups due to severe weather made us stop in Red Deer.

On another note, the truck is running great. The oil gauge has given up, so I'll have to fix that eventually.

 

[x32792]

Well written.

 

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We spent the morning doing laundry in Red Deer and got a late start while we let the kids hang at the hotel pool. Even so, we made great time today. Heading highway 43 west of Edmunton the weather was good and the roads pretty nice and flat, although there was not much to see. Despite the dozens of Elk and Moose crossing signs, the only creatures we saw were cows and horses. This old train bridge was pretty cool:

And this is how Abby spends the hours of 12-3PM most days on the road:

During a restroom stop we discovered a tire going bad. We didn't have enough plugs to fix it, so Preston helped me change it out:

And we ended up stopping in Dawson Creek, BC for the night. Tomorrow we start the "official" Alaskan highway!

 

[Christian P.]

thanks for the report - Waiting for more!

 

[AFSOC]

Great trip report so far. I love trip reports like this that accurately reflect the adventure you and your family are having. No effort is made to conceal or make excuses for mechanical breakdowns, no turning around to pose the rig in the most flattering backdrop and no attempt to overstate any of your experiences. What this report is, is an interesting and honest family adventure, spanning a continent dealing with the type of situations that travel often brings. I am riveted! I can't wait for more, good luck with the rest or your adventure.

 

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Thanks for the positive support!

 

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So the plan this morning was to get up early and get some miles covered today. Well, Abby busted a sandal last night, so Dad made the stupid promise to get her some new ones today and didn't hear the end of it. Stopping at Wallyworld in Fort St. John she had to try on EVERY pair of sandals she could find, including goofy high heel ones. She had alot of fun, but it ate up a lot of time. It worked out in the end, because we needed fuel, and the town had been without diesel for several days and just recieved a delivery this morning. It was well over 150 miles to the next fuel stop and we wouldn't have made it. Topping off our 30 gallon tank and 105 gallon auxillary tank we were good to go, $435.00 Canadian later!

Just after leaving Dawson Creek this morning we made a quick stop:

And

After a good 200 miles or so we were ready for a break. Even though the road was paved, it was in rough shape and quite bumpy. The kids enjoyed some ice cream from the fuel stop/food depot/clothing shop/gun store/campground

We put a few more miles on, and finally stopped early in Fort Nelson for the night, as this is supposedly the last civilization for 350 miles or so.

 

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Leaving Dawson Creek this morning and entering the Canadian Rockies we quickly found the roads to be a combination of dirt and tarred gravel, snaking through areas of steep dropoffs with only the occasional rail. Towering over the road were cliffs so steep even the plant life couldn't hang on.

And

Stopping in Toad River for a snack.

We checked out the collection of 2,000 plus hats.

And we all say hello!

More great scenery.

And

Throughout the day we saw these guys and nine of their cousins at different locations. Some were only 30-40 feet from us.

And

We had never heard of the Laird Hot Springs, but three seperate people reccomended checking them out yesterday within an hour of eachother, so we had to stop. The admission price was $10 per family and 1 quart of blood per person, extracted by the local mosquitoes during our visit.

To get to the hot springs you have to walk a half a mile down a boardwalk through a swamp. The water is crystal clear and in two big pools seperated by a small waterfall. The water comes into the upper pool at 140 degrees and cools down progressively to about 105 degrees. The pools are 2-4 feet deep, and have stone benches in them for lounging. We stayed mostly in the lower pool. I tried wandering up the upper pool, but half way was hot enough for me. The water is silky smooth

And

The mosquitoes chased us out, and we got into the truck with our wet bathing suits on and booked it with the windows down to blow the clouds of bugs out of the cab. Katie's back was raw with bites, but we all agreed the stop was worth it. Industrial hot water resistant bug spray is a must for that place!

Highway 97 between Dawson Creek and Watson Lake is home to the only wild Wood Buffalo herd left in the world. There is about 100 left and they are on the threatened list. They live exclusively on the narrow strips of field along the highway, and frequently get hit by cars. We must have seen most of them.

This guy came and checked us out. He got within a few feet of our windows.

I can see why they get hit.

And this dude was having a standoff.

We finally made it to Watson lake and checked into the only hotel with a room. The water supply broke a few days ago, so mud comes out of the faucets. The restuarant had nothing on the menu under 13 bucks so I hit the food cart out front run by an old man and a Tawainese lady. She reccomended the noodles, so I gave them a try.

The taste was interesting. The brain looking things were chewy. The ear looking things smelled like dog, and halfway through I quit eating it when I dug out and ate a large blue and black beetle looking thing. The shell was kinda sharp and it tasted like burnt hair.

So I joined the kids in their meal of canned ravioli from the "emergency" stock in our trailer.

 

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We are at the point now where the kids are noticing the extra daylight. Crossing into the Yukon last night the sun didn't go fully down until midnight and came up about 5 AM.