FriendlyManitoban
New member
Looks like excellent adventure so far! Keep the pictures coming!
Northern Ontario to Inuvik solo ride on now!
- Thread starter zzz150
- Start date
don't count on gas in ross river is what i had heard, so i got there and thought hey nice, 24hr gas... not so, the card payment outdoor system didn't work. either way the ferry wasn't running until the next day as it was 8pm when i got into the very small town. next morning picked up a fishing license and gas then was ready for the canol north rd.
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so here it shows 3 deg celcius at 9:27pm when i arrived to the border, it went somewhere below zero overnight, i was glad to have my little catalytic heater to dry up the cold damp bed of the truck after a day of rain the dropping temps. in the morning there was 1/2 an inch of ice on my water that was outside.
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camp at the yukon-nwt border, then some of the rivers and a pic of one of the endless views on the north canol. note the incredibly blue water. it was so cold that my feet, ankles and shins hurt after testing the depth, then when it got deeper the cold just went higher. where i turned around it was mid thigh deep and the current was strong enough that it was almost pushing me over when trying to walk across.
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in inuvik now at the jak campground. maybe 20 sites and 3 other sites have ppl on them. there was a bit of firewood and showers for the morning, decent telus service up here, getting the lte network. stayed at tombstone park campground for 2 days, ran into a couple that i'd me two nights before briefly when looking for a place to camp, i was invited on a hike and took the opportunity, it was a great hike and we ended up having another person catch up to us, she was cycling the yukon and alaska with another cyclist, this was her day off..! during the 6hrs we got up to the lakes on the mountains directly behind the tombstone interpretive centre, these are routes but there were no trails. i don't have the exact elevation details but will be looking that stuff up, we don't have hills like that in ontario, we past snow covered sidehills and were above the vegetation on a rocky peak before heading down into a beautiful valley with the lakes, the peak we went past but didn't summit as the lakes was the goal is just to the left of the centre of the last pic. also a quick pic of the truck in front of some funky old bldgs in dawson city.
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more dempster pics. would have been happy to park the truck under the old garage and camp there as ppl surely had in the past but this place stunk like diesel, gas and oil. the ground was clearly saturated... so stayed just up the road near the rock river campground, so far a lot of the side roads i've checked today just went to gravel pits or radio towers, there are a few i skipped past that i will check on the way back down..
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it was very cold and windy when i crossed the arctic circle, seemed appropriate, i was still wearing my shorts because it is summer, just like when it was 3 degrees up the north canol.. i'm now wearing pants and long underwear because well it's just chilly. but it is 11:30pm in inuvik and there are almost no bugs, there were thick black-flies earlier but they're gone for the night now.
picked up a hitch-hiker that i met at the campground last night, he was one of the guides/organizers for a group of cyclists riding the dempster, he needed to get to inuvik to pickup a rental truck to get a few riders that were having difficulties of various forms into inuvik by vehicle as riding wasn't working for them anymore. some people have pretty interesing jobs.
this reminds me i didn't mention the group of hunters i ran into at sheldon lk along the north canol on the way out, what a great night of camping and drinking a lot at a great place with great ppl who know the local area, the one guy in the group hunts up there every year and told me a lot about the area, great ppl.
more pics! more dempster, some brown bears up close finally, the sow and cubs were at most 50ft off the road, digging the earth for whatever bounty they were looking for, they could not have cared less that we were there for several minutes just watching. the cyclists were part of the stragglers, the guy near the truck had a sat phone and coordinated the rental truck in inuvik. the pic with the road blocked off was the very end of the road, this was the furthest i could go. barely out of town. maybe there is something i am missing and will figure out tmrw.
just had an rcmp visit, nice guys, they put up a post on the inuvik buy and sell for me looking to hire a boat to go to go to the arctic ocean, so far the ppl up here have been very nice. on arrival the guy i drove into town treated me to a yukon gold beer and a muskox burger at the mackenzie, great place, modern, new and nice with great food and service. it was a nice way to get to the destination.
picked up a hitch-hiker that i met at the campground last night, he was one of the guides/organizers for a group of cyclists riding the dempster, he needed to get to inuvik to pickup a rental truck to get a few riders that were having difficulties of various forms into inuvik by vehicle as riding wasn't working for them anymore. some people have pretty interesing jobs.
this reminds me i didn't mention the group of hunters i ran into at sheldon lk along the north canol on the way out, what a great night of camping and drinking a lot at a great place with great ppl who know the local area, the one guy in the group hunts up there every year and told me a lot about the area, great ppl.
more pics! more dempster, some brown bears up close finally, the sow and cubs were at most 50ft off the road, digging the earth for whatever bounty they were looking for, they could not have cared less that we were there for several minutes just watching. the cyclists were part of the stragglers, the guy near the truck had a sat phone and coordinated the rental truck in inuvik. the pic with the road blocked off was the very end of the road, this was the furthest i could go. barely out of town. maybe there is something i am missing and will figure out tmrw.
just had an rcmp visit, nice guys, they put up a post on the inuvik buy and sell for me looking to hire a boat to go to go to the arctic ocean, so far the ppl up here have been very nice. on arrival the guy i drove into town treated me to a yukon gold beer and a muskox burger at the mackenzie, great place, modern, new and nice with great food and service. it was a nice way to get to the destination.
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escadventure
Adventurer
ZZ - looks like a great time. Thanks for sharing.
spent some time today talking to local ppl and seeing what was going on here in inuvik, checked out the career centres to see what kinds of work was available here also. had no luck hiring a boat to the coast so booked a flight to tuktoyaktuk for tmrw weather permitting.
i've driven all the way across canada almost and only now am i finding mosquitos and black flies to be a bit thick, but certainly not as bad as i've experienced in ontario! with the light drizzly no wind weather the bugs are hunting this evening.
i've driven all the way across canada almost and only now am i finding mosquitos and black flies to be a bit thick, but certainly not as bad as i've experienced in ontario! with the light drizzly no wind weather the bugs are hunting this evening.
more pics; some of the campsite, one at the winter ice road start, the inuvik greenhouse, and my trucks weight on a scale-this is with a half tank of gas, extra fuel cans empty but loaded otherwise.. roughly 6260lbs.
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