FLASK August 20-25
Aug 20:
Happy Birthday, Rachel! 67 miles to Sears Creek (14 miles west of Dot Lake). 1100-530. Rained all night & into the morning ... again. I just waited & by 830 it was done. I walked to Fast Eddies for breakfast (biscuits, sausage, eggs, gravy, hashbrowns - yes, real US hashbrowns. Hey Canada, hashbrowns are shredded, not cut). Talked to Rae - she's so cool. Talked to Jon at PBS - they're negotiating details with the park & on track for 2 days of shooting around Sept 5. The tent dried a bit during breakfast - yea! With the new pad, the load just got bulkier (I've got to turn the old pad into the Anchorage REI to get credit for the warranty). Groceries. Postcards. Out of town ... oops, left camera battery charging at camp so go back 1 1/2 miles & head out again. Threatening sky, dry pavement, a separate bike path, & flat terrain - what else could you want? A tailwind, you say? Done. Fun spinning out of town. Cool, close mountains with new dustings of snow. Color still spotty but underway. Eventually, some very gentle rollers are presented for my pedaling pleasure. Salami & pita, snacks for lunch. Scenic lakes roll past, though they are not the mirrors that were on display on yesterday's near windless ride. At Dot Lake I stop at the post office (seriously? No one lives here. No one) because I see 2 tourons. Dan & Guy are Isrealis going to school in Champagne-Urbana, cycling from Anchorage to Haines, ferrying to Bellingham, riding to Spokane, & train-ing to Chicago. Of course, I offered to help with the Spokane transition. Nice kids. I roll on, content. The sun is out, the day is warm enough that I cycle without the pullover (or raingear!) for the 1st time since ...? I don't like the garbage strewn pullout at Berry Creek but the next one - just 3 miles farther - at Sears Creek is fine. Paved but no garbage & a little gravel spot for my tent. Mosquitos attack. Spray solves the problem & camp is soon up. Stretching is connected - the sun shines through distant clouds, striking the wheat-like tall grass undulating in the wind. I cook & eat away from the tent, string the food, & decide not to repair the tent sack that tore this morning, or patch the hole in the tent floor that I noticed setting up, or glue my hiking boot soles & sandals. With those tasks & a typical remote camp start, it'll be a good excuse to stop early tomorrow. I feel better than I have recently & it's from (1) having a good sleeping pad, & (2) not having put any effort into the bike today. Wrists are better but ... Anyway, we'll see tomorrow when I hit Delta Junction.
Aug 21:
60 miles to Delta Junction. 1000-400. Sunshine. Horizon to horizon. Slept in & got out when it was hot in the tent - hadn't happened in ...? 9-grain (when is this gonna end?), cocoa, pack. Roll on easy terrain. Stop to take pictures of mountains, chalky rivers (Robertson & Johnson were both wide, gravel islanded, tree strewn, & braided, with sunlit snowy peaks behind nearer treed hills), butterflies, ... Salami on rounds for lunch. Nice change. Lounging & meditating in the sun. Also nice change. The trees are so dense & close that distant mountains with permanent snowfields are seen only when fire or man has cleared a sight line. Delta Junction is the end of the Alaska Hwy (at milepost 1422) so I took a picture, even though I'd failed to get one at Mile 0 in Dawson Creek. Light grocery shopping then another mile - this on the Richardson Hwy - to a State Park CG. Tent up, then chores: glue hiking boots (optimistic), sewed tent bag, patched hole in tent floor, tightened trailer. Connected,effective stretch again. Nice. Dinner was same as last night,except I added real Tillamook cheese to mac'n'cheese & tuna. Plus I ate the whole 6-pack of tapioca pudding snacks & nearly the entire pound of Bing cherries. Rae's exhausted with all her obligations before leaving Phoenix Aug 23 so I'll call again in the morning for a longer chat. Missing her is the most difficult part of the trip.
Aug 22:
59 miles to Salcha River Rec Area CG. 1000-500. Slept in again, purposefully avoiding creating opportunities for long mileage days by being out too early. 9-grain - Thank goodness, that's the last of it. Now on to regular oatmeal. Got to talk to Rae again - what a treat & we coo'd at each other before hanging up. Sunshine horizon to horizon. Are these last 6 days gonna break the rain spell? I get pulled over by Jarred in a red pick-up & he wants to know if I'm part of the Valdez-to-Anchorage group. "Nope." "2 of 'em's got hurt last night. Choppered to Anchorage. Well, free breakfast back in town 10 miles if you want it." Tempting ... but I roll on. Easy terrain with ocassional short sets of rollers as I parallel the wide, chalky, braided Tanana River. I stop anywhere & everywhere. Ooh, lake? Ooh, river view? Ooh, goggles? Schwag! I add them to the construction helmet I picked up for Phin 4 days ago. The lunch view from a bluff above the Tanana - easily a braided 1/2 mile wide, resplendent with gravel bars - is serene but wild. Later, it's especially lovely at Birch Lake so I strip & wade in. Very brisk. An older couple in an RV pull in as I'm dressing. Naked tush seen in Alaska? Check. Just ride off, Craig. Coming my way in my shoulder is ... well ... Fred Knudson ... pulling what looks like a 20' dragster. I mean walking/pulling. He got a bad GM pick-up in 2006 & they didn't want to fix it so he made this 400 lb. GM Bolt racecar/cart thingy & has signs all over it about how GM sucks. He can sleep in it & has but now he sleeps in his truck camper. He'll drive the truck 8-12 miles up the road, park, walk back to his Bolt, & pull it to his camper. Repeat until done. He's pulled it once from Fairbanks to Haines. This trip he's only going to Delta Junction as "that's plenty of exercise." The 69-year-old says, "Now you can tell your wife you've met somebody crazier 'n you! Ha!" Neat. I stop for soup & coffee in Salcha in late afternoon & get asked again if I'm with that Valdez ride. This time someone's got a flier: it's a 750 mile rondannae that started Aug 21 (yesterday). These cyclists ride unsupported & carry almost nothing, relying on the communities they ride through for water, food, lodging, etc. They're not races but they're pretty popular & this one's billed as The Wild Ride. Good to know. Threatening clouds don't spill rain as they pass overhead & I finish 8 easy miles to Salcha River Rec Area, set up (this time I dig a little to confirm that the tent stakes have indeed been hitting permafrost these last few nights), rest in tall grass watching golden leaves fall & rock their way down to me, stretch, & make & eat dinner (Ramen, pepper, tuna, parmesan). I pop back on the bike & go back 1 mile to a little store. Yes, beer! So now I sit at the nice CG picnic table, that storm wreaking thunderous havoc 15 miles off, sipping Alaskan Amber, in Alaska. Seriously?! Sister, Brother - I don't know what you got goin' on right now but, man, my life is good. 3 easy days to Healey - the entrance to Denali. Closing in. [Not 20 seconds later, it begins to sprinkle. As I'm crawling into the tent the deluge comes, with that thunder right on top of me now. Hold on wee-tent!]
Aug 23:
44 miles to Fairbanks. 1000-200. Rained all night & drizzled the rest of the day. Packed quickly while eating oatmeal (yummy!) & on the road as the drizzle continued, though the roads weren't too sloppy. Terrain very easy on this brisk, windless day. A big aircraft deployed a parachute to decelerate on the airbase - pretty cool. Rode past North Pole, AK, unwilling to stop at a gaudy tourist trap but willing to snap pictures of the 50 ft. Santa outside. After some helpful direction from locals, I was held captive at the visitor center from 200-400; everyone wanted pictures, to hear an answer to a crafty question ("Have to repair anything?," from a 12-year-old girl. Then, "How'd you fix it? Got tools?," from her mom), & to tell their stories. Like Patrick, 54, & a new father of a 14-month-old boy, whose momma's in jail. They're going back to Ketchikan where there's more family. Or Bruce & his dad, Dwayne, from Decorah, IA, &, of course, I dated the 1980 Decorah Dairy Princess while attending ISU we had plenty to talk about. Or Karen, from Lincoln, NE, but went to my rival HS (Bellevue East). Fun. I make it to Chena River SP CG, in the middle of Fairbanks, set up camp, stretch, talk to Rae, & eay a huge plate of Chili Rellenos & 3 good beers (props to a sponsor, Deschutes, as Mirror Pond was by far the best beer on tap amongst a decent selection). Talked to Rachel for a nice, long time - what a sweetie. Boot repair looks solid, though a touch-up with more epoxy & some insoles are required. Squirrels chattering & throwing down pine cones from high overhead. Fixed incessant bike squeak - Hey, Julie Callan! Remember that ride where you pointed out the loose bolt on the back rack? Yep, that was it again! Made me think of Rob & how much I already miss that guy & how long it'll be til I see him again. & those wonderful grandkids. Weepy ... Okay, 2 days to Denali!
Aug 24:
54 miles to Nenama. 100-600. I got up early for a few reasons. (1) The guy in the next campsite was crazy & angrily, loudly talking to himself late at night & in the morning. (2) There's construction going on in the CG. (3) I had a list of things to do to prep for Denali. Breakfast at Sourdough Sam's was yummy & filling & I used 3G to email ride photos to PBS, look for Denali-Anchorage shuttle info, & find a local bookstore & outdoor store. Went looking for touch-up shoe glue & insoles but when I pulled the shoes out, it was obvious the repair had already failed - the sole has delaminated. Dangit, Noni! Luckily I found a pair of size 10 Chaco waterproof hiking boots for $40 in the clearance area. (Now if I could just get Chaco to fix my sandal resoles that exploded 2 weeks after receipt.) Also bought 2 weeks of dehydrated meals for in Denali. I'll get oatmeal & trail mix in Healy. The bookstore took my book & I got a hard cover (not in paperback, apparently) of Larsson's The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest (3rd of the trilogy). Then McDonalds for free WiFi where I downloaded books & movies while chatting with Rae. Josh is driving the U-Haul toward Spokane while Rae follows in the Highlander with Bailey. They should be there the day I go into the park. Finally ready, I roll out of town & up an at-times-steep 10 mile hill. There's a set of stiff rollers on the ridge I've climbed onto but the expansive scenery distracts wonderfully. Colors aren't turned in whole sections of forest yet - indvidual trees are often resplendent, though - but from a good vantage, it's lovely to see the huge patches of light green amidst the dark conifers, interspersed with lakes & connecting rivers, alight with reflective sunshine, clouds in the background ... wild, open, intimidating, lovely. I stop before Nenama at a lightly trashed, hidden pullout next to the Tanana River. Tent up. Stretch. The river is at least 1/4 mile wide here & laden with dirt. It moves by talking, sucking, & pulling. Logs float, eddies form, whirlpools combine gracefully. With the long sunset behind distant blue & orange clouds, I sit on the silt bank contemplating the adventure, my life, the destruction & turmoil of humanity, ... etc. Looking out across the scenic, wild river with all the trash behind me & thus out of view is a perfect situational metaphor for how we all live: keep the blinders on, ignore the chaos resulting from our collective desire for comfort & convenience ... "Ignore the man behind the curtain." A sour taste forms in my mouth from my part in it. Sadness overwhelms me so easily at times on this adventure & I realize that missing & longing for Rae is like an undertow. The adventure, all I've seen, all the great people I've met ... all that exuberance & wonder have been slightly undermined, slightly diminished, simply because I miss her so constantly & so deeply. I know she wants me to enjoy every minute as thoroughly & as engaged as possible, so I try & am glad that there are so many times in any given day where I can claim success. But there are days when I cannot & I just cry all day while turning the pedals. There are too many evenings to count when melancholy is invited into my head. A natural hazard of an odd, somewhat troubled person traveling alone for so long, I think. - On another topic, I am quite used to being really dirty now. & my mustache looks so ridiculous. Somehow, I'm reluctant to shave it for the PBS filming. I know I look stupid but I'm somehow still thinking it might really improve with another month. Re-tard.
Aug 25:
59 miles to Healy. 1000-530. Got up early to watch sunrise on a very clear morning with great colors over the river, then back into bed for a little longer. Good breakfast in Nenama, then some cute old ladies wanted to chat in the sun. Easy, crisp rolling on flat roads to Clear where I made a salami sandwich, had an ice cream bar, & talked to Rae. But a trivial parting comment from her left me brooding all afternoon &, unfortunately, the weather & terrain changed, too. A fierce, cold, gusting 25-35 mph headwind & stiff rolling hills made me work pretty hard on this, the last long day of riding (there's just 12 miles from Healy to Denali NP from here, & I intend to ride back down the park road - camping & backpacking along the way - after having the park shuttle take me up it.) It took awhile to finish in that wind & I was chilled & tired but satisfied that I didn't whinge. The local store/CG has nice wooded tentsites & I put the tent up, stretch, walk over to the 49th State brewery for a cheeseburger & beers (they have the bus used in the film Into The Wild. Mostly because there's been folks tramping out to the real Magic Bus & some 22-year-old Swiss gal drowned trying to get out there. I'm sure I'll take some pics today.) Rae didn't answer so I continued to brood, showered, then watched The Big Lebowski on my phone. I'll take the $1 shuttle to Denali tomorrow to plan & get permits, then come back to Healy to do laundry & stock final groceries. Then it's Into The Park Saturday!
