Back to the USA...

I read Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road” until I fell asleep.  I didn’t dream about bears but I did have some odd dreams…  Like a really vivid dream that I’d woken up to find a dozen other motorcyclists camped all around me.  But when I woke up it was only me and my tent rustling in the morning breeze.  Sunlight was lighting the peaks but I could see a big storm hanging over Glacier National Park.

I packed up my gear onto the bike and jumped on Shamu.  We rode the 2 minutes to the border, snapped a couple pictures there for good measure and got into the line.  About a dozen cars and a tour bus were there waiting for the border to open.  I glanced down at the clock on the dash:  8:59am.  Good timing.

It was sunny out, just a little chilly.   The border procedures were swift and soon I was riding into Montana.  Back in the USA!  The road along Chief Mountain was superb and the sights continued to please my eyes.  I wound around down through the foothills to the little hamlet of St. Mary at the east entrance to Glacier National Park.  I could see heavy purple cloud stuck to the mountains and the hazy hue of falling rain.  I went into the little café and sat down for breakfast and coffee, hoping the weather would burn off as the sun got higher.  Wishful thinking.

Fueled and fed, I rode off into the park.  It was super windy though still sunny but that only lasted a few minutes as the road quickly climbed towards Logan Pass.  The rain started.  It wasn’t a problem in the beginning because I was moving fast enough to keep it off of me.  The Park Ranger told me today was the last day that the road would be open for the season.  What she didn’t tell me was that the road was under construction at the pass and traffic was only allowed through in one direction at a time.  So I sat in nearly freezing rain for 20 minutes waiting for our turn through.  At 6600 feet it wasn’t even close to being a high pass in my opinion, but it was high enough to be cold and miserable sitting in idling traffic getting rained on.

The big difference between being in the cold and rain in Glacier National Park vs. the Canadian Parks of the day before is that I was always moving in the latter.  The highways followed the general direction of the mountain range whereas in Glacier the road climbs and traverses the mountains.  Also instead of slightly broken cloud cover creating tremendous effects of light on the landscape, here it was completely socked in and gray. 

Our turn to go over the pass had come and I rolled along at 5 mph sharing the narrow road that clings to the cliffside with dumptrucks, dozers, graders and excavators.  Oh and it was all gravel, wet gravel, less than desirable conditions to say the least.  I could tell that on a nice day this drive would be astonishing. 

Once I was through the construction zone I zipped along down the valley and out of the rain.  The temperature spiked and soon I was out of the park and ripping southeast through a nice valley filled with yellow fields and tons of sunshine.  The mountains could be seen all around and all topped with the same heavy purple.  I had opted for a backcountry highway instead of the Interstate highway.  The road was a sweeping serpentine of perfect pavement and the Montana 70 mph speed limits lead to some really exhilarating riding.  I followed highway 83 south past Swan Lake and then Seeley Lake and then caught 200 east towards Great Falls turning south again on 141 until its junction with US 12 through Helena to 287 south to I-90 for the last 30 miles into Bozeman.

People like to drive fast in Montana.  I got behind a SUV that had passed me on 141 and we zipped along through the rangeland foothills at 100mph almost all the way to Helena.

I pulled into Bozeman, rode directly to Seven Sushi and had some of the best sushi ever.  My great friend Drew Chlebeck and his younger brother Nick own the joint.  This was my first visit since they opened their restaurant.  Drew sliced me up some excellent sushi and even some very rare Montana beef.  And I happily washed it down with some of Montana’s finest craft beer, Coldsmoke Ale from Missoula.

I couldn’t think of a better way to finish off a spectacular ride.  I decided that Bozeman would make a great place to take a day off and rest.  It has been a swift 2750 miles since Fairbanks on Tuesday afternoon which averages out to 500 miles per day in 5.5 days.

Next up:  Yellowstone National Park, Teton National Park and off towards lovely Colorado.

Jasper, Alberta -> Cheif Mountain Border...

Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada:   7:30 am - 36°F.  Occasional freezing rain and snow.

I couldn’t think of anywhere that I’d rather be than behind the handlebars of this amazing BMW motorcycle.  

Stan knocked on my door at 7:15 am as I’d asked him to do last night.  He was getting ready to leave for a day of Search and Rescue training in the foothills outside of the park.  I looked at my phone wondering why my alarm hadn’t gone off.  I set the alarm for 7 am before I went to sleep last night.  When I looked at the phone it was immediately clear.  My phone read 6:16.  I’d ridden across another time zone without knowing it. 

I was groggy and considered going back to bed.  I shook it off, made my way hastily through my morning duties and suited up for another day of adventure about the BMW Luxury Tourer.

Stan and I chatted in the street while the motorcycles warmed up in the crisp cold morning air.  The sky was light but it would be a couple hours before the sun would crest the mountaintops to the east.  Stan told me that I’d probably have some bad weather once I got closer to the Columbia Icefield pass.  We shook hands while I thanked him over and over again for the comfy bed to sleep in.  Shivering slightly there in the street, I knew I would have been pushing the limits of my 0°F rated down sleeping bag had I ended up in the Whistler Campground.

I opted to skip breakfast for the moment and scoot out of Jasper hoping to catch some alpenglow on the huge jagged mountain peaks.  My ride into Jasper last night was stunning and I was so excited to ride the Icefields Parkway through Jasper National Park.  My planned route would take me through three Canadian National Parks back to back.  First passing through Jasper then crossing into Banff and then into Kootenay before rounding down into Radium Hot Springs.

My first miles of the day, I shivered along stopping frequently awestruck by the mountains looming over me on both sides of the road.  Clouds stuck to the mountaintops and I could see their dusty white produce just below cloud level.  The mountains here are just amazing.  Rough and jagged reaching straight to the heavens with little left to the imagination, this landscape is incredibly powerful.  Each mountain has its own personality.  The overall height of these peaks is quite a bit lower than the Rockies of Colorado but the vertical rise is similar if not greater here.  The treeline is much lower than I’m used to giving a totally different appearance; one of enormous eye-crushing grandeur.

When I saw a sign for a roadside restaurant, I decided it was time to pull over and fuel my body with something warm.  Plus my camera battery warning indicator had started flashing red.  I parked, grabbed my charger, and headed into the warm touristy restaurant.

The clouds had covered up the peaks and I worried that I may have made a mistake by stopping.  I hurried through my “Bus Driver’s Special,” which was a finely crafted breakfast burrito with bacon, cheddar, roasted peppers and scrambled eggs served with breakfast potatoes.

Back on the bike I was happy to see that the clouds were an ever-changing display and not a hunkered down get ready for winter kind of clouds.  I motored on stopping nearly every mile to snap another photo or ten.  The snow started up around the icefield.  Sun fought its way through the flakes creating a sublime display.  The glacier was beautiful working its way down to its terminal lake.  I could see big ice rover tour busses inching along way up the glacier.  I thought about what a miserable way to travel busses are.  Hundreds, actually thousands of people packed into motorcoaches to be hustled through the park in warmth and comfort only to pile out and get into another bus, this time an all-terrain model, to take another slightly less comfortable ride bumping up a glacier.  All of this touring without ever really experiencing the joy of a numbing nose and the exhilaration of stinging raindrops on ones face while trying to manage a 800lb motorcycle on less the perfect road conditions.  I bet those silly tourists stayed in a 5 star hotel and ate first class food and I even bet someone else carried their luggage to their room too!  Who could stand for such babying?

I rode higher and higher up the pass.  The weather got worse, the snow picking up in intensity and even starting to stick to the shoulders of the road and to my windshield.  And every mile that the weather worsened my smile grew bigger until it nearly burst through my helmet at the summit.

The clouds on the other side of the pass broke for a moment revealing the most incredible view dropping immediately away into the next valley and Banff National Park.  Encore!  I could see the road twisting down the mountainside like a piece of limp spaghetti tossed off the kitchen counter.  I wanted to stop to take a photo but my desire to lean the BMW into each and every one of those switchbacked curves was so great that my fingers simply wouldn’t work the brakes to pull over.  My wrist disobeyed ever order from my brain and kept twisting the throttle further revving my joy to near redline.

I saw my first yellow leaves since the Cassiar Highway hundreds of miles ago.  Crystal clear glacier green rivers raced by alongside the beautifully paved parkway.  The weather worsened but it was actually to my benefit.  If the sun had burned away all of the clouds it could have taken me weeks to get to Lake Louise.  Even though I couldn’t see the mountaintops, I could feel their presence looming over me. 

Soon I found myself racing along a four-lane brand new highway heading towards Banff.  A few miles more of this high-speed nonsense and I was winging off onto Highway 93 south again, this time into Kootenay National Park.  The road was a little less perfect and the scenery was great, though not quite as astounding as Banff and Jasper.  But the weather was getting better and the temperature was warming.  Several forest fires swept through the area in years past leaving their mark on the landscape.  Thousands of bare aspens filled the mountains with a void stark gray.

The road continued its descent and with every mile the temperature climbed.  Just before Radium Hot Springs I spotted a white rental car pulled off on a side parking lot,  I looked with curiosity wondering why they would be parked in such an odd spot.  Two huge Bighorn Sheep stood only a stones toss from two tourists snapping pictures.  I pulled over and popped a couple quick shots.  The tourists were an English couple who were more than eager to chat with me.  The old man with rotten teeth was rambling on about every motorcycle connection he ever had.  Mostly stories about other people.  Unfortunately the whole time he was rambling on he stood between me and the Bighorns.  I missed several great shots and finally resorted to snapping shots of the big beasts nibbling salt from the pavement with no more than a highway maintenance facility for a backdrop.  Well at least now I know every motorcycle that this guy’s son has owned…

I stopped at Radium Hot Springs planning to hop in for a soak using the free pass Parrish Moses had given me back in Fairbanks.  The thought of rearranging everything on the bike and dragging all my valuable gear and trudging into this packed facility was less appealing than the thought of soaking on hot natural pools.  I stopped a couple that was leaving and asked about the springs.  “Yeah it’s a big swimming pool with warm water and hundreds of people.”

A young guy with three kids had just pulled up near me.  I went over and gave him my free pass.  He was delighted.  He told me it gets a bit expensive for the family but his kids just love playing in the warm pool.  All is well and I motored off down the tight canyon with walls that nearly arched over the roadway they were so tight.  Next thing I knew I was back on the valley floor in 66° F clear weather.  The valley was wide and full of yellow fields of hay.  I motored off for Fernie at a swift 120 kph.

A few mule deer eating on the side of the road and lots and lots of farmland were all I passed.  When I turned away from Cranbrook heading to Fernie, I came into the mountains again.  I expected an excellent ski town in Fernie to have a few beers and find a place to camp for the night.  Though the ski area looked impressive, the town was not, so I fueled up and rode on.  A half hour past Fernie, I came to a traffic jam.  I jumped on the shoulder and tooled along slowly until I came to another motorcyclist.  I joined him in his lane and chatted with him for some time.  He was riding a well outfitted FZR and said his pillion passenger was walking several miles ahead to find out what was going on.  They’d been there for 45 minutes already.

Turns out there was a head on collision between a pickup and a mini van in one of the corners on Crowsnest Pass.  Double fatality.  What a shame.

About a half hour later the roads opened up and I was moving again towards the border.  I stopped for some quick fast-food at an A&W and rode off into the darkening night for the Montana border at Chief Mountain.  I got a up-close view of the biggest bull elk I’ve ever seen.  A little too close, like about 6 feet in front of me as I rounded a corner in the dark.  Thank God for Brembo brakes!

I entered my fourth National Park of the day when I crossed into Watertown Lakes N.P.  I passed a sign stating the hours of operation at the border offices.  9:00-18:00

Missed it by several hours.  Right next to that sign was a sign for River Belly campground 17 kms ahead. 

The campground at River Belly was closed so I continued on to the border where I found a beautiful pull-off with relatively flat ground and an incredible view into the mountains of the Watertown-Glacier International Peace Park.  I set up my tent, wondering about bears.  There were elk tracks everywhere and even some nice cow patties.  I hoped the rustling of my nylon tent would keep the bears at bay.  Just in case, I grabbed my Gerber knife and kept it close to my sleeping bag figuring that should a Grizzly make the terrible mistake to mess with me I’d simply stab it in the eye!

Smithers, BC -> Jasper, Alberta...

SUNSHINE!!!                                                 High 60° F  Low 48° F  Occasional drizzle, lots of sun.

I woke up at 7 am and looked out the window of my motel room.  Puffy white clouds capped Hudson Bay Mountain.  Bits of blue sky tried to peek out around the clouds, but it was looking like it would be another day of rainy riding.

I crawled back into bed.  I’d slept like a baby all night and the room was still void of any rogue noise.  I quickly drifted off to sleep again.  My second alarm went off at 8.  I repeated the process of peeking out the window.  This time to my surprise the clouds were breaking and there was now more blue than white.  I quickly put on a pot of complimentary coffee and jumped in the shower. 

The process of packing the bike and gearing up took all of twenty minutes.  I slurped down my coffee, ate a bag of salted peanuts and motored out of Smithers with a full tank of gas and a giant smile warmed by the rays of sun shining brightly into my helmet.

This was the first I’d seen real sunshine since Tuesday when I left Fairbanks.  My nose had totally cleared up, my sinuses as well, and I felt tremendously better.  Maybe it was the shot of whiskey my bartenders Jade and Melissa deemed that I needed with my dinner last night.  I pointed the big BMW 1200 East and twisted the throttle excitedly.  The pavement on British Columbia Highway 16 was impeccable with large lanes and wide paved shoulders.  The landscape was bright green with only a hint of autumn in the air.  I rode briskly past forests, rivers and hayfields freshly cut and rolled into giant bales for coming winter.

I felt like I’d been transported to an entirely different place than I’d ridden into yesterday.  It was a strange cross of Minnesota and Colorado, two of my favorite places.  The valley floor had the reminiscent fields, farms, lakes and rivers of the Midwest, while in the near distance mountains rose up and created a sublime horizon backdrop.

The road opened up and straightened out as the mountains receded and faded into hills.  Did that sign say 100 kph?  Whoops.  It amazes me that the LT is just as stable and nimble at a 100mph as it is at 30.  Other than the plywood cutout of a police car back in Destruction Bay, I hadn’t had the pleasure of crossing any RCMP, or Royal Canadian Mounted Police, which is good because I set the cruise control at roughly 100 miles per hour for the first hour of the day.  I passed logging truck after logging truck on my way towards Prince George swooping through curves like I was riding a giant flying killer whale.  What was in that coffee?

But then just when I was thinking I’d be in Prince George in no time, I got stuck in a no passing zone behind a logging truck full of freshly harvested trees.  I snuck out onto the centerline to check my options for a quick pass and whoosh a decked out RCMP squad car zoomed past in the oncoming lane.  O.k. so British Columbia really does have Police.  When I finally got around the truck I decided I’d stick to 20kph above the speed limit.  The road straightened out and passed by quickly.  Soon I was rolling down a steep winding grade and the highway became two lanes in each direction.  I was in Prince George.

I’d fueled up about 20 minutes earlier so I simply followed the signs for Jasper and continued on through this rather large junction city.  I crossed a big river and climbed another hill.  The sign said some 170 km’s to the next gas.  I had enough.  I hoped.  Snow dusted mountains could be seen to the north and forested mountains to the south.  I cruised along at a swift 120kph along the tree lined highway for several more hours soaking in the sun and scenery.  Occasionally clouds would gather and sprinkle on me but never for very long. 

I fueled up again and snacked on some pepperoni sticks and a bottle of orange juice realizing that it was already 2:30pm and I hadn’t eaten a real meal yet today.  I felt good so I decided to push on to Jasper, where I’d have dinner and then find a campground.  I looked in the sideview mirror and saw a bright red face looking back at me.  Sunburn.  A little late for sunscreen but I guess better late than never.  I lathered my nose and cheekbones up thick and prepared for the last 200 km’s of my British Columbia traverse.

The mountains closed in on the valley and everything got really big on both sides of the highway.  I rounded the corner and nearly fell out of the saddle at the sight of giant Mt. Robson.  Robson is the biggest peak in the Canadian Rockies and to say that it was impressive is a gross understatement.  Steep sheer faces laden with snow, avalanche chutes dumping down into huge white aprons of debris and clouds clinging to its face appeared miniature to its massive bulk looming over the highway that rode straight at it.  I was awestruck.  I pulled off to the side of the road stopping to take pictures for the first time today.  I’d settled for snapping the occasional shot while riding before but this was too amazing not to stop.

The rest of the ride to Jasper was incredible too but nothing I’d seen on this journey hit me quite as hard as the first sight of Mt. Robson.  Welcome to Alberta, the Wild Rose Province.

I motored into Jasper only to find out that it is the weekend of the annual Jasper Motorcycle Rally.  What a coincidence.  I also found out that all but one of the National Park’s campgrounds are closed for the season.  I got directions to Whistler Campground, swung into the grocery store and grabbed a bottle of water and some Lipton Rice packets. 

I lapped the little ski/tourist town a couple times checking out the motorcycles parked along the road and waved to the bikers.  I decided it would be a shame not to have a beer and some dinner before I made my way to camp.  Evening twilight was lighting the mountaintops with a warm alpenglow and somehow I felt home.  Nothing like a good touristy ski town to make me feel welcome in a foreign place.

I rounded through the streets dodging gawking tourists and wondered when my intuition would say, “HERE!”  Finally it did when I passed a parked R1150GS for the third time.  I backed Shamu in next to the GS and wandered into the Dead Dog Saloon and pulled up a seat at the packed bar.  The bartender was friendly and poured me a frosty pint of local brew.  I ordered a homemade chicken pot pie and a mixed green salad with Italian dressing.  The pot pie ended up being straight from the grocer’s freezer and the salad came with ceasar dressing, but the beer was excellent.

An odd sensation came over me midway through my meal that I should go out and check on my bike.  I slid my barstool back and walked out to the darkening street to find the GS owner backing up on the other side of my moto this time. 

I started chatting with him.  Turns out that he is a local here in Jasper.  He introduced himself as Stan.  I asked him about the campground and how long of a drive it would be to get there.  Stan started giving me directions.  Halfway through his discourse on how Whistler was the only campground left open, information I already knew, he stopped mid-sentence and asked, “Can I offer you a bed and a shower instead?  I’ve got a lock-off apartment at my house and no one is staying in it tonight.” 

So here I lay in Stan’s lockoff, freshly showered after a couple of pints and some live music and lots and lots of motorcycle chat with riders from all over Canada and the US.  I handed out lots of business cards and invited riders from all over to swing by the shop if they ever found their way to Fairbanks.  Stan and I made plans to meet in Dawson City next summer for the Dust 2 Dawson gathering that I attended this past June and to ride the Dempster Highway to Inuvik.  Another great friendship made and a damn fine shower and a bed to sleep in instead of a cold tent.  Not too shabby Jasper, Alberta.  I think I’ll take back all those snide Canadian jokes I used to tell.  “Like take off eh, that’s my Elsinore beer you hosebag.”

High 60° F  Low 48° F  Occasional drizzle, lots of sun.