Goodbye to the Yukon

I neglected to write yesterday, I was tired.  Nothing much happened on the ride.  I am back in the mountains.  So hill after hill is pretty much how the day went.  I did see another Grizzly however, this time it was a good distance away.  I was high on the hillside and the bear was down by the river, doing whatever it is that bears do.  It didn’t look like he was fishing or foraging, just walking up the river moseying along.

I made it to Watson Lake, “the gateway to the Yukon” or in my case, the exit.  We spent some time visiting the signpost forest.  I am sure that you can look it up on the Internet; it is a really amazing place. 

It began when a homesick soldier working on the Alaskan Highway (during its construction), placed a sign with the distance to his hometown (Danville, IL) on the signpost in town.  Little did he know what he was starting; today there are over 68,000 signs that people from all over the world have placed there.  Some individuals actually make the trek to Watson Lake with the sole intention of placing a sign there.  Like most of the places we have been this also falls under the category, best experienced in person.  I would have loved to spend more time here just sitting and looking, it is a strangely peaceful place. Kind of amazing to think of all the individuals that put their mark on this place, it’s funny how a seemingly insignificant act would turn into something like this.  It is truly unique; there are over 68,000 people from all over the world who all share this place and have each made their individual mark on it.  We neglected to bring a sign; I was pretty busy worrying about the ride logistics.  However, we have agreed to return to Watson Lake in the future and bring a sign with us, not sure what the sign will be but we have some time to work on that.

 

Leaving Watson and the Yukon.

I awoke relatively early this morning, threw some pancakes down my throat and jumped on the bike.  I knew that I had a long day of hills ahead of me.  About twenty minutes outside of town I crossed the line from the Yukon into British Columbia.  It felt good to have Alaska and the Yukon behind me, but B.C. isn’t going to be easy.  Interesting fact that I learned about the Yukon, there are approximately 17,000 bears living in the Yukon and 33,000 people; in other words there is one bear for every two people that live up here.  That is a pretty amazing statistic.  More people live in B.C. but I am pretty sure that they have a hell of a lot of bears too.  The weather has finally turned and I have had great weather the past two days.  Today was actually pretty hot, I can’t seem to get a day in the middle, it’s either so cold that I can barely hold on to the handle bars or so hot I can’t get enough fluids down.  I drank 7.5 liters of various fluids (Gatorade, Accelerade, water, juice) today and I am still dehydrated.  So I am laying here in the van still trying to re-hydrate in preparation for tomorrow, which is going to be another hot day in the hills. 

Tomorrow though we are going to make it to Liard Hot Springs, which regardless of the temp outside is going to feel great on my muscles. 

7-25 Stats

76.28 miles

16.8mph average

40.2mph max

4:31:22 ride time

(tailwind for a good portion of the day)

7-26 Stats

70.07 miles

13.9mph average

43.8mph max

5:01:37 ride time