No alarm clock in the bedrooms at the Airforce Lodge, but I find ya really don’t need any, for if the blanket, face mask, scarf, stretched out tube sock or whatever else you can scrounge up in your carryon luggage comes off your face in the middle of the night, the sun will find a way to rouse you.
Last night I went to bed around 11pm (Yukon Time) and the sun was still up. Not GLARING sunlight mind you, but sun indeed. And I awoke 5am, the sun was there again. So instead of fighting it, I just took that as a sign to get an early start.
The Airforce Lodge is just that, and old airforce barracks. The place is METICULUS. Due to the constant dust and grind this Territory takes, the owner has his place scrubbed from top to bottom EVERY day, and in an effort to help his cleaning staff, shoes must be taken off at the entrance way.
The hallways are slender and long, the rooms are tiny and perfect. Remember, that 4-5 pilots would bunk together in these rooms during the 2nd world war, while we were building the Alcan Highway.
The showers are communal with 5 individual stalls and each stall is extremely small and certainly not made for the large of tummy’s.
A fact proven to which, a very large man followed me out to leave the next morning fully dressed with a severe case of bed head. Proof that he most likely dropped a foot into said stall and realized that the physics were not lining up to allow him to get wet all at once, and instead of taking turns dipping body parts inside to wash, he simply decided to stink up his Buick for the next 3-400 miles and await the next motel.
He was from Iowa, what did ya expect.
Just saying.
The mosquitoes have made their arrival as I warm Kai up in the early morning sun, and thankfully I am dressed like I’m negotiating a hostage crisis and cannot be bitten anyplace.
Spoke too soon, one got my foot
Forgot my boots inside the doorway.
We ride off and immediately found myself behind a old Nissan driven by Fred and Lamont Sanford, and decided it was time to break my first law in Canada (excusing the border situation), and pass on the double yellow, as coming all the way to the Yukon, just to be killed or maimed by hitting an old Frigidaire that had an escape from the back of an old rusted out import was not gonna get me any free drinks at my local bar.
Wish they would pull over to tie their shit down before hurting someone this morning.
Big Dummy’s.
The next 77 miles or flew by with nary a wildlife sighting, if you don’t count checking myself in the rearview every few miles, and I soon land at Rancheria RV Gas and Restaurant for my first fuel stop.
Topped off and the owner was so cool that I decided to finally sit down and enjoy a sit down breakfast for once. I order a Yukon Special, and was chit chatting it up with the whole dining room.
These things happen on the road, as I don’t believe I have ever tried to chit chat it up with the whole dining room at my local Applebee’s, although when I’m back in town, I’m gonna try!
The man closest to me feels a little sorry for my trip, as he has pretty much came up the same way and knows what weather I have run into here and again, but I shrug it off.
I mean, look at where I am and what I’ve seen so far. Bad weather shouldn’t let ruin a trip like this.
It would be like turning down a ride in the General Lee just because Coy and Vance were driving it.
Another guy asks if I plan on doing the Dempster Highway, and I say hell no, much too dangerous for my interest.
I had to have that metal plate in my head replaced because every time someone revved up the microwave Id piss my pants and forget who I was for a half hour or so. Over at the V.A. they replaced it with a plastic one and it aint as strong and I don’t think I should be sailing up no damn gravel highway with nothing between the ground and my brain but a piece of Government plastic.
Ok
I didn’t really say that, but come-on, let’s all imagine the guys face if I did!
The next 200 miles into Whitehorse were gorgeous but uneventful. No more wildlife on this stretch either, but anytime I got bored, I would pass a line of RV’s, cruise up the road about a mile or 2, jumped off my bike with camera in hand at some random spot, and act like I’m taking pictures real excited like, then, when all the RV’s would stop and everyone jump out with camcorders and such, I would drop my hands all disgusted like, snap my fingers and say
“Ya JUST missed the biggest Grizzly I’ve ever seen”
Jump on my bike and left them, all running amok trying to catch a glimpse.
Ok
I didn’t really do that, but come-on, let’s all imagine their faces if I did.
Tomorrow, Beaver Creek Yukon!
Peace Grease and Beats
