Flight to Denali

Sherry and I took a flight from Talkeetna to Denali.

               Landing on a Glacier. Four inches of new snow the day before.

Valdez and the Richardson Highway

Took the ferry across the Prince William Sound to Valdez and then up the Richardson Highway.

                                        On the ferry Aurora to Valdez, a 6 hour trip.

 Had the best Halibut dinner at the restaurant at the Best Western in Valdez.

                                          Valdez harbor.

                                                        Falls on the Richardson Highway

                                         High pass on the Richardson Highway

Sherry taking some photos.

Anchorage and on

Well I have been lax in keeping up with the blog. Doing this real time becomes quite a chore when you are so busy all day and often confronted with no connectivity in the evening. Sherry and I left Anchorage on June 26 and rode to Whittier in the rain to catch the ferry to Valdez.

I learned there is a saying about the weather in Whittier: if you complain about the weather where you are the response is, it's shittier in Whittier.

On to Anchorage

It's Thursday, June 23rd and I am headed to Anchorage on the Parks Highway. Beautiful scenery the whole way and I stopped in Denali National Park. Pictures don't do justice to the vastness of it all.

North Pole

After leaving Dawson City by a ferry over the Yukon River I rode the top of the world highway to Tok, Alaska. Unfortunately my cell phone with all the pictures of this portion of the trip was lost somewhere between Tok and my next stop in North Pole. Dave Yeager has a cousin there and she invited me to stay a day or two. So I visited Leslie and her husband Frank, and their 4 dogs and 2 cats. It was a pleasant change of pace.

 Stayed in this guest cabin in the backyard, thank you Leslie for giving up your "girl cave."

Slept in the loft, window open, it was great.

Frank smoked red salmon he had caught. It was fantastic.

Artic Circle

Decided to take advantage of fine weather and rode up to the Artic Circle on the Dempster Hwy in the Yukon. Sign here kinda disappointing. Looks like it is under repair. The Dalton sign is more impressive. Meet a bunch of folks on the way up that I was sitting with at the D2D banquet Friday night. We ended up camping together about  40 miles north of the circle. Very weird with no sunset.

                 Scenes on the Dempster

                 Damaged Artic Circle sign.

                   Camping by this stream.

                      Fellow motorcyclists

A Vermonter, two Aussies, me, wife of RCMP Officer who took the picture at about midnight. Nice fire was going.

Dempster Highway

Today I am heading up the Dempster toward Inuvik, NWT. Weather changes so quickly up here I want to take advantage of what looks like a couple of very nice days. The road is entirely gravel and best to do dry. It is about 250 miles to the Artic Circle which is my first objective, if the weather holds I will go to the end of the road to Inuvik. We will see how it goes.

 Last night gathering for the traditional Dust to Dawson midnight picture.