....and then I started riding again.

The Haines Public Library is beautiful. I'm not at all informed about its history, but it looks like it's been built within the last 5 years. Most new buildings are, I think, ugly. This is an exception. I've not done much exploring of the shelves yet, but it looks great. I'll let you know what I find. Now though, I want to talk more about the trip.

Friday: Having made plans to meet Ben and Kayla in Haines Junction on Thursday the 19th, which is tomorrow, I was considering hitchhiking back to Anchorage to rest for a week and then hitching out to the scheduled meet up. My bike, I decided, would have to stay in Tok. It isn't easy to get a ride when you've also got a bike fully laden with panniers. After asking for help those few people in Tok with whom I'd become at all familiar I had no luck finding a place to store my bike and gear. What I did find, if I wanted it, was ride to the border. The Postal Service has a contract with a local man in Tok for the delivery of mail to every mailbox between Tok and the border along the Alaska Highway. This man agreed to let me ride with him to the border. Stopping at each mailbox made it seem like a long 93 miles, but he was good company. He was born and raised in Alaska, and was in his early 60's now, and had great stories of old Alaska. He told me of hunting year round for food, something that he still does, and about how Alaska has, unfortunately, calmed down a lot in the last 20 years. From his description it sounded to me like when he was my age an Alaskan man couldn't go a week without having to fight somebody. When I told him that I had enjoyed working in a library he said that he believed me, that I had the look of a "city boy", and that I'd not have been able to make it in old Alaska. He was probably right.

At the border we said goodbye and wished each other luck. An older Canadian couple helped me by holding my bike while I loaded bags and strapped bundles and bottles to racks. They asked about my trip, and when I told them our plans they said "that sounds miserable"! They were traveling in an RV.

I decided the ride the 27km between US and Canadian customs, and then to camp in Beaver Creek. The no-man's-land between borders was a weird stretch of road. It seemed to me that cars drove more slowly through it. Maybe the drivers wondered which nation's police would ticket them if they sped. Would it be neither, or possibly both? I had similar thoughts. If I were hit by a car or crashed hard during a fast descent where would the rescue workers come from?

Riding wasn't too painful, and I decided to keep on and not stop to see much of Beaver Creek. The Yukon, for those of you who haven't driven through it, is beautiful. The road winds around and over rolling hills, with nothing but trees, lakes, creeks and mountains to see on either side. That is, when you can see. From the US border I rode 80km, and at least 50km was on super dry, loose gravel. It was rough and offered little traction and so was slow riding, and each time a car passed it kicked a cloud of dirt into the air and shot rocks at me from beneath its tires. Though I thought that I was riding into a headwind, a common cyclist complaint that usually means "I'm tired and want to blame my fatigue on something other than myself", I was forced to accept that there was simply no noticeable wind. Each time a car passed it would send a cloud of dirt into the air that seemed to float directly above the road and take forever to settle to the road. By "forever" I guess that I mean "until I had ridden through it". When I finally stopped I was caked in dust, dirtier than I've ever been and more tired than you've ever been. I don't know how tired you have been, but I was really, really tired. And dirty.

....but then something wonderful happened that I'll write about later. It involves free food(!!!) and then some extra free food(!!!).