catching up, again.

Once again I've let my blog fall behind, and so I'm motivated to make some changes. It's difficult to give a detailed account of each day of the trip. It's time consuming, and I don't want to spend too much time using computers. I am, after all, adventuring after having spent two and a half years using computers in an office. In order to reduce my typing time I am going to make posts much shorter and less detailed. I'll be happy to give more details about locations or encounters if you ask me, and please do feel free to ask, but I'm not going to include as much detail in the blog from here on out. That said, on to the updates:

Saturday, 14 July: Late start out of White River, sometime around 11:30am. After riding for just less than an hour I stopped for a cinnamon bun and coffee at a "gift/rock shop" and spent 40 minutes talking to the old folks that owned, ran, and lived at the store. Hoping for a short day I planned on staying at a campground that my map showed to be 30km away. I arrived and found that it had been shut down. After having lunch and studying my map I resigned to ride to the next place on my map, the Kluane Village Campground, 35km away. The sky was cloudless and I was quickly going through my water. I finished my last drop just after the roadsign announcing "Kluane Village Campground - 2km". 2km later I learned that Kluane Village was not in fact a village, it was a large gas station with a field for camping. This place too had been shut down. I tried to refill my water but there was no power and so no water could be pumped. By the side of the road I waved my empty water bottles until a passing motorist stopped who had water to spare. The man that stopped, an Alaskan, refilled all my bottles, a combined 5 liters. My map showed there to be no other campgrounds until Burwash Landing, 50km away. I didn't arrive until almost 10pm. This was, up to this point, my longest day and hardest day of riding. At Burwash Landing Resort, which has free tenting, I met Martine and F(something), two cyclists from Belgium and Germany, respectively, who Ben and Kayla had met in Tok.

Sunday, 15 July: (Free tenting) + (more than 80 miles covered on Saturday) = Day off. There's not too much to tell. Burwash Landing is really small, has a free-store(!), and is surrounded by beautiful countryside. The "resort" was on the shore of Kluane Lake, which was big and warm. I didn't really swim since I didn't have a suit and the "resort" restaurant was right on the lake, but I spent a lot of time wading with my pants rolled past my knees. Ben and Kayla rolled in around 8.30pm.

Monday, 16 July: First we rode to, through, and past Destruction Bay. That's an excellent name. We had planned on camping at Cottonwood RV park, but when we arrived we found that it cost $26 to pitch a tent, a price that we all agreed was outrageous, and so we rode on. It began to rain immediately after we left. The next campground was called "Kluane Base Camp". We arrived to find that it wasn't a campground, but a collection of cabins. The owner told us that we could pitch our tents for $40! After a short conference we decided to ride the remaining 60km to Haines Junction. It rained the entire way. Approximately 12km before we rode into Haines Junction we had a really fun, really fast downhill. Here we set our current speed record for the trip: 75.8 kmph, or 47.1 mph. Riding this fast, in the rain, unable to see because of the water on my glasses, I thought "I should get a helmet". In Haines Junction we stayed in a home owned by my friends, Sally and Trevor. It was wonderful to have someplace warm and dry to sleep, and to be able to cook on a real stove, and to be able to shower and do laundry. After more than 80 miles of riding, most of which was in the rain, I don't think I could overstate how much we appreciated their willingness to share their home.

Tuesday, 17 July: Relaxing day off in Haines Junction. There's a great bakery you should visit if you're ever in town. I watched Jurassic Park.

Wednsday, 18 July: We hitchhiked to Haines, AK, to see southeast AK and to give my tendons some more time to heal. Doug, driving a tractor trailer, gave us a ride the entire way. I had never been in a tractor trailer before and was surprised to find how much space there is in the cab. We listened to Fleetwood Mac, Rumors, three times during the ride. I didn't mention it then, but I enjoyed it.

Thursday, 19 July: Haines is beautiful. If you've been to southeast you know what I mean, If you haven't, we'll talk about it sometime. It wasn't nearly as tourist-y as I expected it would be, despite the fact that it's a stopping point for cruise ships. Though I have fallen in love with Alaska while I've lived here, I thought that there wasn't much chance I would move back here after this trip. Now that I've been in Haines for a while though, I might. I think I would really like to live in Haines.