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August 1, 2014
Day 14 - Coldfoot, AK to Deadhorse, AK (Fri 8/1/14)
Above: The 500 mile mud road makes the license plate illegible, but it's not like the road is patrolled anyway. The pigs are scared to go on it. Sections of it are paved, but most of it is unpaved.
Additional Photos in the Extended Entry.
(Fri 8/1/14)
Update: I am alive and well and resting peacefully on the shores of the Arctic Ocean in Deadhorse, Alaska.
Starting Odometer: 19,354
Ending Odometer: 19,604
Miles Driven Today: 250
Miles Driven This Trip: 4,951
Here's a rough map of where we went today.
So, this morning, I wake up. Get out of bed at something reasonable like 8:30. Go for breakfast, and to refuel the bike.
I surf the internet in the cafeteria for an hour, as you have to pay for vouchers to use the internet, and it's only via satellite. The bandwidth is indescribably slow. Like breathing through a straw.
Then I decide to go deal with my chain. Task avoidance, again. I've been putting it off for days, and now there are metal shards on my chain guard. My chain hangs so low that women and children point out that it needs to be addressed.
So I get out there in the parking lot to deal with the issue. It's cool, cloudy, and the mosquitos are not as bad as they have been, but as soon as I start work on the bike, they find me, of course. This wave of mosquitos comes over and I'm wearing all of my motorcycle gear, including a helmet, and I spray myself with Deep Woods Off from head to toe, but it doesn't make any difference. They're all fighting over me, tooth and nail. Feuds are starting between long-time-friendly klans of mosquitos. "We found him first...he's ours."
I loosen the rear axel, and adjust the chain tension fairly quickly. Probably it takes 10 minutes. Why did I put that off for so long?
Now that the chain is fixed, it dawns on me that there's no real rush to get back to...anywhere really. I don't have a job. It's not like I have a whole lot to go home to. Part of me wants to see Deadhorse, the Brooks Range, Prudhoe Bay, and the Arctic Circle.
Not that it's anything worth seeing, mind you. More of the point that I'm here, so may as well look around a bit.
The sticker the guys gave me yesterday says "Ride North".
I look around the restaurant, and see another person I'd not seen before. He's on a GS1200R (not the GSA with the 8 gallon tank).
"Where you headed, boss?"
"North."
"How fast you go?"
He just laughs and smiles.
"We're riding together," I say, and leave to pack my bike.
His name is Remus and he's from Romania. As it turns out, he normally rides a Harley. He rented the BMW GS1200R from a company out of Anchorage. Later he tells me that it's a large motorcycle renting outfit. I forget the name of the place. They're all over the world, apparently. I'm learning so much on the trip. I'm just so clueless, really. Update: I think the company he rented from is MotoQuest.
I pack up my bike while he eats lunch/breakfast or whatever meal it is for him. I have no clue. (Later, I learn that he's already driven up from Fairbanks this morning. So, he drove 1/2 of the Dalton Highway while I was asleep in bed. Not that that's hard to do, because I'm pretty lazy. But when he was eating lunch at Coldfoot Camp after driving 250 miles for 6 hours, I was just rolling out of bed and eating breakfast.)
He's filled a plastic anti-freeze bottle/jug with gasoline and I give him duct tape to tape it to his rear rack on the bike. It's going to be 250 miles to the next gas station, so we're both going to have to carry extra fuel. I have a 2 gallon gas container on the back of my bike. He has an anti-freeze jug of gas. Good enough.
By the time we leave, it's 11:45 a.m.
I ask a few people, and they all say it's 240 miles to Deadhorse. There is no gas on the way. The only place to get gas is in Coldfoot and Deadhorse. I have no reservation in Deadhorse, and am just hoping to find a room in the "town" of Deadhorse.
We start out rolling north on a paved stretch of the Dalton Highway, and quickly enter into the Brooks Range. The mountains are stunning. It's clear, warm, and sunny. A beautiful day for a motorcycle ride to the north coast.
After about 40 miles, the pavement disappears, and we're relegated to riding on dirt. But I have no problem with this. We're rolling about 60 mph - 80 mph, no problem. So, even though the road isn't paved, I have no problem going across a dirt road at 85 mph. It's not a problem.
Then, we come to some road construction. And have to stop and wait our turn. While we're waiting, Remus empties his container of gas into his tank. I missed this, because I was busy fending off swarms of mosquitos.
We had been taking lots of pictures up to this point..both of us stopping frequently. But about now, it begins to rain. So, we're shooting less, and driving as the road conditions deteriorate.
Eventually, I can no longer keep up with Remus and I pretty much lose him. Not that it's a big deal. But the road really sucks. It's just this clay-muddy-slippery nightmare that makes it nearly impossible to keep a bike up. Like...the bike has a mind of it's own and it just sort of slides left to right, as I try to keep it going straight down the road.
My buddy dumped his bike and flew back to Connecticut to allow his ribs to heal. I can see now how it happened. I'm sure he went down on the wet clay roads. They're slippery as eels.
We're heading north, and coming south are these trucks going twice the speed limit. The speed limit is 50 mph, and these trucks are coming by at 70 mph, throwing rocks into my helmet, my visor, and my left shoulder. And, they're flipping us off also, for whatever reason.
I slow down some and lose sight of Remus. He's gone ahead of me for whatever reason. Not really what I was expecting to happen, but it is what it is. It's sort of intimidating riding alone across the arctic tundra on sloppy rainy wet clay roads with 18 wheelers screaming down on you with those enormous "Elk Pushers" on the front of the cabs.
Eventually, my bike shuts down, and I pull over to pour my 2 gallon gas can into the left tank. I've driven 224 miles when it grinds to a halt. Pour in the 2 gallons, and now I should be able to go another 80 miles.
Fire up the bike and keep rolling north towards Deadhorse, AK. It's not really raining at this point, per se, it's just miserable. Just cold, wet, sloppy driving down a 100 mile muddy slippery road.
Of course, as I near the town, I'm not really sure what to expect. Maybe I'll find Remus. Maybe I won't. And it's not like I have a reservation or anything.
Now, as I get into town, I see Remus parked out in front of the place, waiting on me. I pull into the parking lot. He's talking to someone that works here. As it turns out, he has two rooms already reserved and paid for. And his buddy didn't show up.
"Why don't we just split one room so we can save money?" I ask.
"We have two rooms that are already paid for. You can have one of them," he offers.
I'm like...fair enough.
Dinner is in an hour. See you there.
Photos in the Extended Entry.
Above: The KTM at the Coldfoot Camp.
Above: Two eighteen-wheelers at Coldfoot Camp with "Moose Goosers" or "Moose Pushers" on the front. This "cow catcher" is designed to prevent damage to the 18 wheeler cabs during the inevitable encounter with a moose.
Above: Don't feed the bears.
Above: Heading north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse.
Alaskan Piepline visible in background.
Above: Heading north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse.
Alaskan Piepline visible in background. Here, Remus stops for a shot. Note that he's riding a BMW GS1200R that he rented in Anchorage. The gas can they provided him had a hole in it, so he filled up an anti-freeze jug and we duct-taped it to his bike.
Above: Driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, we encounter the Brooks Range.
Above: Driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, we encounter the Brooks Range.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The truckers along the route are the most aggressive drivers I've ever encountered. They think that they own the road. They speed, and drive down the middle of the road, intentionally trying to run us off the road. Remus said that every truck that passed us flipped us off..
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: The Brooks Range, as seen driving north up the Dalton Highway from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, AK.
Above: Here, we stop for some road construction and Remus uses the time wisely to pour gas from his antifreeze jug into his gas tank. I was no so smart. I waited for my bike to run out of gas before pouring the gas from my 2 gallon container into the motorcycle gas tank. He later said he told me to pour in my gas also, but apparently I didn't understand him.
Above: The treeless tundra north of the Brooks Range along the Dalton Highway.
Above: The treeless tundra north of the Brooks Range along the Dalton Highway.
Above: The treeless tundra north of the Brooks Range along the Dalton Highway.
Above: Remus fiddles with his bike along the Dalton Highway.
Above: The 500 mile mud road makes the license plate illegible, but it's not like the road is patrolled anyway. The pigs are scared to go on it. Sections of it are paved, but most of it is unpaved.
Above: We were told that towing a vehicle down the Dalton costs $5.00 per mile. Not sure if that's true or not, but this vehicle appeared to have been abandoned, so the towing story is probably true. If you crash up here, I think you just report it stolen and let the state have it.
Posted by Rob Kiser on August 1, 2014 at 9:32 PM
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