Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Day 26 - 53 miles -July 24 by Rita





Day 26 - July 24, by Rita

Aye… it’s a great day to finish off our bike tour of Canada. It has been a real experience! Just camping for 24 + days straight has been the kids’ dream come true. Race who has been avoiding the “far-between-shower” nights, now smells like a real little stick of firewood. He is happy, but we have banned him from taking off his shoes in the van. We spent last night at the White River RV Park where we were asked to join in on a little evening nature walk. Our guide was an interesting character that had a real love for nature. He had the kids spellbound with all the cool things that he had found in the ice fields back up in the mountains. The nature walk was to show us the plants in the area that were edible. Now the kids think we should try all the plants we learned about. We will see about! Just wait till I serve them a bunch of fried dandelions for dinner when we get home. We visited with Bob and Amanda, our guides and also the owners of the park. Bob has been there for 35 years and told stories about all the changes along the Alaska Highway. He was a very interesting fellow and after a long visit we headed to our tent and although it was 10 p.m., the sun was shining brightly on the rain that was drenching us and a bright double rainbow appeared over the grass airstrip near our tent. There was no pot of gold, so we all crawled into our tent for a good night’s sleep.

Today we were off to the border. It was only 53 miles away, so we were very excited and everyone wanted to ride. Once again the views were beautiful, although the road was rough. The closer we got to the border, the rougher the road was, with gravel and several road crews as the more important sights at this time. We had our first flat on a gravel stretch about 10 miles before Beaver Creek. We stopped for a nice lunch break at Buckshot Betty’s in Beaver Creek. Brett and the boys had the largest cinnamon rolls I have ever seen. We shared and they were good! Crossing the border, about 20 miles after going through Beaver Creek, we were all mud spattered from the construction, making it look as we had been riding for a lot farther than we had gone today. I can’t believe that we finished out 1900 mile ride. After loading up at the border, we headed to Fairbanks, some 260 miles away. We stopped in Delta Junction and got a photo by the end of the Alaska Highway. Between Delta Junction and Fairbanks we saw 11 moose...more than the rest of our trip combined. We ended up rolling into Fairbanks and our relatives at 1:00 a.m., and it was still fairly light out.

4 comments:

V.H. Family said...

Dear Owens~ Congrats on completing this wonderful trip!!! Thanks for sharing with us along the way! People here in O-Town have enjoyed talking about your adventure. Now you are off to your next endeavor. I hope you'll keep a blog about life on the ranch! God Bless you all! Much love the V.H. family

CycoSteve said...

Incredible! I just checked the map. You guys did a HUGE ride. Thanks for sharing. You're and inspiration. I hope to just do a piece of your ride sometime in my life.

Anonymous said...

YIPEEEEEEE! WOW...what a terrific accomplishment!! I'm going to take another nap after reading your last entry cause I got tired just thinking about it. That's something I expect everyone will remember for the rest of their lives. And I bet it will inspire others to try it themselves.
Now its time to return to reality, eh? And start your new lives. Hopefully we'll see you in Montana next year! LeftbehindinOFAville! All the best...the Hutchies

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