It's all going South!

Deadhorse to Coldfoot,
Thursday 30th July

This is it, the real start, we go from here to the very tip of South America in Argentina, an incredible thought. The road out of Deadhorse is better now they haven’t sprayed it with water, so we all make good time running at speed on the compacted road which feels more like tarmac, as we near the mountain pass , myself and Paul are in front when he suddenly slows, as I stop I find out why. He had spotted a bike in the grass below the road, it’s a Harley. The bike is bent out of shape with plastic bags on some of the kit, a pick-up turns up a few minutes later and we find out from the driver, it’s the Brazilian guy we were talking to the night before. He has been flown to Anchorage and is alive but not well, and the bike is a write-off, a sobering thought, but he was driving a Harley with road tyres on this treacherous road, while we all have dual purpose bikes with full off road tyres on the front and semi off-road on the back. We continued on a little more soberly to the Atigun pass where most of us stopped for lunch, me at the top, the rest below, so I went back down for a cup of tea! The road continued with lots of great scenery, later in the afternoon I stopped at a river crossing and took photos, but just before the off I decided to take another photo and my camera reported system error and has not worked since, I had picked the Panasonic FT1 for it’s ruggedness so I was very disappointed having had it only 2 weeks and only 4 days into the trip. After using my spare fuel we arrived back in Coldfoot, later at diner another rider arrived, it was Ian Neville (Yorkshire bloke) who has travelled 141000 miles around the world on his bike and is still going, started in Ushuaia 6 years ago! and only now just arrived. I’m not sure I could spare that amount of time for an overland trip.

Miles
Today : 244
Total : 1124
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Friday 31st July
Coldfoot to Delta Junction

Long hard slog, 178 miles of dirt road, which was very enjoyable despite the smoke from Forest fires obscuring the scenery. I had wanted to find someone to fix the camera so asked Jeff (support van) to take it with him into Fairbanks. The last section of road was long and very straight, a full 15 to 20 mile straight stretch on the run into Delta Junction without any bends at all. Delta Junction was a one street town with little in the way of shops, when Jeff returned he had had no success with the camera so I am stuck without a camera, sorry no pictures, at least I have the on-bike video system.

Miles
Today : 350
Total : 1474
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Saturday 1st August
Delta Junction to Beaver Creak

We are due to cross the border into Canada today but not before an excursion to a town called Chicken turning off the main road, this was part dirt part rough tarmac, a the end was the town of Chicken an old gold mining town, with displays of old mining and panning gear, There was also a huge old dredger beached up the hill high and dry, which used to work the river below for gold. After this was another long slog to the boarder, the American customs just wave you through, the Canadian border customs was about 15 miles down the road, leaving this stretch a sort of no-man's land between, although in Canada. The border crossing was very a quick, a quick look at my Passport and waved though and into Canada and the Yukon territory. Very much still a wilderness area like Alaska, long roads without towns and fantastic scenery, but the tree starting to get taller with more foliage. We rolled into the town of Beaver creek which turned out quite lively, having a great pub, complete with pool table, so we ended up with an impromptu "night out" playing pool and drinking some of the very nice local beers (not all lager). I have some pictures now due to another member of the expedition lending me his spare camera, thanks go to Paul.

Miles
Today : 360
Total : 1834