Alaska Beckons - A Month Long Solo Journey

I'd been thinking about this for almost 10 months, pretty much since the end of summer, 2004 -- riding from California to the Arctic Circle. After obsessing for many months, I bought a BMW F650GS, in March 2005, then participated in a Death Valley rally in April to get myself acquainted with off road conditions. Then it was a long wait until the snow melted all along the way from California to Alaska.

I wasn't exactly idle in the meanwhile. I was practicing camping, getting the bike set up for long distance travel and reading all I could about the journey to my destination. But it still felt like a long wait. I began by counting the months, then weeks, then finally counting the days, until the big day arrived.

As is usual, I wasn't prepared for it. There were tons of last minute things to do, like getting traveler’s checks, putting reflectors on the saddle bags, getting Canadian insurance cards, etc. But I finally embarked, leaving Santa Clara, California on a Saturday evening in early June, 2005.

Usually my rides are unplanned. This trip wasn't much of an exception. Sure, I did read up a lot on Alaska and the roads there. But that was so I'd know enough to plan on any contingencies, if need be (and yes, there would be contingencies in store for me). The only constraints I had for the whole trip were:

1. Be back in a month
2. Visit the Arctic Circle in Alaska
3. Camp every night all the way (two reasons for this: I always love camping and I'd read how expensive things would get as I got further north of Vancouver)

And a couple sideline objectives:

1. Spend a day in Seattle on the way up (too many friends I’d not seen in a while)
2. Stop for a bit in Vancouver and get the tires changed (I'd called the BMW dealer there earlier and ordered a set of tires)

Over a trip this long, weather and other local conditions like construction and traffic would be bound to play the spoilsport with a firm schedule, so I didn't plan a daily itinerary of stopovers for the night. I did what I always do -- stop a bit around tea time in the afternoon and check out what campgrounds lay ahead and which of them might be a good stop for the night. The milepost came in extremely handy here, as did the GPS.

So I didn't plan the stops. I didn’t even plan the route, actually. I was of two minds -- either take the fastest way to get up to the Arctic Circle (the Trans-Canada Hwy and the Alaska Hwy) and make detours on the way back, or take the roads less traveled to get up to the Arctic Circle (Cassiar Hwy followed by the Top of the World Hwy) and rush back down the fastest way. But I didn't have to decide right away, anyway, so I just put off the decision until later. The one thing I decided in the beginning was to get to Seattle quickly, then to Vancouver in a hurry. So you’ll have to follow along as I made my way out in pursuit of a dream.

Day 1:

Since I was in such a darned hurry to get out of the house, it didn't even occur to me to take a picture of me on the bike all packed up before I left. So here's the bike all set up and ready to go at a gas station near home -- the last time I'd see the bike so clean on the trip.



After slabbing it up I-5 for the day, I found a campsite about 40 miles west of Yreka (CA) in a small town called Fort Jones. The town was so small, the lady who gave me the directions asked me not to blink if I didn't want to pass it by. By the time I reached the "Indian Scotty" campground in Klamath National Forest it was dark, so I unloaded the bike and pitched the tent by flashlight. I fell asleep to the pleasant sounds of the Scott River flowing by right next to the campground.



Day 1: 390 miles