Denali Highway
After a day of chilling, shopping and barbie-ing, I surfaced feeling a bit dizzy this morning. Doug took off for work earlier than planned, leaving the place to me and Jacqueline to close up after we'd packed and gone our separate ways. I don't think Doug's big on goodbyes.
I decided to get a new front tyre (I guess it's a tire if I buy it in this country), even though this one has another couple of thousand km, I have the Denali, Taylor and Top of the World Highways (gravel) in the next 2 days. I manage to find a decent tire :) Conti TKC80. Bike shops are funny about working on bikes they don't have the franchise for, so as this was not a Kawasaki dealer I was buying the tyre from, it was all very awkward until I offered to pull the wheel off myself!
Lovely noo tire for carving canyons and strafing shingle!
By the time it was all done, it was 11:30 before I hit the road. The bike feels a bit skittery with the new tire, can't decide if it's the worn rear, heavy load, or dodgy pressures. The run to Denali was straightforward enough, a stop in Nenana for a bit of cultural heritage and shopping, plus the odd photo.
Log Cabin church at Nenana
Nenana River, on the way to Denali National Park
Somehow it's 4:00pm before I get on the Denali Highway itself.
...and the sky I'm heading for looks awful dark. The surface is dirt with light gravel to start. After about 20 minutes the rain comes in and it starts to cool down, but still good travelling conditions and I'm making good time, congratulating myself on having the forethought to put all the luggage covers on at the last rip-off gas stop, nice apple danish though.
The bike is quite skatey on the gravel and it's about this time I realise that even though I'm now a gravel veteran (ha!), I have yet to travel any distance on gravel with a full load on the bike. I decide to try airing down the tyres, it seems to work better and I take off congratulating myself on the decision to get the new tire. It's really bucketing now and cooling right off. At about the halfway mark, the road has turned into clay with standing water. I get into a curve a bit hot and drift into the gravel berm, couple of tank slappers and I'm off the road into the bushes on my face. I'm OK but my foot is trapped under the right pannier and I waste what seems like ages finding the buried killswitch rather than go for the ignition switch right in front of me as the motor thuds away on its side. Thank goodness for roller bearing cranks! A few choice words and stopping to think gets me from under the bike after about a minute in the pouring rain and I'm just contemplating how to right the beast when a vanload of people stop and drag me back onto the road. "Go goddam slower" growls one of my rescuers. The bike is pretty much OK, so I get back on, only a tad slower with that warning reverberating in my head. This clay surface sucks in the wet. It lasts for about 40 miles and I'm getting a bit miffed that I took this road for scenery and all I get is 2 foot viz, a road perfect for mud wresting and damn cold to boot. The bike is handling weirdly, the front and back wheels are displaying an independance of motion I only like to see under a blouse and it's making for a long day. I hope I can get to the bottom of it soon, I don't fancy this fight for another 7 days.
At about the 2 hour mark, the rain lightens up and I begin to see some sky over the peak. (I realised a while ago I've been climbing for ages). As I approach the summit, the clouds start to clear and there are some stunning views looking back from where I've come.
I get to the end of the highway about 7:30 and grab a bit of food. My plan was to go South to the Tok cutoff road and jink north back up to Tok, another 125 miles further on. By the time I get to the Tok Cutoff Road I resolve to give up reaching Tok and start to look for accommodation. I end up at a place called Red Igloo Cabins, owned by a charming old couple who take me into their house, make me a cup of tea and tell stories. Viola celebrates her birthday today, so they'd just come back from her party down the road. Sam is a teller of tall tales and inveterate teaser, and I could have listened to him all night, but I made myself scarce after a while and settled into the cabin for the night.
I discovered the only damage from the spill, apart from a wee crack in the winscreen, was to the plastic container of trail mix I had in my tank bag. I now have a couple of stray nuts and M&Ms at the bottom of my bag, but I can live with that, it could have been much worse. I also found that one of my pannier raincovers retains water and bathes the bottom of the pannier in water long after the rain has passed. Great design, thank goodness for supermarket bags eh.
Time on the road, 10 hours, 503 km, 182 of it continuous dirt and snot.
63imp/50us mpg, I think the back wheel travelled further than the front, headwinds, and I know I spilled a bit when I tipped over.
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