Tan Status: Light Farmer

Yup, my arms are already showing a nice golden brown, in contrast to my semi-fishbelly white for the rest of me.

So, on with the trek through Canada!














I had high and mighty aspirations of being on the road by 5 am the day after the Columbia debacle (not a disaster, that name's already taken) but the hotel, like I said didn't afford the most comfortable night's sleep, especially considering the kids in the next room. so I reset the alarm for 5:45 and got up, showered in the shower closet, and set off from Haines, a very nice little city into Canada, 38 miles away. I got to the border and promptly discovered one crappy fact...

CANADA IS CLOSED UNTIL 8 AM!

Punks.

So I slept in my car for another 45 minutes and thankfully judged the time difference right and didn't have to wait 2 hours. When I saw the guard moving road cones, I pulled up ahead.

"Where are you headed today?" (She's actually quite cheerful and Canadian)
"Well, looks like I'm driving to Washington, I was supposed to be on-"
"The Ferry?" (Knowing Smile)
"Yep, so I decided to just drive."
"Do you have any guns with you?"
"Do you have any Knives with you?"
"Do you have any ammunition with you?"
"Nope, nope, and nope"
"So you're completely defenseless, huh?"

CREEPY ALERT LEVEL RAISED TO ORANGE

"Noooooooo."
"You have no weapons?"
"No...but I can handle myself."
(she laughs)
"Well, have a nice drive!"


I expected an improvised roadblock at any time further up the road.

After I was mercifully un-assaulted, I continued the 160 miles back toward Haines Junction. I dodged literal herds of potguts (ground squirrels) as they took in the beautiful sunrise, and it was beautiful. Luckily I managed to not hit any, weaving back and forth on avoidance. I saw one owl, but it wasn't what it seemed, I'm sure.


Suffice it to say, it was a long day, and that is the first day I began to suspect that my speedometer/odometer are mis-calibrated, and boy was I right, so I drove with my handheld GPS as my speedometer for the rest of the trip. I went a long way that day, saw more bears, and some buffalo, and stayed the night in Liard Hot Springs. I got there about 8, overpaid for a room that was better than in Haines, but lacked an alarm clock and hadn't been totally cleaned from the last guest. I ordered a buffalo burger with fries, and heard the wonderful question.

"Do you want gravy with your fries?"

That would be a yes.

I ate in my room then discovered a nasty fact, the fact that I do indeed need to lose weight, when my brand new swimming trunks turned out to be a bit tighter in certain areas than is okay, but screw it, I'm in another country.















So I swam in both the hot springs, enjoying the heat and relaxing after a long day, and met 2 guys, Kyle and John, who were on their way to Kenai for the summer to work. We hung out and got to know each other, and I answered all their questions to the best of my knowledge, with hardly any exaggerations, about Alaska. They regaled me with the tale of their trip up the Alaska Highway, including being pulled over for speeding by a Mountie. Seriously, where else will a cop give you a ticket, and when all is said and done, shake your hand before letting you drive on? Seriously, the drivers in BC may be bad (we'll get to that) and the border guards terrifying, but the mounties sound cool!

The next morning I bought the guys breakfast (their banks had shut off their cards oh-so-helpfully in the middle of nowhere Canada) and was on my way again, to Dawson Creek.








***BC DRIVERS***

-a poem

Drive Safely, Drive Smart
says the driving instructor
and always remember
when it's just you
and another car
for miles around
and you want to pass...
RIDE THEIR ASSES FOR 50 KILOMETERS NO MATTER HOW MUCH THEY SLOW DOWN TO LET YOU BY

***THE END***

by John T Bolds

I crossed the Canadian Rockies the next, day, it was pretty uneventful, but I did listen to 'The Story' it's an NPR show on daily in certain places, but you can download podcasts. I HIGHLY recommend this to anyone, these are great stories, some that rival This American Life, and excellent for road trips.

At Dawson Creek, I spent my first might camping, and it was worth the $18, much better than either hotel.

Next time: Coffee carts in Canada, I reach the United States, my first of many fires this summer, and seeing Vanessa again after 2 years.

10 Bears, 5 buffalo, 2 moose, 4 elk, like 100 potguts, 1 gray wolf, 1 arctic fox, 1 owl, and a rabbit I beat to death

Well, it's been close to 2 weeks since I left Fairbanks, but you might be surprised to know I'm not actually in Utah yet. I'm taking my time visiting both friends and family on the way down and should be there on Sunday. But the fun started on Memorial Day.

The day before, I drove a soul-crushing 14 hours from Fairbanks to Haines, through Canada. The trip started off a bit ominously as I passed out of the Fairbanks North Star Borough, and promptly ran over the back legs of a rabbit. Hoping that someone behind me would finish the job in the time it took to pull a U turn was fruitless, so I found a good stick and ended the poor thing's suffering. Trust me, if you ever have to do something like this, you only want to hit once, so I actually hurt my shoulder a bit swinging the stick, but it proved to be enough, and I wasn't forced to go ape on the thing trying to help it.

After that was fairly easy, I saw my first black bear, and was glad that I had hit the rabbit instead, I can just picture running over a bear's back legs and then having to beat it to death with a stick, it might have proved more difficult.

The Rabbit was an omen though.

I got to Haines at about 11pm and simply parked by the water, grabbed my blanket, tilted back the seat in my 4-Runner, and slept. I woke at about 5 for a bit then slept again until about 9:30, which is when the fun started. I got breakfast, a pretty decent good old country breakfast with pretty good coffee, I only drink coffee on the road, then headed to the Alaska Marine Highway Office.

I had plenty of time to spare, it was 10am and the ferry was to leave at 8pm with me boarding at 6, I just wanted to get all my ticketing over and done with. This turned out to be a very good idea. When I got to the counter, I noticed that all the other window people were on the phone and apologizing. I heard 'electrical problem' and 'Juneau' and I figured I was about due for an apology, which was exactly right. The guy at the desk told me that the MV Columbia had an issue and was in Juneau being fixed, and that while this might cause a 1-Day delay, it shouldn't be too bad. I was asked to check back in at about 3, so I decided to go climb a mountain.

Mt Riley is a beautiful place, and the trails, even the hardest one which I chose, are pretty well maintained, if not saggy in May at the lowlands. It was a beautiful and grueling climb, and I got to find out firsthand that the trail was still snowed over enough to be easy to lose, and had to turn back before summiting. Disappointment to the max. so I made my way back down, twisted my ankle and swore a lot, and went back to the AMHS office.

"Well, you can drive to Skagway and maybe catch another ferry, drive to Prince Rupert and catch another ferry, or just drive." I took the refund and just drove. I saw far too many families who were moving their entire lives sitting around the terminal in tears to want to stay there. So I got a hotel room that night (overpriced for a place that doesn't provide shampoo in my opinion) and had a semi-okay night's rest before heading out the next day.

*In the next journal: John encounters a creepy-ass border guard, more bears, and discovers that BC drivers are total A-Holes*