Thursday june 19--day 17

A nice way to start the day, NAPA Fort Nelson BC
Poor me, I have to put up with this scenery all the time!
The hell with the bears, these will put the real hurt on, these are big ones, 2000lb, not like the little trained ones they have in Yellowstone.
First Brown bear I have seen.
Another bear!
Yet another bear!
Two bears at once.

What a pleasant way to start the day, I stopped off a NAPA and visited Bob and Sheldon who I had met the night before at the Elks lodge. It brought back a lot of old memories, I wish I was their, rep, I would have really busted the expenses account. I had a cup of coffee, Bob gave me a really nice hat, (you will see pics in later posts.) I did not stay long, some where down the road, I will meet these men again, but I always feel understatement is best. Kind of like when I had out of town guest stay at my home, the first night, there were mints on the pillow, the second night there were brochures for nearby hotels. I do wish I would have waited a day to do my oil change as Bob offered the use of his shop if I needed to do any work. I picked up a metric Allen wrench set that I had forgotten, (thanks for the discount Bob) and was on my way. It is always nice to meet nice people with common values so far away from home!

I can hardly describe the ride today other than utterly fantastic! It was about 300 miles a show stopping scenery along the Alaskan Highway. The road for the most part was in good condition, there were a few areas of construction but not too bad. I could not believe all of the wild life. After the first few hours I stopped taking pictures. I saw at least 15 bears along the way, bison, moose and the show stopper was the biggest "Bob" cat I have ever seen in my life, at first I thought it was a mountain lion, but for a split second it looked at me and I recognized it for what it was, I have seen them before, but never so big. It is unfortunate, but the best wild life I have seen have been quick chance encounters and I just have not been able to get a quick picture.

Around 12:00 I took off on an old logging road, and found a nice spot for my afternoon nap. I ate a power bar and laid down for a bit, a couple of times my snoring woke me up, and with all the bears I have seen lately, I was a little startled, When I finally awoke for good, I walked towards my motorcycle which was about 50 yards from where I had laid down and as I got towards it there was a bear on the other side, sniffing my rear pannier, where I keep my reserve stash of Vienna sausages, when I saw him I yelled and he ran off. I was about 3 miles off of the main highway, when I was riding back there was a herd of about 30 bison on the road in front of me, I stopped and tried to get my camera out of my tank bag, when a big bull broke from the herd and headed towards me, I about shit myself, as there was no way I could turn around, thank god for the big air horn I had installed on my bike! I gave it a big blast and the whole herd disappeared into the woods, the sound was unbelievable. I high tailed it back to the main road and headed off.
About 5:00pm I hit the Yukon and it was another 30 miles to Watson lake. I did not figure it would be busy, as Fort Nelson had been nearly a ghost town. When I got to town, I saw that there was a lot of activity, after my experiences through out the day with wildlife, I was not going to camp out tonight. As it ended up, I got the next to last room in town, and believe you me am paying a premium for it, there is Internet, so that is why I am catching up. The town itself is not much to write about, other than it is a dirty little wide spot in the road, and the friendliness, I have seen everywhere else in Canada is not quite as apparent here.
I hope to make it to Whitehorse tomorrow and to Alaska the day after. While I have enjoyed my time in Canada and have met many nice people and made new friends, It will be nice to be back in the USA.

Tim