Alaska-Canada Highway

I woke up early as planned and set off cycling not long after 3AM. This was the start of a very long day!

I stopped a few times in the first couple hours as I tried to adjust my saddle. I’d still not settled on a position I was totally happy with. After a while I got it to a point that was good enough and after that I had little need to stop.

To begin with there were some gentle rolling hills as the road followed a river. I didn’t stop to eat; instead I ate while I rode. The extent of my stopping was to slice up some cheese and grab a few slices of bread from a loaf.

The rolling hills came to an end at the town of Delta Junction. I stopped at a state campground there as I’d seen a sign for water. I went to fill up my bottles and recognized someone at the tap – a cyclist I’d spoken to outside REI in Fairbanks. He’d camped here last night.

From Delta Junction I joined the Alaska-Canada Highway. Road signs began counting down from 1400 miles. The road was now flat and a gentle tailwind pushed me along.

Several hours of uneventful and unceasing cycling followed, until I reached some construction work. I had to wait for about 15 minutes for a pilot vehicle. This was my longest break of the day! In the meantime I chatted to a Belarusian motorcyclist and to the flagger.

Thankfully I was allowed to cycle behind the pilot vehicle. I made up some of the time spent waiting around as I was able to draft at about 40 kph. Sadly this only lasted a couple kilometres.

I reached another town, Tok, at around the 300km mark. I’d already beaten my previous record of doing 280km in a day while touring. There was a cycle path starting 20km out of town, quite out of proportion with the size of the settlement – more a village, really. I only paused to get water there before continuing on.

Not long after Tok I hit 320km: 200 miles. That was my minimum goal for the day but I still had several hours left. From here it became somewhat hilly.

Up and down I rode for another 80km. I passed the 400km mark and went to set up camp in a gravel pull out at around 11:30 PM. According to Strava I’d had 18 hours of moving time! I was pretty satisfied with having cycled 400km in under a day.

That evening I didn’t feel particularly tired but by the next day my legs felt exhausted – which is fair enough! From where I’d camped it was about 40km to the border. Twice I had to ride in a pilot car for a couple kilometres through some road construction. One of the drivers said she made about $95,000 for spending five months up here, driving a car back and forth through construction zones.

I made it to the border, and crossed into Canada’s Yukon Territory. There was no need to stop at the US customs area, and it was 30km to the Canadian side. I was hoping desperately that they wouldn’t turn me around and say I needed to go to the American side! They didn’t, and I was soon officially allowed into Canada.

The customs post was in a small village called Beaver Creek. I stocked up on water, then rode out of town to another bit of road construction. The flagger there asked where I planned to stop. I said I’d see where I got to, and she told me there was a nice place in Haines Junction.

“Isn’t that 300 kilometres away?” I asked. It was about 6PM so that was a bit of a stretch!

“No, no, I don’t think it’s that far. It’s more like 290 kilometres.” Well, I suppose I should be glad she had faith in me.

Past the roadwork there was gravel for about 10km and occasional patches of it for quite a while after. My legs were still feeling very tired (and there was a headwind too!) so I decided to stop early, and went to setup camp in a gravel pullout. Sadly, crossing into Canada had not put an end to the mosquitoes.

My legs felt much better the next morning but I was still tired. After a few hours I stopped for a break. While sitting at the side of the road, 4 cyclists went past, having just set off from a campsite a couple kilometres back. There were two Americans, Suzy and Allu, who’d started in Fairbanks. The other two, Andrew and Jenny, were also American. They’d been travelling for a couple years and most recently were coming from Prudhoe Bay.

After finishing my break I caught up with them and we cycled together for the rest of the day. I enjoyed chatting to them as we rode; it made a pleasant change from my usual solitude.

In the evening we were all running low on water. We reached a village but the gas station was shut and we couldn’t find an outside tap. We all had just about enough to make it to the next gas station, which was thankfully open. We stocked up on water and also bought a lot of (expensive) snacks.

We rode on a little longer before wild camping on the shore of a lake. I set off alone the next morning because I wanted to have a rest day, which meant arriving in the next town relatively early. The strong headwind made that a bit of a struggle but I did manage to reach Haines Junction in the early afternoon, and checked into a hostel.

When I set off cycling the next morning I kept an eye out for wild-camping cyclists, as I knew the others tended to set off very late by my standards. Sure enough, after a couple of hours I saw Allu’s bright yellow jersey. The others were packing up camp nearby.

We spent another day cycling together. They are fairly fast cyclists, but the biggest difference in our habits is they tend to stop for a break once an hour or so, whereas I’d normally ride for about three hours at a time. It was nice to have a bit of a change!

At one point there were signs warning of a wildfire and forbidding stopping. We saw no evidence of it, though the other did see a bear! I didn’t see it.

In the evening we approached the town of Whitehorse, the capital and largest settlement of the Yukon Territory. We camped a few kilometres before the town.

In the morning we all went our separate ways: Suzie and Allu planned to visit a spa, Andrew and Jenny took a rest day in Whitehorse, while I continued on – after a trip to Walmart. There was a supermarket in about 600km but I wasn’t sure how big it was, so I bought enough to last me until the supermarket after that, about 1200km away. I had assumed Canada fully used the metric system so was surprised to find many prices quoted per pound (with price per kilo alongside). Apparently they use a mixture of both, like the UK.

I continued on the Alaska-Canada Highway headed east. The road followed a series of rivers through forested mountains.

A couple days past Whitehorse I left the Alaska-Canada Highway and headed south onto the Cassiar Highway. Soon I crossed into British Columbia, which has the slogan “The Best Place on Earth.” Clearly not the most humble!

A little while later I saw a couple of vehicles stopped in layby, taking photos. I suddenly realised there was a bear! This was the first one I’d seen.

I continued on a little while further before finding a place to camp.

July 13: 401 km

July 14: 87 km

July 15: 178 km

July 16: 89 km

July 17: 141 km

July 18: 153 km

July 19: 144 km

July 20: 193 km