Days 22 – 37: lots of ups and downs

We start off this segment riding the Klondike Highway out of Skagway with rich mining history and spectacular vistas before rejoining the Alaska Highway making our way through the Yukon’s Southern Lakes region to Watson Lake where we resupplied before heading down the Stewart-Cassier Highway.

June 10 – 25, 2024

• Day 22 – rest day in Haines, Alaska
• Day 23 – Skagway to remote camp – 29 miles/4100’ climbing
• Day 24 – remote camp to Carcross, Yukon – 41 miles/2400’ 
• Day 25 – Carcross to Squanga Lake – 50 miles/2100’ 
• Day 26 – Squanga Lake to Teslin – 45 miles/1600’ 
• Day 27 – Rest day in Teslin
• Day 28 – Teslin to remote camp – 45 miles/4500’ 
• Day 29 – remote camp to Continental Divide – 33 miles/1700’ 
• Day 30 – Continental Divide to Big Creek – 48 miles/1700’
• Day 31 – Big Creek to Watson Lake – 40 miles/1700’
• Day 32 – Watson Lake to French Creek – 49 miles/2400’ 
• Day 33 – French Creek to Boya Lake – 19 miles/700’ 
• Day 34 – Rest Day at Boya Lake
• Day 35 – Boya Lake to Vines and Puppies – 30 miles 
• Day 36 – Vines & Puppies to Sawmill Point – 41 miles/1100’
• Day 37 – Sawmill Point to Dease Lake – 27 miles/1600’ 

We took a short 45 minute pedestrian ferry from Haines to Skagway, Alaska via the Taiya Inlet which allowed bicycles and dogs. Historic Skagway was a goldrush town and Modern Skagway is a tourist town receiving between six and twelve *thousand* cruise ship passengers per day. After running a couple errands in town we embarked on our most difficult climb to date – sea level to White Pass. This required climbing almost 3300 feel within 13 miles – this pass is difficult enough for cars, let alone bicycles and when one’s bicycle is loaded for remote touring this ride becomes most extraordinary. Patricia’s bike weights 113 lbs and Dustin’s bike is 142 lbs – yes we weighed them before leaving Fairbanks 🙂  

We crossed back into Canada at Fraiser along the Klondike Highway. The Canadian border patrol agent kept asking us more and more questions…at first it seemed out of curiosity and then it became apparent that once he realized we were unemployed and homeless he wanted to ensure we would not become a burden to Canada. We were asked very specific questions about how much money we had with us, where previously we’d only had to declare if we had amounts over $10k US, and how much money we had in our bank accounts, our specific plans while we were in Canada. 

Most cyclists doing this trip do not cross at Fraiser because it would require the insane climb out of Skagway, instead they head toward Whitehorse, a town we had already travelled to both in summer and winter. When we first crossed into Canada, at Beaver Creek, the border patrol agent even stated “oh you’re on the big trip, huh?”. Note to self: come up with better responses for border crossings…sabbatical, retired, on leave, etc. 

For the next several days we made our way through the Southern Lakes Region of the Yukon & Northern British Columbia while the landscape changed from sharp ragged peaks of the newer St. Elias mountains to the more rounded older mountains Pelly and McKenzie ranges.  

On our ways into Carcross, via Tagish Road – a sparsely used cut through, we startled two bears on separate occasions in the same day. They were both on the side of the road munching on dandelions and scampered into the woods when they became aware of our presence. Sorry no pictures – thankfully it just happened so quickly. 

One night we camped on a bluff along the pristine southern lake of Squanga – our campsite overlooked the serene lake. When we had just finished making dinner and cleaning up a storm popped, we quickly grabbed any remaining gear and dove for the tent. The pressure change was quite abrupt that dirt and leaves were pulled under the fly and onto the screen portion of our tent.

Cycling into Teslin, a town of 239 people, Patricia was ahead on the road when an unmarked white Suburban abruptly pulled over in front of her and quickly parked. A Royal Canadian Mounted Policeman got out of the vehicle and her anxiety rose quickly thinking of all the things she could be doing wrong. The officer went around to the passenger side of the vehicle and grabbed something and started walking toward Patricia. He got up to her and handed her a bottle of water and had one for Dustin as well who soon pedaled in. Whew – we weren’t in trouble! 

The RCMP was named Ron and he retired several years ago and comes to the Yukon in the summer to help out for a month when traffic up the Alaska Highway is most prevalent. He talked with us for a while about our trip, gave us dehydrated meals, took our picture and when he found out we were headed toward his home on Vancouver Island, he invited us to come and stay with him! Ron certainly buoyed our spirits.

In Teslin we took a rest day and went to the fascinating George Johnston Museum. George was a Tlingit man who self-educated himself to use a camera between 1910 – 1940 to record the Tlingit culture and was quite entrepreneurial with trading and even bringing the first car to Teslin, via barge, in 1928 before there were any roads. The Tlingit were traditionally First Nation people from the coastal regions but the Teslin Tlingit were forced more interiorly as the Russians came to the coast and engaged the Tlingit in trapping. Once the trapping revenues dried up they ended up staying in the interior region away from the coast. 

Roadhouses were once the lifeblood of the Alaska Highway allowing travel weary motorists a meal, place to stay, gas, and help with any necessary repairs. As vehicles (and tires!) have become more reliable and many Alaska Highway travelers now come in self-sufficient RVs , the necessity of the roadhouses has waned and many have been closed down and abandoned. A few still remain and for cyclists who do not cover as many miles in a day these roadhouses have been a welcomed oasis in an otherwise desolate region. We’ve stopped at roadhouses for camping, a meal, second breakfast of cinnamon rolls and scones, ice cream, or snacks. Two days outside of Teslin we camped at once such roadhouse, The Continental Divide Roadhouse, just after we had crossed over this geographical feature. We camped under a “dome” as the campground called it, got a shower, and had a little internet. 

From Continental Divide we cycled for two days to get to Watson Lake with a stop at Big Creek Campground along the way. When we came over a particular ridge the horizon appeared to be filled with smoke – oh great…wildfires. The plume drifted toward us and ironically we were not smelling the smoke at all – super weird. As we set up camp we realized the picnic table, tent and all our gear was being covered with a yellow dust – pollen! What we’d thought was smoke actually turned out to be pollen from the abundance of pine trees in the area. 

At Watson Lake, the largest town for several hundred kilometers, we resupplied groceries, took showers & did laundry as well as visited the famous sign post forest. 

The next day we headed out of Watson Lake and backtracked on the Alaska Highway to the intersection with the Stewart-Cassiar Highway, a narrower and less utilized route giving a more direct heading south. We will take the Stewart-Cassiar for its entirety, over 700 kilometers, with a few days side trip to Stewart, British Columbia and Hyder, Alaska. At the northern terminus of the highway we were still in the Yukon and just a few kilometers down we entered British Columbia. 

We spent two days making our way to Boya Lake where we spent two nights camping to enjoy this beautiful aquatic paradise – turquoise blue water surrounded by forests and mountains. We were able to borrow a canoe from fellow campers for a short paddle in the lake and do a little hiking. We camped right along the lake and had the best camping neighbors – one invited us for an amazing dinner of tacos and the other invited us for breakfast! We ate way better than we were anticipating for being so remote 🙂

We then spent two days making our way to Dease Lake to resupply, shower and do laundry before another remote stretch. Both of these days were quite rainy but we’d been lucky to have booked a wall tent with a wood fired hot tub for our rainiest of days – we’d camped 18 days straight and were excited for a reprieve from the constant setting up and taking down, plus it was Dustin’s birthday so why not?! The wall tent was quite posh, everything is relative, AND included a delicious dinner and breakfast – nice to not have to cook!

Riding along the Stewart-Cassiar has given us significantly less traffic and many gorgeous views. This road has quite a few “rollers” many of which do not even show up on our cycling Garmin – we’d had short climbs up to 12% grade that weren’t expected but we persevered albeit slowly.

Tomorrow we head off for an even longer remote stretch headed toward Stewart, BC. We’re excited to see this area because right next to Stewart, BC is the unique community of Hyder, Alaska (a US town completely surrounded by Canada with a population of 16) where we will receive our last USPS box with Katy’s food (thanks Laura for sending it!!).

We hope to publish the next update in about two to three weeks when we arrive in Prince Rupert to take the ferry to Vancouver Island. Please don’t worry if you don’t hear from us – this is quite a remote area of the world with almost no cell service. When we have WiFi we will try to post a “we are alive” message to Instagram/Facebook.

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