The Rise Up Ride: Day 130-132, Up and Over Haines Summit to Alaska
Date: 30 August - 1 September 2021
Start Location: Million Dollar Falls Campground, Yukon, Canada
End Location: Haines, Alaska
Distance: 112 km
Time: 6:25
Total elapsed: 7:25
Elevation: 988 m
Saturday night, getting up to place a log on the fire and water the bushes, there were stars outside the cooking shelter in the Million Dollar Falls Campground. This was significant not only because it meant that the storm had passed but that the summer's nightly gloaming at 60°N had been replaced by real darkness. As the equinox nears, days and nights are, respectfully, shorter and longer by six minutes every 24 hours. It was not yet dark enough for the Northern Lights but good enough to see the familiar winter stars return to the sky before the sun came up and announced that it was time to ride over the mountains to Haines. The season is changing quickly and it is a very good time to be heading back to the lower latitudes.
This road is the least traveled, best maintained and scenically spectacular of any I've ever ridden. It, and the collection of historic trails that have paralleled the route over millennia, are steeped in a rich history of trading, greed, suffering, and war. Originally a trading route used by the coastal Chilkat Tlingit tribe to trade eulachon oil extracted from the tiny candlefish with the Athabascans, who lived further inland. It formed part of the Dalton Trail that was heavily trafficked in the 1890s during the Klondike Gold Rush, when miners were charged by the mule to use it. But it was in 1943, fearing possible Japanese bombing of the White Pass Railroad supplying the Alcan from Skagway, that the road was completed as a back-up route to a possible "Alaskan Front" during WWII. It's too easy to let "outcome bias" allow us to forget that in 1942, following the Japanese land and air assault on the Aleutian Islands, the Americans were very concerned about a land invasion of the Homeland from Alaska. And, in another interesting fact about the road, it also served as the route for an early Alaskan pipeline from 1954-1970, pumping aviation and vehicle fuel north to Fairbanks. But this year, with COVID-19 restrictions limiting most traffic, the Haines Road was a big, wide 248 km empty stretch of rough chip seal, and a big long deserted official National Scenic Byway.
In the six hours it took me to climb to Haines Summit and fly down the steeper grade to the US border, I might have seen only about twenty tanker trucks and ten RVs. With no traffic, tailwinds and blue skies, I was flying up the mountains, less daunting than stunning. By mid-afternoon I was waved through the Canadian side of the border to be quickly processed at the US border ("Are you carrying any firewood?" Seriously…) before bombing the rest of the way down to the Chilkat River.
Thanks to Javier for the lift through the road construction outside of Haines. I'd stuck out my thumb while pedaling, knowing that my bike would eventually end up in the back of the pilot car through the mud and gravel. He stopped and dropped me outside of town where I found my way to my Airbnb after picking up enough provisions at the store so that I could spend these last two days feet up, writing some of the most recent adventures and reclaiming burned calories. Thank you to Jess and her kids, my hosts at The Nest overlooking the Chilkat River, for the just-laid eggs from the coop and freshly foraged chanterelle mushrooms.
Tomorrow, I'll pack up and pedal into town to spend my last nights at the @innathaines, preparing for the final two legs of this journey. On Saturday the Alaska Marine Highway Ferry MV Matanuska sets sail for the four days and three night cruise down the Inside Passage to Bellingham, Washington. 36 hours after docking, the Amtrak Empire Builder leaves Everett, WA for Chicago with bike and rider aboard for the long trip back to the new Moynihan Amtrak Station in Manhattan. Further!
