The weather was fine for the first part of the day, but of course, that couldn’t last too long, and although I don’t remember when clouds rolled back in, I do remember that it was raining when night came. I was riding in the mountains

The road north of Prince George was very nice. There was a lot less traffic this far north – but it was now mostly RVs and big trucks. RVs having limited passing capabilities, they tend to quickly end up in convoys of five, ten or more rigs plodding along. Typical riding was to blast along for 10 or 15 minutes all by myself, then catch up with a few RVs, pass them at the first opportunity and repeat. The roads were still very moto-friendly (as in curvy and mostly well-kept), and the scenery kept getting better and better. Even the threatening weather would add drama to the mountains, and I would never tire of taking in the new views revealed at the next curve or pass. I passed a few motorcycles, all serious-looking bikes with mountains of gear strapped to any available surface, more or less slickly. There were quite a few "adventure tourers" (BMW GS, big dual-purpose thumpers), a few of our typical long-distance tourers (RT, ST, Gold wings), but I think that the most represented brand was… Harley Davidson. They ran the gamut, from shiny Road Kings to old hardtail rat bikes. And most looked like they were coming from far and going far, not just locals out to clean out the cobwebs out of the carbs. Nice.

At Chetwynd, I left 97 to hop over 29 and cut back to 97 without having to go all the way around to Dawson Creek. Night was falling, and I was not too crazy about leaving the main highway, but I had plenty gas and the shortcut seemed to save quite a few miles. It turned out very nice, a great road again, a pleasure to ride – although I missed a bit on the fun, what with the weather turning nasty, my back being sub-optimal, and fatigue starting to appear. Back on 97, the weather really started to turn much worse. I was climbing in the mountains, it was getting foggy and it started raining quite hard, then soon rain started turning into snow again… &&%#$@ summer. Although I had a fuel cell, and could go over 400 miles between fueling stops, I was paying attention to that needle that kept creeping down, and absolutely no village, no gas station open (duh! midnight, in the middle of the mountains, in Northern BC?) There were a few names on the map, but I had no idea if they were villages, or just wide spots on the road. I had packed with me the Milepost, a wonderful book that pretty much details mile by mile what can be found on the various roads going up north, and it would probably have given me more details. But it was in the bottom of my topcase, it was raining and snowing, I didn’t want to stop on this narrow road in the fog – and it wouldn’t have done much good anyway if it gave me the bad news, I was pretty much committed to keeping keeping on. On hindsight, not the smartest way to manage a ride! That stretch of the ride got to be quite miserable. The bike was working great, my gear was working great and keeping me warm, dry and cozy, I was a bit tired but still far from being punch drunk, but I was still getting a bit, well, depressed. I was talking to myself (well, not that this is so uncommon) and calling myself names for my stupidity in having signed up for this daft rally, for having dropped the bike, for not having stopped a couple hours back and waited out the bad weather when I had a chance to pull into a friendly motel with an alluring "VACANCY" sign flashing, for being stupid enough to be riding alone here, in the middle of a miserable night, probably on the wrong road, most likely with the Abominable Snowman waiting for me around the next curve. I was going over various scenarios, all more appealing as I was riding along: what if I had a flat and had to fix it by the road in this weather? What if I had miscalculated distances and mileage, and was going to run out of gas? What if I had taken a wrong turn somewhere and was headed the wrong way? (I have, er, kind of a history of doing this in rides…) What if I missed a corner and ended up in the ditch, and had to wait 30 minutes for a car to come by. Or what if I missed a corner and ended up down the ravine and had to wait till next spring to be found. Or what if I were succumbing to hypothermia, or fatigue, and not even realizing it? I think that when you’re in a rally, you spend a lot of time talking with yourself (or am I uncovering a bit too much about myself here? :-) You go over various strategies, go over your planned route and triple-check for the ninth time that it makes sense, run what-ifs scenarios, check actual mileage vs. what you had estimated, listen to the bike and go down checklists of maintenance items done or to do soon, … and in between, admire the reflection of the light on that rock face, enjoy that perfect apex in the road, mull over life back at home, how to make the world a better place, and what is the final word on how to fix the perfect Ti punch. Oh, yeah, and ride safely! This is a great way to keep your mind buzzing, to ensure a smoother ride, to help while the time away and to eat miles . But that night, my stream of consciousness had definitely erred towards the unhealthy. It was midnight, I was all by my sorry-ass lonesome self going through the backdoor of nowhere, in conditions not fit of a kooky penguin, why in the world was I not at home, in the comfort of my bed next to my sweetie, listening to my kids loudly dreaming of a soccer game or a pool party, cozy and rested and safe and not hurting? Although I have spent a lot of time in the outdoors, that was a long time ago, and I am very much a city slicker now, and this was definitely pushing the comfort envelope. And right then, I was not happy ’bout it.

And that’s when I arrived at Muncho Lake. I didn’t quite know what to expect, wasn’t looking for much, and there was even less than I thought. It seems to be just a resort, maybe skiing in winter, and outdoors activities in summer. I was hoping I could find a gas station there, just for peace of mind, but nothing, just a couple dark buildings by the side of the road… except, joy of joy, I spotted a motel sign. I had rode over 900 miles since probably 6 or 7 that morning, I had been up since 4:30, I was feeling like crap – I thought about it for a long 1 / 4 of a second and decided to stop and see if they had any vacancy, or barring that, if I could crawl in a shed somewhere (temperatures are around freezing, it’s snowing, I really didn’t want to sleep on the bike or in the parking lot…) There were no signs to indicate the vacancy status, and the office seemed quite dark. Then I noticed the big sign hanging in front of the office: "Nobody in the office." Uh oh… "Rooms around the side to the right. Doors are unlocked. If the curtains are drawn and the lights are on, feel free to take the room. Please stop by the office in the morning to sign in." Right on!! I rode around the side, found an empty room… and then all the second guessing, the self-doubts, the morosity, the blue funk just went poof, and I was having big fun again…

That would be one of the (well) hidden pleasures of this LDriding business for people like me. Like other somewhat extreme activities, it forces us to get away from our easy lives, pushes us a bit out on a ledge, shakes the dust bunnies out of our cozy routines, works the kinks out of our stiff assumptions, and lets some primitive juices flowing, but within some reasonably safe setting. Wow, deep, dude.

I decided to leave the bike on the sidestand, for some reason. The motel was pretty cute, built like a log cabin, Not much in the room besides a bed and a bathroom, but that was all I needed. I took my anti-inflammatory pill, and decided that a good sleep was what my body needed most. Getting to Whitehorse on time would be nice, but that it was probably a better idea yet to take care a bit of my body. I was afraid that I would not be able to fall asleep, or that I would wake up if I shifted in bed the wrong way. I had packed along some Ambien, great little pills that help you fall asleep and get through at least one good sleep cycle. Then they totally flush out of your system, and do not leave you groggy. They work great to fight jetlag, for instance. Better living through chemistry. I popped 1/2 a pill as soon as I got in the room, so that it would have time to start taking effect while I got ready for bed. I ate my last sandwich (I had prepared 1/2 dozen sandwiches before leaving: two or three different cheeses, pâté, salami, on real bread… They hold together well, so they’re easy to eat while riding, they taste 10 times better, and they’re probably a fair sight healthier than most any fast food I could grab on the road. Yeah!) I had a bit of a hard time getting in bed – I was not really much in pain when on the bike, but although I made a conscious effort to constantly shift my butt back and forth and sideways on my seat, I did stiffen up a bit, and I moved pretty slowly. I drifted asleep listening to the song of the rain on the metal roof. Now that I was in a nice room, and had kicked out the little demons that had ridden along in my head the past couple hours, the crappy weather had lost a lot of its nastiness, and was definitely not a concern anymore. Mańańa would bring whatever it wanted, for now, I was feeling royal.

I slept rather well, but when I woke up a bit after 3 AM, I was stuck! My back was completely frozen, it hurt quite a bit when I tried to turn to my side to swing up out of bed. O joy. That could have been one of the downside of sleeping too soundly, I didn’t move at all and tightened up – but I don’t think I would have moved enough to make a difference anyways. Well, I spent some time slowly stretching and working on my back, lathered on Ben Gay, and finally managed to crawl into the shower and let the warm water work its wonders. Rebounding from last night’s blues, I was feeling pretty high despite my senatorial pace around the room. To add to my effervescence, I couldn’t hear rain on the roof. Whoohee! It had indeed quit raining, and although the sky was still pretty much all gray, it looked much better. I only had about 450 miles to go, and I had a whole 7 hours to do it. Things were looking up. Of course, I had no idea of what kind of road laid ahead of me…