Yukon Ho!

June 25, 2006

Biking time: 11:00AM to 7:30PM
End: Rancheria Motel
Distance: 97km
We woke up about 730am and packed the tent in record time to avoid being eaten alive by mosquitoes, then biked up the road to Sally’s.
The cafe was packed with 6 bikers and 2 big-rig drivers but Glen had the table on the screened-in back patio all to himself and his cup of coffee so we joined him. He told us about some more crazy mountain shit he does (cans his own preserves, has a friend named Bear Bait who’s been scalped by a bear once and treed twice) while we scarfed down awesome breakfasts.
After about an hour and a half of coffee-drinking and blab-blabbing we said good bye, stocked up on beef jerky at the convenience store across the road, and started down the Alaska highway.
We had a couple patchy sprinkles early on but nothing too bad, and we stopped to chat with a couple of American cyclists so that put us in a pretty good mood. Nothing really started sucking until after lunch. The long slow grades that had been such a welcome change from the drastic ups and downs of the Stewart-Cassiar started to piss us off. We just kept climbing these hills that wound around lakes and rivers for miles where it looked  like the road couldn’t possibly go any higher. We also started to get a bit of a headwind, followed by a light shower that came along and soaked us before we realized it wasn’t going to taper off like the earlier showers had.
We would have pulled over and camped right then but there was absolutely nowhere to pitch a tent and everything on us and our bikes was soaked and frozen. We wanted to be someplace with a roof so we just kept climbing into the wind and the rain and the godforsaken HILLS of the Yukon PLATEAU (friggin’ liars) until we finally hit Rancheria Motel -a collection of little brown and white Swiss-style motels, cabins, gas station and restaurant. We leaned our bikes against the laundry cabin and made for the restaurant. We opened the door on the 60’s. The place was awesome -the lights were dim and all the walls and tables were made of dark wood. There was a massive fish tank built into the wall that separated the diner from the bar and the wood walls were covered in huge glossy wooden plaques with pictures of wildlife printed on them. The bar was full of stuffed animals -deer, bear, muskrat, wolf, squirrel, owl, goat- you name it, they had it stuffed and on display in that bar.
The only people at the tables were the older couple that owned the place and the cook. They’d watched us ride up, sat and laughed while we changed in the bathroom, then chatted us up, superfriendly, and served us coffee, beer, hot beef sandwiches, potatoes and pie.  During dinner Sean and I decided the thought of going back out in the rain and the cold was too soul-destroying and, since we hadn’t showered in a week or washed clothes in two, it was worth the $55 for a room so we could clean our supplies and selves.
Done deal. The waitress/owner showed us to #11 -a very 60’s room in a million shades of orange and brown- where we washed all our clothes in the bathroom sink and hung them from every hang-able off-able surface to dry.
It was the best place to cure the worst mood and we never wanted to leave. Plus it showed up 4km earlier than we’d expected it to.

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