PA2: Fairbanks to Anchorage

I pedalled into Fairbanks, tired, dirty and in desperate need of a pint.

First order of business was getting some accommodation sorted, then I could secure the bike and head out to explore.

Summer is the high season in Fairbanks (in fact it’s pretty much the only season for tourism, unless you want to see the northern lights or do a bit of dog mushing), places were either booked up or asking ridiculous amounts like 290 dollars a night.

Fed up with messing around, I chained up the bike and went into a Mexican pub.

Burrito, four pints of wonderful Alaskan Ale later and life had got its sparkle back again. I came out carrying my luggage and wandered back to my bike. Loaded everything on and decisively gave a cheerful pump on the pedal. KACHUNK! The front wheel came off.

Quick release axles require only your bare hands and a couple of seconds to remove. I should be glad they didn’t steal my wheels too…

I wouldn’t have dared leave a relatively nice bike chained up in the middle of Brighton unattended, so I should have known better.

This was my first major inconvenience with solo travelling. Had I been in a group we could have just rotated people watching the bikes.

I attached my front panniers and front wheel onto the rear rack to make a sort of wheelbarrow, with which I then began the long walk of shame towards the nearest bike shop. Obviously my antics didn’t go unnoticed, much to the enjoyment of the locals.

After a few minutes of pathetically slow progress I must have looked forlorn enough that someone pulled over and gave me a ride. His name was Chris and apparently he had actually cycled down to Argentina with his mates in 1998. Lucky break! 

Chris showed me the bike shop and then took me to a hostel up the road. He had lots of stories from his adventure and some great tips about staying safe on the road, which I readily absorbed. His son waiting in the truck just wanted to get home already.

The hostel was happy to let me camp in their back garden and use their kitchen and showers.

I ran into lots of very interesting people at the hostel. It’s not exactly Tenerife; you tend to rub shoulders with the more adventurous types in Fairbanks. Quite a few local guys came over for a few hours to hang out and chat. Most were cyclists and I learned a few bits and pieces about riding in the US.

Ken told me that you should never lose line of sight with your bike in town, he would take it into shops with him if necessary and walk it down the aisles. I gave this a go for the rest of my time in Fairbanks and no one batted an eyelid.

I also heard a few scare stories about muggings etc. Apparently certain parts of Anchorage are a bit dicey. There have been quite a few shootings despite the relatively small population. 

The next day three cyclists caught up with me from the Dalton. Holly, Lonny and Keira had pedalled down in just eight days. Apparently this was their first ever bike tour, what a ride to start with!

We agreed that the food situation had been a bit precarious on the Dalton. Apparently over the last few days they had struggled a bit for food and water. 

Once I leave Alaska for Canada I’ll be dealing with hundreds of miles of road between population centres. Therefore I need to adapt my rig slightly to carry more calories and drink. I slimmed down my possessions, mailing a few bits and pieces home. The result being I could load on enough (10 days) food to get me all the way to Anchorage. 

There are occasional convenience stores along the way, however they are not the cheapest. Since I’m planning on doing this for well over a year my provisioning strategy is generally to go to a Walmart or similar and get supplies in bulk cheaply. This also gives me a lot of autonomy if I spontaneously decide to explore off my planned route without having to worry about resupply.

After two full rest days lounging around the hostel and doing a bit of bouldering in town, it was time to set off for Anchorage.

I had been warned that the first 50 miles or so were essentially a constant climb, which I wasn’t massively excited about considering all the extra weight I was carrying. 

It turned out to be a fairly gentle gradient, just a case of selecting a low gear and chugging along at a crawl. 

Reaching the town of Nenanda, I found a quiet road with some waste ground and plonked my tent down. 

The next two days were pretty uneventful pedalling. The main roads have a generous hard shoulder along the side, about a metre and a half or so, in which cyclists and pedestrians can travel. It collects plenty of gravel, detritus and tossed trash. Road maintenance isn’t too concerned with the shoulder either so there are plenty of cracks and bumps.

Consequently I got my first puncture of the trip. Had to pop into a restaurant and beg for a bucket to find the leak. 

Back on the road and I ran into a pair of Austrian cyclists coming out of Denali national park. They were riding the Parks Highway from Anchorage to Fairbanks. 

A few minutes later I met a young French guy, Lucas, also riding from Anchorage to Fairbanks. 

He told me he had met a Brit in Anchorage 7 days ago, James, who had just started cycling the Pan-American Highway from there.

I guess James didn’t fancy the Dalton? 

It’s possible he was also factoring in this 90 day ESTA and figured he would have a better chance if he started 1000 miles closer. 

Lucas didn’t want to ride the Dalton either. 

I reached Denali National park on the 16th of July, 3 days out of Fairbanks. Really big views. 

Decided to pay up for a couple nights of camping and then planned my foray into the park.

The park road would normally go 90 miles in, however a rockfall had cut it off at mile 43. The road has some serious elevation gain and is unpaved. I wasn’t feeling it.

I decided to potter around and do a bit of hiking near the entrance of the park. 

After a sleep I settled on a 1000m climb called ‘Mt Healy Overlook’. 

Funny thing with groups of walkers. When you catch up with a bunch resting, they could either A.) stay still and let you pass as you are clearly climbing faster anyway; or B.) decide to start walking when as they see you approaching, dragging out the inevitable even longer and blocking the single path.

Well they all went with option B. A similar thing seems to happen when out biking on the downs or even driving on the motorway. You can set cruise control and gradually overtake someone at a fixed speed and then watch them jam on the power and move ahead, before you then gradually reel them in again. I’m guessing it’s a primaeval instinct that served a purpose at some point in our evolutionary history.

Beautiful views from the top, and then a slow plod back to camp. I wasn’t surprised to find that DC skate shoes weren’t cut out for mountaineering.

Returning to camp with thirst, I discovered Pabst blue ribbon beer.

Back in the 19th century in the USA beer bottles didn’t have labels, instead the glass was embossed with the brand. Pabst came up with the idea of tying blue silk ribbons around each bottle, thus clearly distinguishing them from the competition. PBR, as it is known, has experienced a sales slump since the craft beer explosion in the 2000s. They have something of a cult following amongst urban hipsters, which has turned the brand into something of a meme.

I really liked it. Quite a floral hoppy flavour. Not bad for a tinny.

Went for a wander around the camp grounds with my PBR and bear spray and ran into a few interesting characters.

Ended up getting an unsolicited lecture about how the current political administration is going to outlaw private property if they aren’t stopped soon. 

After listening politely I excused myself to go explore another trail. 

It turns out walking all day in shoes that aren’t actually intended for walking isn’t great for your knees. So much for a ‘rest day’.

Had a lay-in and then set off in the pouring rain for Anchorage. 237 miles left to go, which I figured would be four and a half days of plodding.

The hills gradually flattened out the further I got from the park entrance, but the constant rain and a reasonably sturdy headwind wore me down over the days. 

It was just a case of putting on my MP3 player, hunkering down in my waterproofs and getting the mileage done. Camp, sleep, break camp and do it all again. 

Supposedly some of the best views of Mt Denali are from the South. No chance of that in this weather. I hope no one was planning an expedition to the summit this week. 

I sheltered from the rain at the Alaskan Veterans Memorial and learned a bit about the military history of Alaska, such as the Japanese invasion of the Aleutian Islands in WW2.

Alaska was used as a staging point to fly thousands of aircraft to the Soviet Union during WW2 as part of ‘Lend Lease’. The hope was that this would encourage the Russians to join the war against the Japanese, which didn’t actually happen until August 1945. Regardless, the equipment was still valuable in keeping the Germans at bay. 

Some historians claim that the reluctant Japanese surrender in 1945 actually had more to do with the rapid advance of Russian forces, rather than the two atomic bombs.

There was also a huge US military presence in Alaska during the cold war. The Soviets shocked the west by detonating their first atomic bomb much sooner than anyone anticipated. In response, a network of radars along the coast of the Arctic Ocean, known as the Distant Early Warning (DEW) line, was constructed. This was backed up with a number of airbases and missile batteries intended to intercept intruders. The shortest distance between Russia and the United States is over the Arctic, so Russian bombers would have had to penetrate Alaskan and Canadian airspace to reach their targets in the lower 48 states. A lot of servicemen and women had to brave severe Arctic conditions to ensure ‘America’s top cover’. 

Having strung out my sheltered stay at the memorial for as long as possible, it was time to get back to cranking out the miles.

People often stop to see if I am okay while I do my refuelling. I met a cheerful Jehovah’s Witness who gave me a leaflet, talked a bit about peace and told me the wild cranberries were in season. Peace is fine by me and some fresh fruit would really break up the monotony of my diet of jam tortillas, rice, pasta and spam.

I met Colleen, who recommended a Thai restaurant down the road. She said the sauce was so nice she had just ordered a batch from Amazon. I could definitely have done some damage to a green curry by this point. She was really friendly and offered to take my picture in front of the view of where Mt Denali would have been visible if the weather wasn’t so rubbish.

Another jam tortilla and Gary pulled up next to me. He pegged me as English and immediately took the piss out of my accent. Turns out he had spent 4 years living in the UK while his dad was serving at RAF Lakenheath. 

He’s just bought a patch of land and is building his property up from scratch, a proper 21st century homesteader. 

As a resident over 60 in Alaska, Gary can apply for a permanent identification card from The Department of Fish and Game which would enable him to hunt, fish or set traps for free.

Once you have been a resident of Alaska for more than 12 months you begin receiving a share of the oil industry profits via the Alaska Permanent Fund. On average residents receive $1600 annually, just for living there!

As we were talking a series of large dump trucks drove past. He casually pointed out that they were building his driveway.

His house is going to be built from two shipping containers, one for accommodation and one for storage. He will be using solar panels to generate electricity. It is a somewhat stressful situation where he needs to get everything assembled before winter comes. 

He intends to expand next year by constructing a log cabin and then converting the shipping containers into grow houses to produce vegetables over the winter. 

He’s on his own with this project, so there is no one else to blame if anything goes wrong. On the other hand, he can experience all the pride of a job well done if it works out. Adapt, improvise and overcome.

There’s a big part of me that is envious of Gary building his off-grid life in the woods. 

Gary’s father, Thomas, spent part of his US Air Force career based in Alaska.

On November 15, 1957 an Air Force TB29 was returning to Elmendorf air base from a radar calibration mission when they lost visibility due to weather. The plane crashed into a glacial slope at 5600 feet, killing six of the ten crew members.

1st Lt Thomas Seebo, piloting a Piasecki SH-21 helicopter, was directly involved in the rescuing the 4 surviving crew members. 

I could tell that Gary Seebo held his father’s military service in high regard; he followed in his footsteps by joining the US Air Force in 1975.

Apparently he got spat on by an anti-war demonstrator, who called him a ‘baby killer’. He had only just graduated and therefore never served in Vietnam, from which the US had already withdrawn at that point.

A loud blast of a truck horn interrupted our conversation. I guess we were cluttering up the side of the road. Time to get moving again.

I think if it wasn’t for all of these chance roadside encounters I would have given up pedalling long ago. I don’t see the point in just keeping my head down and blasting past people and places with stories to tell.

Pedalled down to a town called Willow. There seemed to be some sort of strange patch of tarmac following the roadside. It couldn’t possibly be…? A bike lane! 

It’s probably pathetic how emotional I got about having my own little road after days of trucks blasting past me a few feet away. The drivers are generally pretty nice here and will often cross all the way into the opposite lane to pass me even though I’m on the hard shoulder. All the same, having a bit of wobble room is great!

I spotted a sign for a thrift store and immediately dived in to remedy the self-inflicted shortcomings in my wardrobe. For all of 21 dollars I walked out with warm clobber from head to toe. Dry socks for the first time in days! What a lovely sensation.

In the grand scheme of things not the biggest mess up, and now I know I’ve probably reached the limit in lightening my luggage. If I have to take on anything extra I’ve got to find a place for it somewhere, somehow.

I’m certainly not saying you have to carry this much clobber; there’s plenty of people who have pedalled huge distances at a much better pace with just a tent/ bivy, sleeping kit, an extra layer or two of clothes, a few tools and a toothbrush (be sure to cut off the handle if you want to be truly ultralight!). 

You’ve probably heard the saying ‘All the gear and no idea’, but I also quite like the slogan of the Finnish outdoor brand Savotta: ‘Better gear, less misery’.

On the way out of Willow I met two German cyclists, Dennis and Katija. They were riding North up to the Yukon river, a little way up the Dalton, before heading south for Argentina. They will be perhaps two weeks behind me?

Honestly at this point it seems like I could randomly throw a tennis ball and it would probably hit someone travelling the Pan-American Highway. 

After Willow there were pretty frequent signs of civilization all the way south. About 3 pm I decided that I’d worked hard this week and deserved a treat. Beer o’clock?

Alaskan Amber was just the ticket. What Americans call amber ale seems to be the nearest you can get to an English cask bitter, although it is sold cold and carbonated.

Since I had my separate cycle lane I figured I didn’t have to worry too much about getting slightly sloshed on my amble southward. I experienced a big boost to morale, but my miles per hour dropped off quite noticeably!

Ended up camping just 35 miles short of Anchorage, hoping my last day was going to be a doddle.

At camp in Matanuska Lake state park I just sat down at a picnic table and vacantly stared off into the distance. I love the great outdoors, but there is also a lot to be said for slumping on a sofa with some cheesy TV.

Josh, my neighbour, popped over for a chat. He’d got tired of the new corporate ownership of his audiology clinic and fancied a fresh start. He decided to complete uproot his life to come and work in Alaska for a year. 

Josh and his partner, Sarah, have driven their 3 daughters (Annabelle, Luci and Grace), their dog (Steve), cat (Felix) and hamster (Thor) all the way to Anchorage from Wanatah, Indiana. 

Since it would have cost about 2500 dollars to ship each vehicle up here, plus all of their other household possessions, they just brought the whole load along with them. This involved driving both an RV and their pickup truck, which towed a trailer, which in turn towed their car. 

Upon arrival it turned out their home wasn’t quite ready yet, so they had to keep living out of their RV and hopping between campsites while Josh started working at his new job. Fortunately it’s still the summer holidays and no one needs to be driven to and from school.

It sounds like it’s been an absolute mission and I’m seriously impressed by their decisiveness; dropping out from their established family routine and taking a chance. By comparison heading off alone on a bicycle when you haven’t got ties like kids and a house is pretty straightforward!

The next day I had a nice long lay in. I knew I had a Warmshowers host lined up in Anchorage, only 3 hours and a bit away.

Warmshowers is a website where cyclists host cyclists. It relies upon a friendly community who reciprocate their free accomodation by hosting riders in their own places when they can. 

It’s wonderful to know that someone out there is waiting to invite you into their warm home when you have been out in the elements for days on end.

The road was a dual carriageway all the way down. The first 10 miles I was riding on the shoulder with traffic speeding past just a few feet from me. I wasn’t going to stop for any jam sandwiches on this stretch for sure.

I started getting too hot and tucked off to the side as best I could to stop and take off a layer. Immediately a well intentioned Alaskan pulled over and walked back to me to ask if I was okay. I had to ask myself the same question… I’m doing this for fun?

Thankfully I got a dedicated cycle route for the remaining miles. Eventually I arrived in a soggy meek heap outside the front door of my hosts, very ready for a few days off the bike.