Day 10: A Short Short Day

Just before leaving on June 24th, we developed a complication in our plan for tire replacement.

Plan A:

Order tires on the internet and have them shipped to our motel in Whitehorse and have them installed on July 13, Day 20, before leaving for Haines. 

After placing the order, it was immediately canceled by the vendor. Apparently they are unable to ship to Canada within their current freight contract.  In fact, another internet tire seller also would not ship to Whitehorse. 

Plan B:

Have the tires shipped to Pittsburgh so they could then be re-shipped to Whitehorse.  This didn't work because we found out there is a postal worker strike in Canada.

Plan C:

Finally, we decided to have the vendor ship the tires directly to my sister’s house in Oregon.  However, this means our tires have to last until Day 25, a full 9000 miles, instead of the 7500 miles we would have traveled by Day 20.

We have been monitoring the tire tread on our tires so we can project when the tires will need replacement.

Although the data is limited at this time, it appears Mc’s tires will just make the 9000 miles, however, Mick’s appear to be wearing faster, projecting “bald” on the rear when arriving in Oregon.

The weather man predicted very cold temperatures for today.  A low of 7C and high of 14 C.  The road to Skagway goes through a high altitude mountain pass (Dead Horse Pass) that could be 5 to 10 C colder than the temperature in Whitehorse.  If the temperature drops to 0 C in the mountains leading to Skagway, then there is a potential for ice on the road. 

Due to the combination of cold temperatures and need to preserve tire tread, the Skagway leg of our planned travel for Day 10 was cancelled, and we drove approx. 160 miles to Destruction Bay.

As indicated earlier, we have had trouble with slow internet service at the motels, and the Westmark in Whitehorse continued the trend.  After waiting hours for pictures to upload and/or log onto the web page, we went out in search of internet service before departing for Destruction Bay.

After striking out at McDonald’s, we walked over to the Yukon Inn and sat in the lobby.  The internet service was superb!! 

After checking out of the Westmark, we had another breakfast at the Yukon Inn restaurant, drinking coffee and blogging away.

We finally departed Whitehorse for Destruction Bay around 1:30 pm, local time.

Before we left the Yukon Inn, Mick made some new friends from Europe.

There’s a new view.

(Mick’s in the lead.)

Although the bulk of the road construction will be between Destruction Bay and the Alaska border, we ran into several patches of “loose gravel” on the way to Destruction Bay.

Haines Junction.

This is the Chilkoot mountain pass we will be taking to get to the ferry in 10 days

Now there’s a hard core biker.

Mick’s Weeds:

They are called Fireweeds because
they are the first after a fire - also at the side of the road after they cut the brush.

Snowpuffs

... at least that is what Mick calls them.

Huge weeds

Dandelions even grow here!

I was just admiring some of Mick’s weeds during a break.

We’re down to one GPS.  Mick’s hit the ground today and has not been “itself” since.

Kulane Park:

The water is an unusual blue color caused by the suspended solids in the glacier run off.

Housekeeping Contest Award Winner!

Best Overall Outhouse!!!

A little more rain

The “law abiding” community of Destruction Bay.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police car

Wooden Division

Today’s Stats:

Arriving Destruction Bay at 6 pm, local time

Riding Time:  2 Hrs., 56 mins.

Today’s Miles:  161.5

Total Miles:  3925

Today’s MPG:  45.8

Today’s MPH:  57.2 (avg.)

Tomorrow’s Destination:   Fairbanks, Alaska.

430 miles.

Mc