June 29, 2007
To Tiekel Lodge: Richardson Highway
We sleep well despite being in the midst of a parking lot full of RV's, it is quiet during the night. We decide to ride out with Doug and Jenn this morning. We take our time, have some coffee from the service station next door and eat our breakfast. About 9:30am we ride into town, first stop an outdoor store. On the ship yesterday we had to store our camp fuel and bottle in a "paint" locker. We remembered to take ours upon arrival, Doug and Jenn did not...they need to replace two bottles of $35 and bear spray. Changing our minds, we buy two mosquito head nets, we are thinking we'll need those inland.
We set off on the Richardson Highway, past the old Valdez townsite about 4 miles to the East. Old Valdez was wiped out by the Tsunami during the earthquake of '62. Doug and Jenn have less gear and are stronger riders than us, after about 14 miles just before the start of the climb to Thompson Pass, we stop for lunch, they go on. We'll meet them again at camp tonight. The pass is just over 800 meters high, a couple of long steep sections of road and one large hairpin gets us there. There are nice views of the valley below and of a glacier at the top of the pass.
The descent is awesome.
We pass another glacier and fly downhill with a strong tailwind. The last 10 miles are "dry" since we've run out of drinking water and the roadhouse we were hoping to have a mountain dew was closed. Tiekel roadhouse is a rundown cabin/restaurant with a small RV park and some tent spaces. It was bought only two weeks ago by two guys from Wisconsin who like to kayak around here. They found it on the internet. There also is a manager and a guy who works here for a room and who just returned from a four month Asia trip. We find Doug and Jenn camped along the river, a site is $5 and a shower $3. Patrick buys a shower, Rachel takes a sponge bath in the river.
For dinner we go to the restaurant and each have a great burger.
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Today's ride: 98 km (61 miles)
Total: 9,826 km (6,102 miles)
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