Today was the first day of riding on my Alaska trip.
I put in about 650Km which is good enough for a day (planning for about 500Km per riding day).
I started off in the city at about 9am. I stopped for a fuel up and a coffee and a muffin for breakfast and then headed off through the city...
Traffic was not good but not too bad either,
After about 45min I was on the main highway out of town headed North. This is the SeaToSky hwy and has pretty much been completely rebuilt over the past couple of years in preparation for the Winter Olympics that will be held in Whistler this winter. The road is much improved and is a pleasure to ride. From Whistler I kept going north to Lilooet. Again, this road has been completely repaved over the past year and what was a gravel road in places and narrow and rough for the rest, is now a magnificent new road that winds up into the alpine and along a mountain valley, past lakes and through forests to Lilooet...a real gem of a road for motorbike riders.
But as you get near Lilooet, the country changes from green to brown and the air temperature zipped straight through the thirties and up into the low fourties.
It was not as hot as when I rode through Death Valley, but it wasnt far off!
As I got to the town of Lilooet, the skys became smokey and the air was full of heavy lift helicopters with water bags slung below them...There were at least five of the big machines and they were fighting a bunch of fires in the hills around town.
I headed on and the temperatures stayed high and the country stayed brown and the sky stayed smokey.
When I got to Kamloops the helicopters were replaced by big twin engined water bombers dumping their loads of bright red fire retardant on another set of local fires...
The Okangan valley is really burning up this year!
Sad to say but I think its gonna stay this way in the future. I think the idea of “protecting” the local forests with such expensive fire fighting methods is not going to last very long...
I think global warming is here to stay for the time being and its a lost cause to spend these many millions of dollars on fighting the fires... The pine bark beetles are killing a very high percentage of the trees and the dead timber is kindeling for the fires that are becoming so much more frequent with the hotter and drier conditions.... The writing is really on the wall!
I bet the official body that does the fire fighting with the aircraft says it saved $XXXXX worth of forest by spending $YYYYY (where Y is less than X). But I bet they just add it up for the year just passed and that in reality, each year they are saving the same bits of forest...
Cumulatively, Im sure its a loosing proposition!
Anyway, from Kamloops I head North on the Yellowhead Hwy and after less than an hour of riding, the vast vistas of burned out forrest (from last year I would guess) give way to greener views.
It takes till 5:30 before the temperature is back below 40degC again. I ride on and at about 7pm I stop in a small town for the night. I find a suitable place to set up a tent and then I go to the local pub for a couple of beers and to assess my first day of travel...
Air cushion seat is doing well.
Riding jacket and pants are doing pretty good but I need to make some adjustments.
Got my face sunburned through the helmet visor (should have been expecting that!)
Knees are sore (should have expected that too)
Hands are shakey and ears are ringing (as usual after a day on the bike)
Yep, a prtetty normal day on the bike :)
I put in about 650Km which is good enough for a day (planning for about 500Km per riding day).
I started off in the city at about 9am. I stopped for a fuel up and a coffee and a muffin for breakfast and then headed off through the city...
Traffic was not good but not too bad either,
After about 45min I was on the main highway out of town headed North. This is the SeaToSky hwy and has pretty much been completely rebuilt over the past couple of years in preparation for the Winter Olympics that will be held in Whistler this winter. The road is much improved and is a pleasure to ride. From Whistler I kept going north to Lilooet. Again, this road has been completely repaved over the past year and what was a gravel road in places and narrow and rough for the rest, is now a magnificent new road that winds up into the alpine and along a mountain valley, past lakes and through forests to Lilooet...a real gem of a road for motorbike riders.
But as you get near Lilooet, the country changes from green to brown and the air temperature zipped straight through the thirties and up into the low fourties.
It was not as hot as when I rode through Death Valley, but it wasnt far off!
As I got to the town of Lilooet, the skys became smokey and the air was full of heavy lift helicopters with water bags slung below them...There were at least five of the big machines and they were fighting a bunch of fires in the hills around town.
I headed on and the temperatures stayed high and the country stayed brown and the sky stayed smokey.
When I got to Kamloops the helicopters were replaced by big twin engined water bombers dumping their loads of bright red fire retardant on another set of local fires...
The Okangan valley is really burning up this year!
Sad to say but I think its gonna stay this way in the future. I think the idea of “protecting” the local forests with such expensive fire fighting methods is not going to last very long...
I think global warming is here to stay for the time being and its a lost cause to spend these many millions of dollars on fighting the fires... The pine bark beetles are killing a very high percentage of the trees and the dead timber is kindeling for the fires that are becoming so much more frequent with the hotter and drier conditions.... The writing is really on the wall!
I bet the official body that does the fire fighting with the aircraft says it saved $XXXXX worth of forest by spending $YYYYY (where Y is less than X). But I bet they just add it up for the year just passed and that in reality, each year they are saving the same bits of forest...
Cumulatively, Im sure its a loosing proposition!
Anyway, from Kamloops I head North on the Yellowhead Hwy and after less than an hour of riding, the vast vistas of burned out forrest (from last year I would guess) give way to greener views.
It takes till 5:30 before the temperature is back below 40degC again. I ride on and at about 7pm I stop in a small town for the night. I find a suitable place to set up a tent and then I go to the local pub for a couple of beers and to assess my first day of travel...
Air cushion seat is doing well.
Riding jacket and pants are doing pretty good but I need to make some adjustments.
Got my face sunburned through the helmet visor (should have been expecting that!)
Knees are sore (should have expected that too)
Hands are shakey and ears are ringing (as usual after a day on the bike)
Yep, a prtetty normal day on the bike :)
