WHAT AM I DOING?


I must say that this is an adventure. I came to Alaska to ride my bike and I am building a deck. The new adventure begins on June 3. I will ride to Girdwood, Alaska,which is about 36 miles from Anchorage. On June 4 I will ride to Whittier, Alaska, which is about 24 miles from Girdwood. At Whittier I have to wait for Jim Jr. to drive me through the tunnel. There is only one road into Whittier and it goes through a tunnel. No bikes, no walking through the tunnel. In Whittier I will catch the ferry to Bellingham, Washington. I will spend five nights on the ferry between Whittier and Bellingham. From Bellingham I plan to ride my bike to Saint Paul, Minnesota. I will take a route mapped out by Adventure Cycling Association and I will use their maps. On my travels I will update this blog whenever possible. Feel free to follow along and post a comment or email me at silverfox.jim@aol.com

Sunday, June 17, 2012

End of the Adventure

I'm home, so the adventure is over.  I must say that it has been an excellent adventure.  We spent two nights at the cabin and came home on Saturday.  I want to thank everyone for following my blog.  It was always great to get comments.  I am comfortable with my decision to call off the adventure.  I did travel a lot of miles to make that decision.  I also spend a lot of money and accumulated a lot of stuff in the process.  The ferry ride was great.  There was a group on the ferry that reminds me of my coffee group.  The group on the ferry are the smokers who go to the back of the boat to the smoking area and solve the world's problems.  That is kind of what the coffee group does, except with coffee.  Great group of people.  Both groups.  I know when I get back to coffee they are going to say "What were you thinking anyway?". 

A big thanks to Jim Jr. (webmaster), Destin and Elsie for their support and putting up with me for a month.  They are fun to be around.  A month is a long time to impose on their family.  But, I would do it again if they would have me.  And of course Georgia.  My biggest supporter and rescuer.  I don't know why a long time ago she didn't whack me along side of the head and say "What are you thinking?".  But she didn't and she found me in the Cascade Mountains and took me back home.  Now there is a gal for you.

Friday will be my 70th birthday. So to everyone that checked on me through my blog thanks for the great big birthday present.  JIM (The Silver Fox)

Friday, June 15, 2012

MINNESOTA

We made it to MN last night. We are at our cabin on the Crow Wing River. We,ll be here a couple of nights or maybe more. That,s up to Georgia. I have to be nice to her, she did come to get me. Tuesday I will be back to the coffee shop to reclaim me favorit chair.

Thursday, June 14, 2012

Miles City

No wifi last night but they have it working by this morning.  Hope to be on the road by eight.  The picture is where I had dinner last Saturday night.  First night off the boat.


Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Missula

It is Wednesday morning 7:30 and getting on the road. We will see how far we get today.

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

GEORGIA

Georgia in front of motel, with rental car and still smiling.


Camping in Concrete

My camp site on the last night.


Decision Day

So here is the story.  I am sitting in the Hampton Inn in Ellensburg, WA.  It is Tuesday morning about 2:15 am.  I finished my second day of riding on Sunday and stopped in Concrete, WA.  It has been two hard days for me.  Both days I did 30 to 35 miles.  Now the real climbing starts as I head toward Newhalem. It is decision day. Can I continue on and make it over the mountains? Am I still having fun? Can I physically do this?  The answer I came up with was no.  On my adventure I have been gone from home for not quite a month and a half and I have maybe a total of 250 miles bike riding.  The most fun I have had so far is building the deck with Jim Jr. and being with Elise and Destin. I don't think that I am made up for this long distance bike riding or maybe fully loaded bike trips.  I have to see what comes up down the line.  But for right now I long to be home with Georgia and the guys at the coffee shop.  So the adventure is over. Sunday I went to plan C or is it D or E. I called Georgia and as the faithful wife she flew to Seattle on Monday, rented a car and picked me up in Concrete.  I just love that gal for putting up with me. Like I said we are now in Ellensburg WA and heading home. I have some pictures that I have not been able to post the last week so on the way home I will post them.  Thanks for following.  It has been an anventure.

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Dad has not been able to find a hot spot on the ferry portion of his trip to get online and blog from, so gave me a call, updated me on his progress, and asked I do a quick update on his blog. So here it goes.

Dad called from Ketchikan, Alaska today.  Ketchikan could be looked at as an old haunt of Dad's, considering he and I left the town in flames once years ago on a past ferry trip we took together (this was back when the old man drank). I found some pictures of Ketchikan on the web and posted them below.





The Lower 48ers reading this may remember Ketchikan from a while back when the "bridge to nowhere" controversy was in the national media. Alaska was getting a lot of crap for receiving what was being perceived as too much federal money. A bridge project in Ketchikan became the face of the criticisms and was characterized as a waist of money.

Of course, these criticisms were ridiculous. In the case of the Ketchikan bridge, the facts are as such: 1) Ketchikan is Alaska's fourth largest city, 2) Ketchikan's airport is an international airport used by people from all over the world, and 3) this airport, located in the fourth largest city of the country's largest state, is located across an ocean straight from the city itself and is not connected by a bridge.  So I ask you, what side of that equation equals "nothing," Alaska's fourth largest city or an international airport? I've included a picture below to better illustrate the situation.



Moving on, Dad said that aside from a small amount of rain, the weather has been great. Very sunny. Since leaving Whittier and before arriving in Ketchikan today, he has been to Yakutat and Juneau. Juneau is Alaska's state capital. Dad has seen whales and porpoises so far on his trip. He also wanted me to be sure and let everyone know that there are 166 passengers on his ferry. He gets into Bellingham, Washington on Saturday morning, so maybe by Saturday evening we'll see a new post from Dad himself.

Signing off.

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Ferry Day

It is Tuesday morning, 5:00am.  I can see the ferry landing out my hotel window.  I have my bike and BOB in the hotel room. It would have been nice if the room was on the first floor.  There is no WiFi on the ferry so it may be about 5 days before you hear from me.

Mine will be one of the many souls aboard the M/V Matanuska. Below are some pictures I found of the M/V Matanuska on the Web:


Open water I will be crossing between Whittier and Juneau


The "Inside Passage"

Just a couple of weeks ago the M/V Matanuska crashed into a pier at Petersburg, Alaska. I found this photo on the web of the scene at the time of the accident:

M/V Matanuska crash in Petersburg, Alaska

Boy, I hope that person isn't driving the ship now!

Monday, June 4, 2012

ON MY WAY

Here I am sitting in this hotel room and the table is not level.  Where is Joe when you need him.  That is for the coffee shop boys.

So here is how my day went:

I left the house about 9:45 and got a little lost getting out of town.  I went out C Street and missed my turn to get to Seward Hwy.  I went about 5 miles too far and of course that is 10 miles when you have to back track.  That was no problem.  When I got to Potters Creek rest stop l stopped for a rest.  At this point I have gone about 20 to 25 miles.  I get a phone call.  It is from the ferry people telling me that the ferry is late and will leave tomorrow morning instead of tonight and I now need to be there at 6:00am tomorrow instead of 8:00pm tonight.  I called Jim Jr. and we decided to keep the same plan of meeting me at Whittier and drive me through the tunnel.  I would stay in Whittier for the night.

Then, another mile down the road, and I get a flat tire. Not just a pin prick, but a mangled mess of glass and wire that I need a pliers to remove from the outer tire. No idea what I rode over. Just the night before Jim Jr. and I decided to leave all repair stuff in the BOB bag, which he was bringing to me in Whittier.  Well, another phone call to Jim Jr., and Destin came and got me and the bike. I dropped Destin back off at work, went to REI, got a new inner tube, and fixed the tire.  Jim Jr. got off work and we drove to Whittier.  I am now at the Anchor Inn of Whittier, Alaska, and Jim Jr. is back home in Anchorage.

One could characterize the Anchor Inn as a bit of a salty abode. Lots of character and local flavor.


The Anchor Inn - My favorite spot inWhittier. Thanks
to all the folks working there for making my stay so
comfortable!


Sunday, June 3, 2012

Well, the old man went to bed. I guess I have been working him too hard on the deck. Plus, he has a big day tomorrow and needs his rest. Before he slipped away, however, Dad asked I update his blog tonight. A good idea I think, given his trip "re-starts" tomorrow and he likely won't be posting on a regular basis as he ferries to the Lower 48 over the next five days (after his bike ride from Anchorage to Whittier, of course).

I have been supervising Dad's training regime over the last two weeks. It could be characterized as "cross-training," given I don't think he has had time to ride his bike but more than once or twice over that time period, but has gotten a good work out under my tutelage, mostly consisting of lifting and carrying 2x6, 2x8, and 4x4 lumber. Think Rock IV, when Rocky went back to basics to train in the Siberian wilderness before fighting the Russian.

I must thank the old man for his help in re-building my deck. I couldn't have done it without him, and boy oh boy, does he ever do good work. Here are some pictures of where we are at on the deck construction:




The deck may not look far along from the pictures, but believe me, the hard work is done. All that is left now is to set a few joices and put the flooring on. I think I can handle that on my own, but we'll see.

Be sure to keep an eye on Dad during his travels. The next several days should prove interesting, with the ferry ride and stops in picturesque places like Yakatat, Juneau, and Ketchikan, Alaska. Hopefully along the way Dad will find a hot spot to fire up his new tablet computer and post some pictures of those locals. He'll be updating his blog map as he goes, so feel free to follow along. It will also be interesting to see how the moose count goes as he travels south. Oh boy, lots to pay attention to.

All for now. Signing off.

Saturday, June 2, 2012

It is Saturday morning.  It seems to be easer to do the blog in the morning than at night.  I always just want to go to bed in the evening.  Deck work is coming right along.  No pictures because you can not really see the progress we are making and the picture would make it look like we are just sitting on out butts.  Which is not true.  If it looks like we are making progress today I'll put pictures in tomorrow.

I make my last trip to REI yesterday so now it is just a matter of packing everything.  I leave Monday morning. 

Friday, June 1, 2012

Time to get back bloging.  I bought a Samsung Galaxy Tablet 2 with a seven inch screen to take with me on my travels.  I tried to write my blog with it last night and after about an hour and half doing it I tried to put picture in and I lost everything.  I went to bed after that happened.  I have this neat touch screen device that works great but is very slow. 

I leave Monday morning and will ride to Whittier, AK where I will catch my ferry.  The ferry leaves at 11 pm but I have to be there at 8 pm.  This is about 60 to 70 miles ride.  I wanted to leave Sunday and stop in Girdwood, AK Sunday night but I could not find a room.  Girdwood is about 40 miles from Anchorage.  I will meet Jim Jr. at Whittier and he will take me through the tunnel into Whittier.  The only way into Whittier is through a tunnel.  This tunnel is shared with a train.  It is a one way tunnel so on the hour the cars go into Whittier and on the half hour they come out.  The cars drive on the train tracks and when there is a train cars wait.  I'll get some pictures when I get there.

Price of gas here is $4.46.  Sunrise 4:34 am and sunset 11:21 pm.