I woke up very early to see bright light on the tent and crawled out while the Butterfly slept.
It was a stunning sunrise over the mountains that captured me. I walked down to the creek nearby, surrounded by glowing light on golden vegetation and was captured in a divine moment of life. It so engulfed me I simply could do nothing but thank God for what overcame my senses. Can say that I've never, ever felt what I felt that morning.
After just absorbing as much as I could, I wandered back to the sleepers and checked the bike thermometer. It read 34 in the sunshine, with a hard frost on the bikes and gear. It likely had gotten close to 30 during the night, however the sun felt great despite my stinging fingers hoping for a hot mug of coffee to warm up on. Fanda had gotten up and we talked about the night’s bear incident for awhile. Kim was awake, deflating mattresses and rolling up gear in the tent. I pulled the soaking wet fly off and draped it over a bush in the sun, then we slowly disassembled camp.
Breakfast was a 34º can of beans, since we only had oatmeal and the thought of cooking and cleaning up sounded worse. Again I checked Kim's chain to find it very slack and now had real concerns that it might not make it to Fairbanks. I tightened it up and we rolled out into the warm sun and cold shadows of the mountains, Coldfoot and fuel lay about 109 miles ahead of us, followed by 250 more to Fairbanks.
Ahead also lay Atigun Pass and the mud we'd slithered through a couple of days before. When we arrived it had been graded smooth and was far better than previously, however only dry dirt had been applied over the mud and the ride was a bit squirmy. Still the views and sunlight were breathtaking.
The south side of Atigun led us back into brilliant yellow trees and myriad colors of vegetation on the mountainside. The river along the road was the cloudy aqua seen in high places and the road was better, but still unable to relax as potholes and patches were abundant.
A masterpiece of color…
As we neared Coldfoot and gas, Kim shouted in my headset she'd run out of fuel and I glanced down - 3.6 miles from Coldfoot! She'd run out 3.8 miles from Coldfoot on the way up. Fanda rescued her with petrol for the last 3 miles to the pumps.
We went inside and saw a group of Swiss folks eating a hot breakfast and we broke... the ice cold beans having worn off with a vengeance. Fanda went for a bowl of chili, I went for biscuits and gravy and The Iron Butterfly had an egg sammich. It was hog heaven for 30 minutes.
Kim added her number to the list on the walls...
Outside we packed up and I readjusted Kim's chain - at the end of it's adjustability - and psyched up mentally for the final 250 miles.
About 15 miles out of Coldfoot, to my left down off the road, I saw a semi tractor and trailer in the ditch, having gone off a 45º embankment and sitting down in the mud. I was sort of shocked and before I realized it had passed on down the road a ways before thinking to swing back to check on the driver. We zipped back up the road a few hundred yards and scrambled off the bikes.
Kim was honking her horn while I got down the embankment to the open driver's window. I could see two feet sticking out from the sleeping compartment and shouted in. I heard mumbling and then the driver emerged saying he was fine. I asked him what we could do, did he need a ride, did he need us to take him to Coldfoot and myriad other questions. He answered that he'd driven for 28 years and never had an issue until last night when he suddenly was off the road on a clear night. He said he was fine and another driver had stopped and was taking a message to Coldfoot for him. I told him it was a miracle he hadn't rolled the truck and he agreed.
We later went up the road to see his tracks and how he went off a road on a 45º slope at the angle he did and didn't roll it was unbelievable.
Kim kept asking me in my headset to ask him this and that but he said he was fine. In jest I said "How about some cheap vodka? He perked up and said "Hell yes I could use a shot after all that". Kim produced the bottle we'd all shared at the campsite and Fanda delivered it as well as a huge chocolate chip cookie we'd bought for the road. The driver was happy and genuinely thankful.
It felt weird leaving someone down in a ditch, but as we got back to the bikes another semi pulled up and the driver jumped out, shouting "Hell of a place to park dude!" then scrambled down the hill to the truck.
We continued on, dodging potholes for a while until we came across the same red and yellow VW bus - Big Emma - we'd seen a couple days before. We stopped and the same two couples piled out, letting us know they'd bailed on the idea of making to Deadhorse and had turned back at Coldfoot. Guess they got cold feet... nyuk nyuk
They drove on as we were saddling up to go and I looked back to see a semi coming down the road behind us. Kim was in back and a bit in the road so I told her to move over since the truck was coming. She pulled forward to get in front of us, but Fanda saw her moving and thought we were leaving so he accelerated out right behind her. He was committed and she couldn't hit her brakes, so she accelerated out as fast as possible. I nailed the throttle to get with them, but we were damn close to the truck and I'm sure he had to get on the brakes hard. We felt like crap knowing what had happened and sped on quickly, commenting on how we'd probably pissed him off and he'd chase us now. Kim laughed, but then a few miles down the road we saw a huge dust cloud behind us and glaring headlights. The truck was going seriously fast to catch us so we raced as fast as possible despite the road conditions until a few miles further when we took a fast pull out just over the crest of a hill. The truck rocketed past in a huge dust cloud and didn't see us. It was a bit crazy and creepy. Fanda was not connected to our headsets so I'm not sure he knew what was going on. We waited a while and saw the truck a mile away on a hillside climbing the road with a massive cloud of dust behind.
A few miles down the road we passed a rolled and destroyed car that had been pulled up on the roadside and a mile or two further spotted another wrecked pickup off the roadside.
We finally neared Fairbanks as the skies filled with rain ahead, stopping to suit up and then riding in a downpour for the last 40 miles. Kim was exhausted and nervous about running out of gas, so after missing the first roadside station we found another, filling the thirsty 700 in heavy rain. We followed Fanda to his house and surprised Kachka who'd been busy updating the blog. We'd initially figured the ride may take 4 days if the roads were really bad but we'd made it in 3. She was happy to see her Fanda again.
We were muddy, soaking wet and and exhausted when we called the motel where we'd stayed before and thankfully she had one remaining room. After getting in and drying off a bit, the best pizza Domino's ever made arrived at the room for a celebratory feast for a long day.