Introduction

Just about every two years I have saved enough money —and saved enough vacation days to be able to take a month off from work and bicycle tour somewhere. In 1998 it was the Mississippi River Ride from Minneapolis to New Orleans; in 2000 it was the Pacific Coast from Vancouver, B.C. to Inverness, CA. Where would it be in 2002?

Before I'd even returned from the Pacific Coast tour, I was thinking of where I'd like to bicycle explore next. I decided on touring in southern China with Peter Snow (www.bikechina.com). I wanted to see the Yangtze River Valley before it was dammed and lost forever to the flood waters. I wanted to see the Li River and the karst hills in Guangxi. I wanted to see rice terraces and hill tribes, prayer flags and monasteries. The idea of touring China possessed me for over a year, but eventually the logistics just became too daunting.

In August of 2001, my mind turned toward the north—as it so often does in the heat of an Oklahoma summer—and I eventually decided on Alaska. It was a happy choice.

My daughter, Jessica, who had ridden the Pacific Coast with me, was in Japan. She was planning on meeting some friends in India in the summer of 2002, and so decided that she could not go on the Alaska adventure. So, I determined to go solo and self-supported and to that end became obsessed with plotting a route and lining up things to do and people to visit.

Because I work for the fire service, I determined to enlist the hospitality of Alaska fire departments and personnel along the way. I also wanted to see Denali National Park, go deep sea fishing for halibut, run a wild river in a raft, kayak, dig for clams, photograph wildlife, bird, hike, and . . . I decided to treat the tour as an action vacation. I would operate under the philosophy that I was using my bicycle not as an ends in itself but simply as a means of getting from one activity to the next.

In May, less than two months before my planned departure, I received an e-mail from Jess: "I'm going with you!" Woohoo! What great news. I immediately backtracked, adding Jess to my reservations and plans. We talked about what we each planned to take, weeding out duplicates.

Our bicycles and gear are essentially the same as for our Pacific Coast ride, but this time we will both pull B·O·B bicycle trailers. Jess bought a waterproof bag for hers. Mine, a newer model, came with one. We invested in a little more rain gear (pants and shoe covers). I threw in a warm hat remembering how cold my head had gotten on the coast tour. We decided to take separate tents this time . . .for comfort as well as for fewer trips in and out in which we would inevitably let in mosquitoes. Jess bought walkie-talkies. In mountainous Alaska, cell phones are undependable or useless, but the walkie-talkies will allow us to keep in touch if we get separated on the road. I bought a new little 35 mm SLR camera.

Before the sports store in Fairbanks with our bikes and gear

Basically we will tent camp in state, national, and RV parks (the latter being abundant in Alaska). We will also rely on the hospitality of my fire contacts and stay at fire departments and with fire people. We have scheduled only two nights in motels, but if it gets too cold or wet, that number may increase.

Because there are so few roads in Alaska, our route is simple. We will meet in Fairbanks and then head south down the George Parks Highway, stopping in Denali National Park for a day and continuing on to fire service people in Palmer and Anchorage before continuing around the Turnagain Arm of the Cook Inlet to Portage and then cycling the length of the Kenai Peninsula to Homer. In Homer, I plan on spending a day deep sea fishing for halibut while Jess "hangs out" with the interesting types who camp out on the Homer spit.

We will then backtrack to Portage, spend the night at a campground near the Portage Glacier, and the following morning hitchhike through the Whittier tunnel to a ferry, which will take us on a 7-hour cruise across ice-studded Prince William Sound to Valdez. We will climb out of Valdez and over the Chugach Mountains on the Richardson Highway, and continue on the Richardson through the Alaska Range and back to Fairbanks.