Whitehorse to Beaver Creek

Thursday 21st June  440 km ride today from Whitehorse  Yesterday we had a lay day in Whitehorse. Two nights were spent at a b&b run by a lovely lady who took us to heart as she has a daughter in Sydney. The morning rain showers kept us inside doing domestic chores and talking to our host.  In the afternoon we took in a few of the local sights in clouding a rushed tour of the paddle wheeler Klondike.

Whitehorse is located down on the Yukon river in a depression left by the recent ice age while most of the population are settled up on plateau west of the city. A visit to the Beringia museum was a highlight, where the geological history of the area is explained. This includes the movement of the massive ice blanket that covered most of the Yukon and Alaska between 20000 and 10,000 years ago. Today the weather was fine with scattered cloud with a top of around 22'c, the best day we have had so far. We rode north and west through valleys bordered by mountains of ever increasing height until we passed close by Mount Logan at 5959m, the tallest peak in Canada. A large moose tried crossing the road just in front of me but was scared off by and oncoming truck. I would really have liked to get a photo.



There was a minor mixup at Haines Junction when I mistook another biker for Mike while waiting for him on the road side. I took after this guy but was unable to catch him so ended up riding all the way to beaver creek alone while mike was looking for me around town. Not to worry, Mike arrived just 15 minutes after me.  As the mountains receded to the south east the county looked more and more like the Tundra, short wiry trees and lots of small shallow lakes. I rode past one shallow river that must have been 4km wide, strewn with tumbled rocks and broken trees. During the floods of a few days ago it must have looked impressive. The last 80km of road was badly effected by the winter ice pushing up and breaking the surface leaving a difficult surface to ride.