Day 13: Fort Nelson, BC: 259 km

July 11, 2013

A short day!  We love the short days.  On a clear day, the ride through Muncho Lake to Fort Nelson is absolutely beautiful.  On our way north, it was our first taste of twisty roads and elevation changes.  On our way south, it was a bit of a cold, rainy, foggy soup.

 

We started the day with a nice sleep in and Dendog got a real breakfast with coffee.  He seemed to enjoy it.  After watching him gyrate into his rain gear we hit the road.  Approximately 4 hours to cover the distance and we did not take rest nor gas break.  We were escorted by a pilot car for a bunch of kms due to construction. Our lane was relatively gravel free.  We were glad!

We crossed three shorted metal grated bridges (in the rain) and they were uneventful.  The final long one is tomorrow.

Our wildlife tally included 3 more sheep (I have to correct the earlier post, we did see female sheep, not goats) including a male, moose (cow and calf), a fox and a baby bear.  The moose crossed the road in front of us.  The others were better behaved.

Our hotel room has an outside door and we parked the bikes right in front of our room. That should help our early departure.

The wind was pretty strong here while we were out at supper, and the cover was blowing off my bike.  Our neighbor secured it for me.  He has a motorcycle too.

I met another Super Tenere rider today in Fort Nelson.  His name is Hans and he is on his way with some friends to Anchorage and Fairbanks.  We had a nice chat about road conditions and a brief chat about the bikes.  I have met two Super Tenere owners, both at the Fas Gas in Fort Nelson.

Dendog and I took turns on point today.  That was nice.

Last night I left my keys in the ignition in the ON position for about 1.5 hours.  Oops.  I was afraid my battery would be dead.  The Shorai fired the bike right up.  That saved us using the booster cables Dendog engineered.

You may note that our marker in Spotwalla is now basically pointing in the correct direction.  Our route will be the same from here to Saskatoon as it was on the way up.  Filtering in Spotwalla may make it easier to figure out our last day’s travels.

Hoping for a bit less rain tomorrow so we can make it to Dendog’s 3:00 appointment in Grande Prairie, AB.  Tomorrow begins our new trend of losing an hour with time zone changes.

We only shot video and pictures with the GoPros today.

Bring on the prairies!