A little history with a plan.

From the time we are young children, almost everyone has a dream of “taming the west”. It has mostly been tamed; this new dream will be our Great American Adventure, our west. The year 2009 will be Alaska’s 50th Birthday celebration. It has also been 50 years since my dad has lived in Alaska. He moved to Alaska from New York. At that time it was dirt roads all the way there; that had to be an adventure in itself. For the last 17 years or so we have been talking about riding motorcycles across the country and through Alaska. My dad will turn 58 on our trip to Alaska. If we don’t go now we may lose our opportunity to pursue the dream of the Great American Adventure. Time has passed and we have not pursued our dream - until now.

My brother and I live in Kannapolis, North Carolina. This is where we will start our adventure. The bikes we chose are Suzuki 650 V-Stroms. These are adventure touring bikes made for the long hours and rough conditions. My dad and Alvin live in Show Low, Arizona. This is where they will start from. My dad will be riding a F650GS BMW Dakar adventure bike while Alvin is still deciding on his ride. We chose the 650’s because they are light, nimble and have great fuel mileage.

On June 6th, Mark and I will leave Kannapolis, NC and my dad and Alvin will leave Show Low, AZ. We will all meet up in Rugby, North Dakota which is the center point for North America. From there we will cross into Canada and ride for the famous Alaska Highway in Dawson Creek, British Columbia. From there we will ride into the Yukon Territory to Dawson City. Once in Dawson City in the Yukon Territory we will prepare for our 1000 mile roundtrip ride along the Dempster Highway (a dirt road) which leads to the Artic Circle and a little town named Inuvik in the Northwest Territory. We will have to check over our bikes which will involve checking equipment, doing oil changes and possibly changing out tires to a more aggressive off road (knobby) tire. Once we are back in the Yukon we will be crossing into Alaska at the Northern most border crossing, also a dirt road. From this point we will ride to the Alaska Highway and head straight for Fairbanks, Alaska. Once again this is a place where we will prepare the bikes and check equipment for the Dalton Highway ride. The Dalton Highway coincides with the Alaska pipeline and is a 1,000 mile dirt road roundtrip that will lead us past the Artic Circle, again, and over to Prudhoe Bay Alaska (Artic Ocean). Once we are there it will be time for us to celebrate and, if brave enough, take a swim in the Artic Ocean.

As soon as we get back to Fairbanks, we will head for Mt. McKinley then over to Anchorage. After Anchorage it will be time to head home. To avoid riding the same highway twice we will be taking the Cassair Highway through British Columbia and pass through Jasper National Park to get to Calgary. We will then cross back into the states and ride to Great Falls, Montana where my brother and I will head back to North Carolina and the others will head back to Arizona; ending our journey on July 5th.

As long as we are healthy and God willing, we will be heading out June 2009 for our journey. Our dreams and ideas will become reality!

Thanks for taking the time to read our post. Please check back for future updates.