A circuitous loop through British Columbia and points north.
As we crossed the border into the Yukon it was hard not to think of how this trip came about. John and I were sitting at his kitchen table when the subject of where to do the annual July ride came up. John relayed how his sister, Cheryl, and her husband, Gordon Barker, were expecting to be transferred from Whitehorse to Nova Scotia in the fall and that this would be the last year to visit her by motorcycle.
I’d never been to the Yukon and none of us had been there on a bike. I agreed to come up with a tentative route, proposing a loop through British Columbia that took the Stewart-Cassiar Highway with a return to Calgary through Alberta, staying mainly on the Alaska Highway.
I emailed a tentative map to John and Keith for their approval. Both were excited about the trip, but to help with the accommodations, a fourth person would be nice. Keith forwarded the email to his neighbour and, within a few minutes, Kyle Gwilliam became our fourth. We planned for a Friday arrival in Whitehorse to make things easier for our hosts, leaving tweaking the route and anxiously waiting as the only things left to do before departure day.
In the past, the roads have been our destination, and the places were points of convenience. This time, the destination was the goal, and the roads merely a means of getting there. As three of us are retired, with our youths a fond memory, we planned for the longest days to be about 700 km.
Planning Needed
The next morning, we stayed on the Trans-Canada until Kamloops where we took Hwy 5 north to Little Fort with the aim of taking Hwy 24 over to Hwy 97 the rest of the way to Hwy 16. Highway 24 is a winding secondary highway with sweeping turns that twist for 100 km through hill country. About 30 km from our destination, we came upon construction, where we followed a pilot vehicle for about 3 km until suddenly coming to a halt where a two-vehicle accident had blocked the road.
We stood in the dust swatting flies as emergency vehicles drove by toward the scene just around the bend. From here, we noticed a T-intersection with local traffic coming from the north, which two locals had explained would…
