North Territories and Alberta

Well… this is my first article about my trip Come bike to earth… and already so many things to say…so many people met, so many adventures to tell…

The first real contact we had, Lionel and I, was with Lara and Jeremy, living in Yellowknife. They hosted us when hard times began. Indeed, Sublime, my tandem, was missing ! But, okay, a lot of kind air company agents were saying that it will arrive the day after… or the day after that… or the day after that… finally, we got it back on Saturday at midnight (strange hour… thanks Canadians).

But, during our waiting time, we got the occasion to speak to Tony (during the summer, or Snowking when comes winter). This guy (with a beard like Santa's one) builds every year a huge snow castle on the Great Slave Lake, with a capacity of about 300 people and hosting wedding ceremonies. Snowking has created his own monarchy, around liberty value, and with Mother nature as his queen !

Well, let's come back to Sublime. On Monday, we were ready to leave Lara and Jeremy's house. They had let us the key of the house during the weekend, and we had some good time and barbecue with their neighbours, Maika and Logan (if you read me, thanks again and sorry for the spelling !).

The first day of pedaling was a little odd. We had made our 80kms as foreseen, we found a nice place to camp, we had a not so bad dinner, and we even had a possibility to wash our clothes… almost.

Lionel : look… there is a small lake.

Orianne : mmmh… go first.

Lio : well, it's okay… a little bit muddy and swampy, but okay.

Ori : I'm in… okay. But how will we go out ? We are sinking in the mud…

Lio : wash your clothes… we'll see… step by step.

They weren't clean… at all. Neither were we.

So, as I said, a little odd, because at this time, everything was going pretty well (except for the muddy lake), but it was strange to think that that would become our life for one year. I think that the only moment I had a small doubt about what I was going to do during one year was this first day. Not during my year of preparation, not in the plane, not in Yellowknife waiting for my bike, but there.

And then, we became to be used to this way of life ! The second day, a car has stopped downside the road, and we met Dave. Dave, who is an expert in tandem bicycles, has travelled a lot by tandem, and had especially good advices to start and stop. Yeah, surprisingly, there is a technique for that. And for many other things as Dave explained to us.

Awesome.

Can you imagine the probability of meeting someone fond of tandem, the second day of a trip of 22.000kms, in the middle of nowhere (yeah, North West Territories are really nowhere) asking you « Can I try with you, and give you some tips ? » (and water and food of course). I love that world.

The next meeting was wilder… we were chilling around our fire and our meal (dark story about pasta, powdered cheddar and tomato soup) until I saw a bison, 10 meters away from us. Big, slow, heavy animals (actually, I used to think that they were some kind of prehistoric animal… apparently they are not).

Lio : Hum… what should we do ?

Ori : Just don't move. Keep eating.

And he left, slowly.

We also have seen a moose running away on another day. The last step of our wildlife education is to see bears.

Michael on bicycle (from Vancouver to Yellowknife) crossed our road at Fort Providence (and he should have finished as I’m writing, have a nice fly back to Holland) at the only place where you can buy coffee and hot chocolate (firstly, after a huge storm on Sublime) and beers (secondly, after a long talk with Michael). This 60 years old man (sorry Michael) told us stories about making bisons run, about your thoughts turning round when you have no one to speak with, or about other incredible travellers. Beers, chat, stories, bicycles, experiences, what else ?

We ended our evening at the campground, where Shedon has shared the warmth of his fire, his chair, and his kindness with us. Again. I love that world !

We are still on the road, still at 80-90kms per day. The landscapes are really beautiful, with long roads with yellow paint, cutting green forests under blue sky. We have seen waterfalls of red muddy water, dark blue rivers running between rocks, black burned trees in yellow grass… We are happy, motivated, wet ( like most of our clothes), sometimes sweaty, everything is perfect. But it should get even better.

After 7 days, we decide to stop in an area with low metal buildings. We learned quite fast that it is a forest fire fighter camp. They offered us to eat with them, to sleep there in a real bed, to get to do some laundry. They told us about their job consisting in mostly… waiting for a forest fire, looking at a spider building its web, betting on which vegetable the « animals will eat first ». But, when the action begins, they fly in their helicopter to fight the fire.

I remember asking Lio « Do you think if I sympathize with the pilot, we could fly ? ». I was kidding, but we ended up flying.

We flew over the Hay River, following its bed, only a few meters above the water ! Awesome. Beautiful. Wonderful. Anythingyouwantful !!! I love that world !

The head still full of helicopter images, we were on the road again ! Fighting the rain and paradoxically fighting the lack of water !

Again, the kindness of human people, canadian people, surprised us when we met Wilma and Glen. We spent our evening with them, watching the Olympics with a piece of pizza. Wilma, as a true mother for us, made some fresh cookies and breakfast on the morning ! Best cookies ever !

Finally, as I write this, we are in our tent, listening to the sound of droplets on the roof, after two small days of only 40kms. Indeed, we broke 4 spokes yesterday and it has taken us some time to fix Sublime. But we are proud to say that we have reached one thousand kilometers since the beginning 13 days ago ! And this technical problem has led us to Hector from Spain, with who we discovered the folkloric side of Peace River at the… Peace party. It was a pleisure to rebuild the world with you Hector !

See you in another thousand of kilometer !

Thanks again to my sponsors :

TraKKs

Syemens cyclo Genval

Le journal du raid - 123Ecole

Berghen

Lasne Optic