Day 8 - Epic Al-Can Odyssey

Day 8 – Ft. Nelson to Ft. St. John
452 miles

Since we were in Canada, we decided to take a side trip to the Northwest Territory, about 200 miles out of our way.

We’d heard stories of people getting stranded out of the road to the Northwest Territory, since there is nothing, absolutely nothing on that road.  We came prepared with 4 ½ gallons of gasoline strapped to the back of the bike.

We drove all the way through Canada like this, just in case. Luckily, finding gas on the main highway wasn't too hard, but you just never knew what would be open and what wouldn't.

So we set out. The road, we were told, was paved all the way to the territory line. After that it was just a dirt road. It, indeed, was paved – and one of the nicest roads we drove in Canada.

We made it to the Northwest Territory!

And ran out of gas about 60 miles from where we started. We were very glad we prepared for the inevitable.

We made it back to Fort Nelson, picked up our gear and headed through the oil fields to Fort St. John.

When we arrived in Fort St. John, our first impression was that we were back in civilized country. During the last few days, we barely saw a house, let alone a large community. Now we were in Oil Country where every car was a very large pickup truck.

We laughed at dinner, sitting by the window that faced the street. Pickup, pickup, pickup, CAR!! Oh wait, that was a taxi, pickup, pickup…  These weren't just very large pickups, these were massive, tricked out, accessorized to the hilt,

We realized we were in whole different world, full of guys who spent their days in the oil fields and their evenings at the gym and spent their money on pickup trucks and beer.

This, of course, is part of the great adventure – whole new worlds that we haven’t seen anywhere except on TV.