Coldfoot to Fairbanks, via Deadhorse: 753 miles, 34-59 degrees F. (View in Google Maps)

I woke up in Coldfoot, after spending the night in a shared room with my new friends, Antonio and Carlos. I'm glad I saw them in the parking lot before heading to my room. I left fairly early- on the road a little after 7. It didn't take long to get going, because I only took my tankbag and gear in. I did convince the store/restaurant/motel to store my sidecases for the day. They wanted to inspect them to make sure there weren't any explosives, which seemed amusingly silly to me.

It was horribly cold out- 36 degrees- which made things a little more difficult. It stayed below 38 for the first 160 miles, including dropping to 34 for a while. It's roughly 240 miles from Coldfoot to Deadhorse, and only about 30 miles are paved. In some ways, it's fairly boring, except for the 10% grades up and down Atigun Pass, which is 5000 feet.

There were a lot of caribou hunters north of Atigun Pass. It made sense when I climbed onto the final plateau toward Deadhorse- I saw a couple by themselves, then a couple of herds of them. I can't describe the goofy walk of caribou, but I got confirmation of it later on. They have a wide stance and kind of flop their legs around, it's kind of funny.

Deadhorse is interesting. It's very much an industrial camp- lots of huge equipment, it isn't designed for tourists or non-employees. I stopped in and asked about the Prudhoe Bay tour. It was 12:30, they said they could get me on the 5:30 tour since I didn't call ahead for security clearance. So I decided to pass- I didn't want to loaf around all afternoon, then sit through a video presentation, just for a short bus ride to the Arctic Ocean. I'll do it some other time.

Next I got some gas. It was the most expensive US gas I bought- $3.79 per gallon, when it was almost a dollar less in Fairbanks. The pumps were pretty weird, too- not too hard to figure out, but it did take a while to figure out how to pay for it.

I then ate at the Prudhoe Bay Hotel. I think it's the only place to get lunch in town, and it is buffet style. All of the workers were wearing coveralls and had the personalities I'd expect for an oilfield- wary of a young solitary rider in town. A nice fellow struck up a conversation with me though- we talked bikes, equipment, and what it's like to work year-round in such an extreme climate.

I planned on running back to Coldfoot, then deciding what to do after that. I thought I'd be there around 6pm- a little early, considering there's nothing to do, but that's okay. Saw the caribou on the plateau, and saw Antonio and Carlos 40 miles out of Deadfoot. Otherwise it was a relatively simple ride back to Coldfoot. I was amused (again) by the river naming- you'd see things like "South Fork Foo River 3". I don't know if the "3" is to give the bridges unique naming (because of multiple crossings), or what. A real-life example, without the number, was "W Fork of the N Fork Chandalar River".

In Coldfoot, I was gassed up, picked up my cases, and chatted briefly with a couple of other riders. It was about 7:30pm, I figured I'd go to the Yukon River Crossing, since I could get there by 9:30. I ended up being there by 9:00, but didn't see any inspiring camping, was nervous about bears, and the mosquitos were bothering me. So, I decided to go to Livengood. Once I got there (and didn't see anything), I figured I may as well go back to the hostel in Fairbanks- it was dark, I wouldn't have to set up my tent, and I could get started on my tire replacements at the shop first thing the following morning.

I stopped at Hilltop. I didn't need gas until Fairbanks, but I wanted to look for some Rotella synthetic oil. I knew they had Rotella- unfortunately, they didn't have the synthetic, only the Rotella-T. Oh well, I knew I could look the following morning at Wal-Mart (ugh).

The rain started on my descent into Fairbanks. Things were really wet, but I wasn't complaining- it was the first rain in 2 days, and it was only on my final 12 miles of a ~750 mile day.

Overall, I went up and back on the Haul Road in only 33 hours, including 10-11 hours while stopped in Coldfoot. It helped that I didn't have my cases for the Coldfoot-Deadhorse-Coldfoot run- first and only time I'd be without my cases for the entire trip.

When I got in at Fairbanks, I did a quick inspection of everything. One of the four bolts holding my aux tank vibrated out, not a big deal. More importantly, I lost a bolt on the package rack- the same one that came out when the aux tank bracket broke. I figured I'd go to the hardware store in the morning to replace both bolts, and use Loctite on the package rack bolt.