Reached Border City (Alaska)

Nederlands, English

We're now at Border City, 3 miles before the Alaska-Canadian border.
Today we cycled about 104 km, and we had a very warm day. We cycled today through the hills that border the Tanana River, which meant that the road went up and down a lot. Tomorrow we'll be entering Canada...

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We zijn nu gearriveerd in Border City, 3 mijlen voor de Alaska-Canadese grens.
Vandaag hebben we ongeveer 104 km gefietst. We hadden vandaag een zeer warme dag. We fietsten vandaag door de heuvels die grenzen aan de Tanana River, wat betekende dat de weg veel op en neer ging. Morgen gaan we dus Canada in...


View of Tanana River.

Climbing the hills...

Reached Tok (Alaska)

Nederlands, English

Today we've reached Tok. We expect it will take about two days to reach the Canadian border. The last days we really have beautiful weather; clear skies with a warm sun.

Thanks for all the messages that we have received from you all by the internet, thanks a lot!

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Vandaag hebben we Tok bereikt. We verwachten nog twee dagen nodig te hebben om de Canadese grens te bereiken. De laatste paar dagen hebben werkelijk mooi weer; wolkeloze hemel met een warme zon.

Bedankt voor alle berichten die we hebben mogen ontvangen over het internet, ontzettend bedankt!


Wild camping.

Reached Delta Junction (Alaska).

Nederlands, English

After a long time we're able to update our internet diary again. We're now at Delta Junction and we're able to update this diary in the local library. We've cycled the Parks Highway from Fairbanks to Denali National Park. At Denali we cycled the park road, which gave us some incredible sights and we also saw some wildlife again (bears, caribou and chipmunks). After our visit to Denali we continued on towards Cantwell and the Denali Highway. This Denali Highway is a gravel road along the Alaska Range, which again took us through some incredible beautiful surroundings! Though the gravel road was very bad and we could not get a high average speed on this road. We passed the McLarren Pass (second highest pass of Alaska) and at the end of the Denali Highway we cycled north again on the Richardson highway (accross the Isabel Pass) towards Delta Junction. On this highway today we saw some bisons. Now we will be driving on the Alaska Highway towards the Canadian border.

Below you'll find the latest pictures of our trip:

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Na een lange tijd kunnen we nu eindelijk weer ons internet dagboek vernieuwen. We zijn nu in Delta Junction en kunnen in de plaatselijke bibliotheek ons dagboek uitbreiden met het laatste nieuws. We zijn over de Parks Highway van Fairbanks naar Denali National Park gefietst. In Denali hebben we de Park road gefietst, welke ons enige ongelovelijke vergezichten en natuur (beren, cariboe en eekhoorntjes) te zien gaf. Na ons bezoek aan Denali gingen we verder naar Cantwell en de Denali Highway. Deze Denali Highway is een gravelweg langs de Alaska Range, wat ons door enige werkelijk ongelovelijk mooie omgevingen voerde. Maar de gravelweg was zeer slecht te befietsen (wasbord) en we konden daardoor geen hoge gemiddelde snelheid halen. We passeerden de McLarren Pass (de twee na hoogste pas van Alaska) en aan het einde van de Denali Highway gingen we weer noordwaarts over de Richardson Highway (daarbij over de Isabel Pass) richting Delta Junction. Vandaag zagen we op deze highway nog enige bizons. Nu zullen we onze tocht over de Alaska Highway vervolgen richting de Canadese grens.

Hieronder de laatste foto's van onze tocht:


Denali National Park Sign


Caribou Denali Park Road


Polychrome Pass on Denali Park Road


Denali Highway


Arrived at Delta Junction


Squirrel on bicycle


Mt. McKinley (we're lucky to see McKinley the whole day).

First trip pictures

Nederlands, English

Today we're taking a rest day in Fairbanks, so we have some time to add pictures to our log (view below)...
Also we added trip statistics to the right side of this log.

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Vandaag nemen we een rustdag in Fairbanks, dus hebben we mooi tijd om enige foto's op de weblog te plaatsen (zie hieronder)...
Ook hebben we tour statistieken toegevoegd aan de rechterzijde van dit logboek.



Arctic Circle reached


Climbing the hills after Coldfoot


The muddy road makes cycling difficult


Many steep roads need to be climbed...


A big forest fire made cycling part of road impossible

Finally in civilised world again: Fairbanks, Alaska

Nederlands, English

After 720 km we arrived in Fairbanks. We started our cycling trip on the Dalton Highway, a gravel road, which sometimes can be very difficult to cycle. We crossed the highest pass in Alaska (the Atigun Pass (1500 m)) and crossed the Gates of the Arctic National Park. We saw a lot of wildlife (cariboes, grizly bear, chipmunks, fox and eagle). A big forest fire along the Dalton Highway forced us to get a lift past the fires, which were hazardous for our health. We're ok and enjoying ourselfs very much; we're cycling through very beautiful surroundings.
Now we arrived in Fairbanks and on paved roads (since the last 100 km) again. We'll be heading south to Denali National Park.

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Na 720 km zijn we geariveerd in Fairbanks. We begonnen onze fietstocht op de Dalton Highway, een gravelweg, die soms zeer zwaar te befietsen is. We zijn over de hoogste pas in Alaska (de Atigun Pass (1500 m)) gefietst en door de Gates of the Arctic National Park. We hebben veel wild gezien (cariboes, een grizly beer, eekhoorntjes, vos en arend). Een grote bosbrand heeft er voor gezorgd dat we een stukje moesten liften, omdat de vuren gevaarlijk voor onze gezondheid waren. We zijn in goede gezondheid en hebben een GEWELDIGE tijd; we fietsen door ontzettend mooie omgevingen.
Nu zijn we aangekomen in Fairbanks en weer op geasfalteerde wegen (sinds de laatste 100 km). We gaan nu verder onderweg naar het zuiden; eerst naar Denali National Park.

About 1 day before start...

Nederlands, English

Still only about one day before we're starting our trip. Next friday morning we'll be leaving the Netherlands from airport Schiphol (Amsterdam) towards North America (Prudhoe Bay). This last day we'll be packing all our lugage, boxing our bike and making our final preparations. Our next message will probably be from Alaska. We'll try to often add another message to this page during our trip.

So come back often to this page to follow our progress!!!

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Nog maar ongeveer 1 dag te gaan voordat we nu werkelijk met onze tocht beginnen. Komende vrijdag vliegen we vanaf luchthave Schiphol richting North America (naar Prudhoe Bay). Deze laatste dag pakken we onze bagage in, zorgen dat onze fietsen goed in de fietsdozen wordt opgeborgen en maken we de laatste voorbereidingen.
Zeer waarschijnlijk komt ons volgende bericht uit Alaska. We zullen proberen tijdens onze tocht zo vaak mogelijk een bericht op deze pagina achter te laten.

Dus vergeet niet om nog vaker deze web-pagina te bezoeken, zodat je onze voortgang kunt volgen!!!

Only 1 month before start of trip

Nederlands, English

(From this post on I'll be posting the progress in Dutch and English, to also allow my dutch readers to follow our trip).

Only still one month (30 days) before we'll start our trip. These last months we've done a lot of work in preparing our trip:

• We performed extensive maintenance on our bikes; replaced front chainrings and rear cassettes sprockets (Jan Dirk even replaced the complete crank set on his bike). We also got new tires for our bikes, so the first few kilometers we won't have any problems with these. And Fred got a new front carrier.


• We collected cardboard boxes to be used for the transport of our bikes on the planes. The boxes were not as solid as we hoped when we received them from the bike shop, so we used a lot of tape to strengthen these boxes.


• We used water repellant spray to prepare our cycle bags and tent for the rain.


• Collected any missing items on our pack-list.


• The last few months we also have been making some small cycling trips to get used to sitting on a saddle for longer periods.

So now we're reasonable ready to go on our trip. We'll be doing some training cycling trips until we'll leave for North America. We both are looking forward to the start of our trip...

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Nog maar 1 maand (30 dagen) tot we vertrekken op onze tocht. Deze voorgaande maanden hebben we veel tijd besteed aan de voorbereiding:

• We hebben onze fietsen een uitgebreide onderhoudsbeurt gegeven; we hebben de voor en achter tandwielen vervangen (Jan Dirk heeft zelfs het complete crank-stel van zijn fiets vervangen). Ook hebben we de buitenbanden vervangen, zodat we zeker zijn dat we hiermee geen problemen krijgen de eerste paar kilometers. Fred heeft ook een nieuwe voordrager gemonteerd.


• We hebben kartonnen dozen bij de fietsenmaker opgehaald. Deze dozen zullen we gebruiken om onze fietsen in te transporteren met het vliegtuig. De dozen waren niet zo stevig en enigszins beschadigd toen we deze kregen. Hiervoor hebben we veel tape gebruikt om de dozen te verstevigen.


• We hebben met waterafstotende spray de tent en onze fietstassen geimpregneerd, zodat we geen last zullen hebben van een mogelijke regenbui.


• We hebben alle spullen die we nog op de paklijst misten verzameld.


• Deze laatste maanden hebben we ook al enige fietstochten gemaakt om alvast te wennen aan het voor langere tijd verblijven op een zadel.

Dus nu zijn we redelijk gereed voor het begin van onze tocht. De komende dagen zullen we nog wat training fietstochtjes maken. We kijken beiden uit naar het begin van onze tocht...

18000 km. till now.

All cycling trips combined, we've cycled about 18000 km till now. This trip we expect to cycle about 9000 km through North America. So this is half of the total distance we have cycled during our previous trips.

Cycling trip records...

All kinds of cycling trip records:
Copied from BikeTrip

Across Canada : 27 days, 5 hours and 30 minutes
Alone, fully geared and unsupported. That's a total of 7089Km for an average of 260,3km per day. Approved by the Guiness book of world records. Check out Erik's site.
Record made by Erik Straarup on the 1999-07-25.

Around Australia : 55 days 17 hours and 8min.
Eugen beat the previous record of 57 days around Australia. Solo, no support.
Record made by Eugen Schilter on the 2004-09-25.

Around Australia (Team) : 19 days, 7 hours and 15 mins
Through all seven state capitals, the team had eight riders, (four Army and four civilian) with one rider on the road at all times.
Record made by Bruce Hopkins on the 2004-09-01.

Coldest temperature : -47°c
In Greenland during the winter in 1992.
Record made by Andy Heßberg on the 1992-02-01.

Fastest 100 000m vertical climbing : 106 continuous days
Fully geared during a trip from Chile across Bolivia, Peru to Ecuador
Record made by Beat Heim on the 2002-01-11.

Flat tires : 18 in 1 day
In China/Nepal in 1996. That's what I'd call a shity day ! Check out Corax's site.
Record made by Janne Corax

Flat tires (2) : 503 on 150000km
During their trip around the world (between 1980 and 1994).
Record made by Françoise & Claude Hervé

Highest amounts of bribes : 75 US dollars and 20 Euro
Crossing Trans-Dniestria (35km) costed me 75 US dollars and 20 Euro's in bribes.
Record made by Ivo Miesen

Highest Daily Distance (fully geared) : 379Km
Fully geared on asphalt in Sweden.
Record made by Janne Corax

Highest daily distance (no gear) : 701km
From Sioux Falls to canadian border across all of Minnesota (23.5 hrs). Check out Tom's website.

Record made by Thomas Laussermair on the 2004-09-18.

Highest ride : 5685m
kunlun mountains, close to kerriya shankou/pass. Fully geared.
Record made by Janne Corax and Nadine Saulnier.

Highest Speed : 100 Km/H (62.5mph)
On my fully loaded Trek 520 touring bike I hit a maximum speed of 100 km/h (62.5 mph) on a descent from Tehachapi California to the Mojave Desert. This was in June 1997. Of course I had a strong tailwind. This area is famous for strong winds. At the top of the descent I rode through a huge array of windmills that generate electricity equal to a nuclear power plant.
Record made by Wayne Estes on the 1997-06-01.

Hottest Temperature : +53°c
In Mauritania near Choum and Atar (in the shade of course !)
Record made by Heinz Stucke

Longest bike trip : 40 years and still going
Heinz Stucke has been biking for fourty years non stop now. 1995 to 99 Guinness Book of Records: "Most Travelled Man in History"
Check out his story...
Record made by Heinz Stucke on the 1962-11-01.

Longest distance (Audax style) : 840km
Ivo Miesen biked 840km with audax-gear as a
max (1 hour of accumulated sleep over that stretch).
Record made by Ivo Miesen

Longest distance on same bicycle : 335 000km
during 28 years !
Record made by Heinz Stucke

Longest period without seeing a human being : 14 days
Between Sumxi (Tibet/Xizang) and Pulu (Xinjiang). Check out Corax's site.
Record made by Janne Corax and Nadine Saulnier.
on the 1999-08-01.

Longest ride under heavy rain : 8 hours
In Bahia, Brasil
Record made by Dai, Saivani and Ara

Longest take off in the morning : 5 hours
It was raining outside and we had to wait for the sun. We were in someone backyard moreover ! It was in Denmark.
Record made by Alexandre Lagache & Stephen Shapiro on the 1998-07-09.

Longest turn back for forgotten gear : 90km
After a 90km ride, Stephen suddenly realizes that he forgot the tent poles and stakes in our hotel in Belfast. We drop all our gear at someone's place and rode back to pick it up. Spent the night in the hotel too...
Record made by Alexandre Lagache & Stephen Shapiro on the 1997-07-01.

Longest wear of underpants : 72 days
the reason for this madness was the cold in the himalayas, no fun to take off any clothing when it is -10 to -20C all the time... Check out Corax's site for a picture of his leg after these 72 days !!!
Record made by Janne Corax

Lowest number of flats : 0 in 16 months
During his "Schizotour". Check out Corax's site.
Record made by Janne Corax

Lowest ride : -396m USL
In the dead sea, Jordania
Record made by Serge Leret.

Most aggressive dog : 35km
A dog in the Qamdo area (China) chased Corax for 35 km ! In Spring 1996. Check out Corax's site.
Record made by Janne Corax on the 1996-06-01.

North Cape - Gibraltar : 18 days, 2 hours and 33 minutes
Alone, fully geared and unsupported. That's 5476,98 km so an average of 302,5 km a day. Approved by Guinness Book of World Records. Check out Erik's site.
Record made by Erik Straarup on the 2001-06-01.

Oldest bike tripper : 73 years old on 'Le tour du Canada'Tour du Canada

Shortest bike trip : 5 km
From Canterbury harbour to 5 Km after Canterbury harbour. Rear rack broke, decided to hitchike to Scotland instead.
Record made by Alain Lescaut on the 1992-07-10.

Shortest bike trip (2) : 9 miles (14 km)
In October 2000, I cycled the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage trail in Spain and covered 9 miles on one of those days. And yes, I was quite embarrassed when I saw the hikers at the end of the day asking me, "What are you doing here?"

Record made by Tony Kim on the 2000-10-01.

Shortest Day Ride : 30 Km
I have no excuse for that one. We were both tired I guess. Happened in Southern France.
Record made by Alexandre Lagache & Jean-Paul Benavides on the 1999-08-05.

Slowest ride on a truck : 35km in 12h
Considering truck rides are a necessary part of long bike trips... Ara had to take one in Bolivia during his 10 000km bike trip through South America. He was actually lucky because it takes 4 days to do the same during the rain season. Check out his website.
Record made by Ara Masllovet on the 2002-00-00.

Youngest bike tripper : 5 weeks
Manon Hervé was conceived and born while their parents were doing a bike trip around the world. She kept on touring with them for 6 years...
Record made by Manon Hervé on the 1998-09-12.

Youngest Tourers : Tristan (7) and Stefan (10)
Tristan and Stefan courageously rode their bikes on a 1096km bike trip from Golden, BC to Penticton BC for 3 weeks in 2002. More details on their website.
Record made by Tristan and Stefan on the 2002-07-01.

Highest Roads In North America

Highest Road In The USA
Mount Evans Byway, Colorado.

Highest Paved Through Road In The USA
Trail Ridge Road, Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado.
(We plan to cycle this road).

Highest Unpaved Through Road In The USA
The highest unpaved through road in the USA (and possibly in North America) is the Mosquito Pass between Leadville and Fairplay, Colorado. The summit of the pass is 13,186 feet.

Highest Road In Canada
The highest drivable pass in Canada is Highwood Pass (7239 ft. / 2205 m.). This road is Highway 40 in Kananaskis County, Alberta (southwest of Calgary).

There may well be paved or unpaved spur roads or four-wheel drive roads in the Canadian Rockies or in the Yukon which reach greater heights?