Up The Dempster Without A Paddle
Trip Start
Jun 28, 2003
1
10
15
Trip End
Aug 04, 2003
Inuvik,
Northwest Territories,
Canada
Monday, July 21, 2003
This is what I thought about for a long time on my trip up the Dempster. I left last Wednesday (July 16th) and encountered the worst possible summer weather. Before leaving I was already experiencing some anxiety. It is recommended to take a full-size spare tire with you. I decided to take a chance on that one. I was filling up at the gas station right at the intersection of the Dempster and Klondike Highways when a car pulled in with a flat tire. He had made it 50km and turned around because of the flat.
I rolled the dice.
The first 100km of the highway runs through Tombstone Territorial Park. The weather was already gloomy. A thick cloud bank covered the mountain tops. Still I was able to hike quite a ways up Angelcomb Mountain before I was enveloped. There were even a few scant sunny moments that had me believing the weather was breaking up.
It was about 150km out of Dawson City (or 210km before Eagle Plains) when I began following a woman in a GMC Jimmy who was taking blind corners and hills on the wrong side of the road. It's not that she was a reckless driver. Sometimes the wrong lane was the only way to keep moving along the road.
Bradley T Hughes at the Arctic Circle
At this point you are driving along the Peel River. The rain was coming down in a torrent. The road had already decayed into a mess of potholes and mud. In order to keep any speed (lest you start getting bogged down in the mud) you had to use whatever part of the road was best. Sometimes it was the shoulder, sometimes the oncoming lane.We rounded a corner and there was a huge RV well into the bush. The local road maintenance crew was already on hand and everyone was okay (better the bush than the river). The crew stopped me to tell me that my passenger side headlight was out. Great. Not broken but the light wasn't working. That's when I started thinking about a possible car accident out here. The weather was bad enough that there wasn't much tourist traffic but the supply trucks that run up and down this road were still coming by at regular intervals.
And if you're ever driving the Dempster that's a rule you've got to remember. The road was built for these trucks. These drivers have made these runs hundreds of times. This is your first time on the Dempster. You are not a better driver than them. Get out of the way. When you see one coming just pull over as far as you can. It will not only protect your car from a shower of gravel but you will earn the respect of the truck driver.
From the Peel River the road climbs into the Ogilvie Mountains. The first hill was 9 kilometres long and nothing but mud. I don't think my spedometer every got over 40 kph. I chortled at the Maximum 90 signs.
Bradley T Hughes in Eagle Plains
As I made the climb the visibility got worse and worse. By the time I got to the top I couldn't see beyond the edge of the road. The rest stop at the top of the hill mentioned that you could see 180km down the Peel River Valley at that point. I couldn't see past the sign.For the next 110km the road runs along a ridge to Eagle Plains. I don't know if the drop off the side was 2 feet or 200. I felt like Daffy Duck in one of those cartoon where he's battling the animator. I was just a car on a page of white. It was like driving down a hospital hallway.
370km from the start of the Dempster you reach Eagle Plains. It had taken me 6 hours to do the previous 200km. I wasn't going any further tonight. Eagle Plains sits on the same ridge we were following. Thus the whole place was lost in the fog.
Although Eagle Plains exists on maps it is not a real town. It was built specifically for the highway. Without it there would be a 550km gap between gas stations. All that exists in Eagle Plains is a single building that holds a garage, restaurant, lounge, and a motel. There is an RV Park and some portables that I assume the employees live in. 24 people work there during the summer, 8 during the winter. It costs $120 for a motel room. It costs $10 to stay in the RV Park.
Guess who slept in the car that night?
The place was miserable. The decor hadn't been updated since it was built in 1978. Why bother putting any effort into it when there is no competition? And there never will be any competition.
Eagle Plains
Eagle Plains is entirely self-sufficient. It has its own water, sewage and power supply. As well it takes signals directly from ANIK-1 for the TVs in the rooms (this was a big thing back in 1978). If you wanted to compete with the present Eagle Plains facilities you would need to make a massive investment. The government spent $3 million in 1978 to build it.The fog continued all night and into the morning. When I woke up I realized that my windshield was cracked. There was a chip that was hidden from the driver's side view by my steering wheel. Super.
My decision then was to drive to the Arctic Circle 40km away and then turn around for home. My little car wasn't up to the challenge of the combined road and weather conditions.
I crossed the Arctic Circle at 10:30am on Thursday, July 17th. That was my goal. By the time I made it that 35km the crack had crept a few inches across the windshield. Still it was only another 60km to the border of the Northwest Territories. I thought I could make it.
Slow and steady wins the race. I kept it at 60kph or lower. Although the rain had stopped the fog continued and nothing was drying out anytime soon. Not far past the Circle the road drops down into a valley out of the Ogilvies. Visibility improved. Still that crack kept moving and there was now a second finger moving in the opposite direction of the first.
The lowland driving doesn't continue for very long as the Dempster climbs into the Richardson Mountains to the NWT border.
The Mongoose Flies!
Once again the fog and slippery mud slopes wreaked havoc with any sense of safe driving. I slid into corners and peered over seemingly bottomless chasms of mist. On the right hand side was a huge snowbank leaking into the road that made things even worse.As I reached the summit I saw a truck in my rearview. I was doomed. I couldn't get out of the way in time. That was when the Miracle of The Dempster occurred. The truck was a road maintenance truck. It pulled off into the rest area at the top of the hill. It didn't need to go any further. The road from that point on was fine.
On the opposite side of the mountains (incidentally my third crossing of the continental divide while on the Dempster) the clouds lightened. I could make to Inuvik. I think I can. I think I can.
At Fort McPherson the sun came out and everything was fine driving for that last 185km. The gravel was in good condition and I stopped wincing at the sight of every pothole. The windshield fingers slowed their march across my sightlines. The only disappointing part was that this is the boring part of the drive through the MacKenzie Delta.
By the time I pulled into Inuvik (68 degrees North) itwas gorgeous. I found the Happy Valley Campground right downtown. The tenting area was right beside the bathrooms! Another miracle! The campground manager was arguing with a patron who wasn't tying up his dogs. Could this be campground heaven? Would our noble adventurer cross the 70th parallel? Would he make it back down the Dempster with his car intact?
Stay tuned! Same Brad-time, same Brad-channel!
(By the way I'm writing this while in Dawson City. I have to catch up on a lot of travelogue-ing and I'm running out of time. So it ends here for now. I'll be back soon with the rest of my adventures beyond the Arctic Circle.)
