Thursday, August 18th, 2022. Yukon Territory, Canada.
Slow drive along the Dempster Highway. Barely any cars on the road at all, save for the camper truck couple from Michigan I've been playing leapfrog with all morning.
"Lunchtime?" I hear one ask the other at a must-stop turnout.
Long wait at a construction stop for the pilot car. Ravens overhead. There's no rush. Nowhere to rush to. No rush hour. Just a rushing red river down below.
I don't need to tell you that it's beautiful out here.
You don't need to be human to be spellbound.
Further up the road, further up the globe. So close to the top of the world but it feels like we're already there.
I pull us into a construction turnout. So much wide open. So much solitude it could swallow me up and I'd never know I'd disappeared.
Raven shows up. Wants to know if I have any food. I put a few peanuts out on the rocks. He flies over for a look, yells something, and flies away.
Couple from Michigan shows up, too. They park. We talk. I resent them for disrupting my solitude. But why? I've been alone with my dog for days on end. Minimal human contact. Just me and my thoughts and fears and the wide open, lonely road.
They are gentle, the couple. Kind. Curious. Pilot falls in love. They've had great weather their entire trip here, they tell me. I've hit all the storms, I tell them, including that one near Dawson City they'd missed and dismissed as a faulty forecast. It's not fair, I think to myself, but I keep my envy in check. They're much older than I am. They've already figured their shit out. They don't need a challenge like I do to find themselves. They're already found.
This is their vacation.
This is my journey.
72kph. 45mph. Speed limit is 90kph but I don't want to use the spare tire I've got strapped to my roof. We ease our way along the long dirt road and take in the sunshine.
The afternoon finds us at Eagle Plains, where I gas up the car for a price I don't care to think about. We eat lunch out back behind the hotel with the ravens.
At the edge of the Arctic Circle.
And then onward and upward we go.
For more pictures of the Dempster Highway, click here.
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