Day 15
May 29th 2004
T'was a cold and wet day today. It rained on and off all day, with temperatures below 10 degrees for the most part. The roads weren't that great either. All in all, not the best day of the trip. I'm pretty happy it wasn't scheduled to be a big one.
Before leaving Prince George, I checked the oil again. I had checked it last evening and it seemed to be low. With this bike, you're not supposed to take action after one abnormal reading, because the little oil window is know to behave in mysterious ways. Anyways, after riding to the garage to gas up, I checked it again, and sure enough, it was low. I added some and got the impression that it was starting to darken. I still have a week to go so I decided that if I could find some motorcycle oil today I'd change it. According to my plans, I might find some in Jasper or Calgary.
Between Prince George and Jasper National Park, I saw a moose, 3 bears and 2 deer. Later in the day I saw maybe 20 mountain goats and 2 elk.
When I got to Jasper, I realized that this is a very touristy place that seems to cater mainly to seniors on buses. I stopped at a Shell station and asked if there was a motorcycle shop around. No.
While I was at the Shell, this guy rides up on a KTM Adventure. He's obviously going for the long haul by his luggage. I check out his plate, it's European. We start chatting. His name began with an "M" but that's all I remember of it (which is more than I usually do). Anyways, M is from Sweden and he had his bike shipped to Halifax a few weeks ago. He's slowly making his way to Yukon and Alaska to explore up north. This guy seems younger than I am and he's taking 6 months to tour around like that. I thought one usually only had the means to do that after retirement... I asked him if he was planning to make it all the way up to Prudhoe Bay and he said that "he'd see" Ah those Scandinavians, always wild and crazy... He told me he was eager to get to some dirt roads, as he was getting tired of "all this pavement". We wished each other safe trips and I took off.
The scenery wasn't the greatest, mainly because of cloud cover
This is what most of the day was like, that's why there's not many pictures. Jasper National Park isn't nearly as fun to ride through as Banff. In Jasper, the road just gently snakes its way on the valley floor so you don't go up mountains at all. The road through Banff does allow some elevation gain. Fortunately, it did stop raining for a little while and I got these pictures
This last one was at about 6 000 feet elevation, certainly above the snow-cap level. Shortly after I took that last picture, it started snowing. Nothing that would accumulate on the road though, the heavy winds did a good job at blowing the snow away. Needless to say, the electric vest stayed 'on' all day.
I made it to Calgary and stopped at a service station to get directions to the nearest motorcycle shop. Once there, the service department guy seemed quite willing to help me out by allowing me to use an oil pan so that I could change the oil in the parking lot. He had to go ask the service manager first though, but he refused. I thanked them for their time and got directions for another motorcycle shop. The second one, Blackfoot Motorcycle, was much more accommodating. After explaining my situation to them, they told me I could do my oil change in the service parking area, they couldn't let me use the garage for liability reasons, which is understandable. They gladly provided me with an oil pan, along with some paper towels.
Of course it was very windy and raining while I was doing this, but I did manage to park the bike next to a wall to offer me some shelter. It was the messiest oil change that I've ever done, the wind was blowing some oil everywhere as it was draining from the bike. I also had to shelter the hole in which oil goes in during refilling, so that too much rain didn't get thrown into the mix. Strangely, when I looked at the oil level prior to changing it, there was way too much in the bike. It had turned dark though, so I guess it was worthwhile changing it.
As I was finishing the change, one of the service guys came out, helped me clean up and offered me a cup of coffee. They were truly nice at Blackfoot Motorcycles, and I thanked them profusely.
At least now I won't have to stress about the oil. It was a messy job, but at least it's over with.
Funnily enough, probably within 20 minutes after checking in to the hotel, it stopped raining and it hasn't rained since. Probably saving itself for tomorrow...
Day Stats:
Total Distance: 840 km
Total Time: 9 h 28 minutes
Overall Average: 86.6 km / h (includes time doing oil change)