Completely amazing but one and done.

I've had a good night's sleep, a shower, food and a hug from a stranger who felt like a friend - I feel like a whole new person.

So let's talk the Dempster...

Here is me just as I was starting out...

And here is me just as I was finishing...

Still standing and still smiling (kind of), a little wiser, and feeling like I accomplished something. Oh, and with WAY more grey hair! Seriously, I had a shower (how can a shower change your whole outlook on life?) and looked in the mirror, for the first time in many days,  and was shocked at what was happening on my head. My hair has lived mostly under a hat for the past month and upon inspection (not even CLOSE inspection, just a quick glance kind of inspection) it was clear that there was A LOT MORE GREY HAIR on my head. I am going to wear it proudly and be confident that I earned every single one of them. When people comment on my hair (which oddly, many people do) I will have good stories to tell. Anyways, totally got sidetracked there - back to the Dempster.

It is a once in a lifetime for me.  A one and done.  Absolutely thrilled I did it and went all the way to Tuk, but I'm never going to do it again. Now that I'm finished that part of my trip and I'm back on paved ground with things like cell service and gas stations and tow trucks and you know, people, I can safely say that it was a stressful 9 days. Not awful, just stressful. 

The weather was not great in the days before I left so the road was in rough shape. Actually, the day before I left there was a travel advisory for mud, water and large pot holes. The up side of that is that there wasn't a lot of dust on the first day, but WOW, once it dried out, the dust was insane.  See this picture below? That is the dust INSIDE my trunk after a day of driving. I don't think I will ever truly be rid of Dempster dust.

The road is very slow going, there are very few people, no services for a day at a time, no cell service or wifi, lots of pot holes, wash board, mud, dirt, broken down vehicles and tire pieces around. When I went by my first abandoned vehicle I spent the next hour wondering what happened to the people. 

Now that I've met many people who have done the same trip, the road conditions seem to change daily and some people have way better luck with the road than I had. 

On the other hand, all day, every day, you look at things like this...

I feel like my pictures show a tenth of the actual depth and beauty of what was around me at all times. I spent a lot of time slowing down just to roll down the window and stare (had to roll it down cause it was always covered in dust and mud!).  This was one of the times when I wished I had someone sitting in the seat beside me. I would have loved to just look out the window and take it all in, but I was looking out the window, directly in front of me, and trying to scan the sides, watching for holes, big pieces of shale (death to tires!), animals and any other of nature's death traps. Thus, the stopping every now and then to just sit and look. You could seriously take thousands of pictures as the sky changes and the light shifts and the shadows move. The trip back seemed entirely different than the trip up. 

Overall, the car did fantastic. It is a total rockstar. It never complained (unlike me), it ate a million bugs, inhaled hundreds of pounds of dust (just an approximate guess), road on some boats, deflected rocks like an experienced battle warrior, housed me and listened to me randomly curse and sing for about 1800 fairly intense kilometers. It deserves a badge of honour. In fact, it saved us both in a scary incident with a huge semi, going way too fast, on a stretch of road with only room for one of us. 

After 3/4 of the journey passed us by, I arrived in Eagle Plains, went in for some food and a beer and came back to this... (this is the tire that took all the action in our mishap with the semi. That tire went off the side of the embankment but hung on for dear life and kicked us back up to road. So the injury was fully warranted.)

So I did this...

So that I could make it to the other end of the Eagle Plains compound and Stan could do this...

After 20 mins, the tire was patched and I was on my way for the last push to the end. I took it slow because I really didn't want to have to change the tire out and because the weather had not been great and I was driving through some interesting conditions - including 2 mud slides. At one point, I was behind a bulldozer, in his tracks with mud almost as tall as the car. See?

If I haven't made it clear enough, the Little Honda that Could is a rockstar. A hero, in fact. 

Finally, 22kms from the end of the road and pavement was in sight, the tire could just do no more. I was able to inflate it twice and limp to the pavement and get it changed.

We rolled in to Dawson, dirty, tired, stressed, hungry and totally over it all. But a shower for me, a rest for the car, some phone calls to book the car a spa day in Whitehorse (new tires, oil change, bath and once over before phase 2 of the summer adventure begins) and I made my way to the saloon to listen to this guy (who is FANTASTIC!)...

And I ate this...

It was the perfect way to the end the day and the long journey up to Tuk and back. I headed back to my campground and settled in for the night and had the best sleep I've had in many days.

I woke up this morning feeling completely rejuvenated and ready to take on the world. Tomorrow. 

Today I will sit and read and write and chat and eat and tonight? You will find me in the saloon again, but with this guy for the famous Sour Toe Cocktail. Google it.

Heading south and east next as I make my way across the Yukon, in to BC and eventually AB. I can't wait for August! It is a month of friends and fun. And it's all on paved ground.