Hitchhiking the Snowy Yukon
20/12/2011
If someone had told me in early August that I would be hitching through the snow drifts of the Canadian Yukon by November, I would have assumed they were crazy and probably told them as much. However that is exactly what happened, and it just goes to show how fast life can change. I had stored my bicycle at someone's house in Nampula, Mozambique, so that I could hitch to Lilongwe and buy my Tanzania visa, plus get in a long-awaited swim with the beautiful fish of Lake Malawi. The idea was then to pick up my bike and spend another few months peddling leisurely along the Indian Ocean coast, making sure to dive into the crystal waters of as many remote beaches as possible. However I never did make it back to Mozambique (my bike, tent and supplies are still sitting in a family's backyard, whose phone number I don't have) or even to Lake Malawi - instead I recieved an urgent phone call from home that had me on a plane and back in Canada within 48 hours. It was a hectic time, going from the completely blissful emotional extreme of a no-commitment life on the road, to an opposite one of a family emergency and the stress of a serious situation completely out of anyone's control.
Thankfully though, things slowly got better, and the ansy feeling of needing to be back "out there" soon had me staring at the map once again. When I saw that there was a Canadian road that crossed the Arctic Circle, my mind was made up and I found myself hastely stuffing 80 lbs of winter camping gear into a borrowed backpack large enough to hold a midget or several small children, and started out on the 7000 km road to the northern Yukon.
Hitching Canada in the winter was an amazing experience, and the people I met and lifestyle I experienced (not to mention the raw beauty of the north) gave me a new appreciation and respect for the country I was born in. If I ever do decide to settle down and want to call Canada home, the Yukon is definitely a place where that could be possible. Until then, things have cleared up enough for me to get back to the other side of the world, albeit with a slighty shifted outlook and a few more experiences to speak of. Enjoy the picture-blog!
Thankfully though, things slowly got better, and the ansy feeling of needing to be back "out there" soon had me staring at the map once again. When I saw that there was a Canadian road that crossed the Arctic Circle, my mind was made up and I found myself hastely stuffing 80 lbs of winter camping gear into a borrowed backpack large enough to hold a midget or several small children, and started out on the 7000 km road to the northern Yukon.
Hitching Canada in the winter was an amazing experience, and the people I met and lifestyle I experienced (not to mention the raw beauty of the north) gave me a new appreciation and respect for the country I was born in. If I ever do decide to settle down and want to call Canada home, the Yukon is definitely a place where that could be possible. Until then, things have cleared up enough for me to get back to the other side of the world, albeit with a slighty shifted outlook and a few more experiences to speak of. Enjoy the picture-blog!
