Well, it’s almost been a month since we returned from our Long Ride North and I’ve been thinking about the Peace River in Alberta, Canada. For those of you just tuning in, my wife Kathy and I and her brother Tim and his wife Donna rode our motorcycles to Alaska and back. Kathy rode with me. Tim and Donna each rode their own motorcycles. 28 days and 8,279.8 miles of pure adventure. Yea, it was a good ride. I may be back physically but mentally, I’m still out there in the Yukon. Heck, I may never be “normal” again. I may just stay gone.

To kind of keep the mood alive and fresh, I’m re-reading a book by Constance Helmericks. I came across “Down the River Wild” a few years ago when we were running sled dogs. It is a true story, written by Constance of her canoe trip through the Canadian North country. Leaving their suburban Arizona home, she took her two daughters Jean 14 and Ann 12 for an Arctic adventure. The summer of 1965 they canoed the Peace River from Dawson Creek in Alberta, Canada to the Great Slave Lake in the Northwest Territory. On our Long Ride North this summer, we rode through Dawson Creek, over the bridge of the Peace River and right past the spot where mother and two daughters launched their expedition. 

This is a picture from our Long Ride North just as we crossed the Peace River.

Here’s the Peace River looking downstream. They would’ve had to put in right here somewhere.

The second summer, they finished their journey by canoeing out of the Great Slave Lake, onto the Mackenzie River and all the way to the Arctic Ocean.

 If you enjoy this sort of reading, I highly recommend the book. I see Amazon.com has several used copies as it has been long out of print. The originals are a bit pricey. Daughter Jean went on to write two books of her own, “Arctic Daughter” and “Arctic Son”. Yep, I’ve read those also. Constance and her husband Bud had spent a good amount of time when they were married “up North” and she wrote extensively about their time there. Bud was also an accomplished bush pilot.

Here’s the “small world” part. Some of you old timers who read this column maybe be asking yourselves at this point if Constance was any relation to John Helmericks. Yes, they were related, as John was the brother of Bud. When I first moved to Montrose in 1979 I remembered going into Helmerick’s Sporting Goods here on Main St.. I think it was in the west side of Around the Corner Gallery. I had to do a bit of sleuthing to come up with John’s first name and David DeVinney helped me out there as his jewelry store at the time was right next door to the sporting goods store. So there ya go.