By Patricia Older
PICAYUNE — There it was in a remote part of the Yukon, nearly 4000 miles from Pearl River County and about 10 feet in the air, a two foot long road sign with the words, “Carriere, MS.” For Brian and Barry Pearson, they were amazed to see the dark green sign. “We had to find it,” said Brian, noting that they had actually discovered through the Internet that the sign was in Watson Lake, Yukon at a place called Signpost Forest. “I had studied the picture on the Internet so I would know what was around it,” added Barry. “So when I saw the Jeep, I knew we were near the sign.” Signpost Forest has over 40,000 signs from all over the world — but more on that later.
The two Carriere brothers came across the sign this past summer when they embarked on a motorcycle road trip that would take them 9500 miles, across Alaskan tundras, through the Dakota Badlands, alongside Bighorn sheep, next to thundering moose and grazing Bison. They would see mist-shrouded mountains that seemed suspended in time, highways that would challenge the best motocross rider, and a landscape so breathtaking that it changed their lives forever. “When you see something like that, you begin to realize what really is important,” said Barry.
The 26-day road trip actually started as an excursion to attend the Sturgis bike week in North Dakota. Brian made his first trip there in 2005, and then again in 2006 with his brother, Barry, when he brought his bike.
As the two brothers started their planning for the trip last November, they began to think about what the future may bring. Both work for the Michoud Assembly factory in New Orleans and were told last year that their jobs may end in 2010. Realizing it was a probably a now or never situation, the brothers realized 2009 was the year to go. “We decided it was now or never to make a ride to Sturgis,” said Brian. “Then it hit us — why not Alaska via the Alaskan Highway.”
But, the decision to take the 9500 mile trip was not an immediate thought when they first started planning the road trip. “Our plan was to go to Sturgis, then we decided we wanted to go to the Rockies while we were out there,” said Brian. “We realized this may be our last chance to make this trip because of work and all, so I suggested to Barry we go to Alaska.”
Barry was more than up to the trip. “I had to clear it with the boss,” said Barry, referring to his wife and family. “But she had no problem with it, she said I should go.”
Knowing that they would have to do a lot of planning to do for the trip, Brian said they began researching routes, deciding what they needed take along with them, and what to expect along the way. “The Alaskan Highway is pretty desolate, so we were concerned about certain things, especially gas,” said Brian. “The hardest part was figuring out what we would need,” added Barry referring to what they could reasonably carry on two Harley Davidson Road King Classic motorcycles.
Then, after months of preparation, on July 27 the pair loaded up their motorcycles with three days worth of clothes, tents, sleeping bags, cameras, and rain gear and set out on their journey. “It looked like Jed Clampett heading down the road,” mused Brian.
After working a half day the two men were able to leave around 5 p.m., making it to Canton for the night where they unpacked all the gear strapped to their bikes and settled in for a short night’s sleep. “That was tough — having to unpack the bikes every night,” said Brian.
Up at 3 a.m., they repacked the motorcycles, and set out, this time in the rain, for the most grueling day of the three week trip. “The second day we did 1100 miles,” said Barry, adding that their goal had been to make it to Sioux Falls, South Dakota. “It took us 18 hours, I think.”
Staying on Carriere time and not changing their watches when they crossed the dateline, the brothers then settled into riding country roads and taking their time. “Once we got to Sioux Falls, we wanted the sun to our backs.”
The brothers rode through Sturgis a couple of days before the nationally-known motorcycle event started, stopping long enough to see a few vendors and purchase a couple of T-shirts. They then set out their sights on the Alaskan Highway. “The landscape was like “Dances With Wolves,” said Brian of the beauty of the Wyoming countryside. “The land is rolling hills and you can see for miles...you could smell the aroma of the hay they were bailing and the sunflowers in the fields.”
In Montana, the pair met up with Picayune resident, Robert Hester, at Custer’s Last Stand — Little Big Horn. “On the way to Shelby, Montana we met up with a friend of ours…. (he) had ridden to Colorado and was heading to meet up with his wife and some friends to spend a week at the Sturgis bike rally.”
Noting that the experience at the historical site was emotionally moving, the brothers said they were in awe of how little had changed in the landscape. “The land hasn’t changed since Custer was at Little Big Horn,” said Barry.
After spending some time at Little Big Horn, the trio parted ways and Barry and Brian headed north, taking country roads with the help of heir GPS devices. “We took the back roads to Shelby and the countryside was so beautiful it is hard to put into words,” said Brian. They soon found themselves at Dawson Creek, British Columbia, an eight square mile town famous for being the start of the Alaskan Highway. “It was pretty far north, but it was still 80 degrees,” continued Barry.
But the fair weather was not to last. With roads buckling from frost heaves the previous winter and a cold, lingering rain, the last 150 miles to their destination for the night was a test of their endurance. “We were glad to get to the lodge,” said Brian. “We felt like we had just gone through the first day of football practice in full pads.”
Spending the night at Northern Rockies Lodge over looking Muncho Lake, the brothers soon discovered that is a small world after all. After ordering dinner — a hamburger and fries with a glass of A & W Root beer for $16.85 — a man sitting at the table next to them asked where were they from. “When he said ‘ya’ll’, I knew he was from somewhere in the south,” said Brian. The man told them that while he was from Alabama, his wife was from Hattiesburg. “Here we are over 3000 miles from the house, in the Canadian Rockies, and here is somebody from home,” said Brian. “It truly is a small world.”
The next stop they made on their trip was at place called Signpost Forest. Signpost Forest, just outside of Watson Lake, has an interesting history. In 1942, a homesick soldier working on the Alaskan Highway posted a sign with the mileage to his hometown. People who passed by, liked the idea and other signs soon followed. Today over 40,000 signs, from license plates, to road signs, to handmade plaques, are posted through-out the “forest.”
With a sign they had made in Picayune by Roper Supply reading Picayune, 3,689 miles, the pair posted it to one of hundreds of poles in the ‘forest.’ “We couldn’t post it higher than we did because we didn’t have anything to get up that high,” said Brian. The brothers had carried the sign tucked behind one of their backpacks all the way from Picayune.
They then set out to find the Carriere sign they had inadvertently discovered in a photograph posted on the Internet while researching for the road trip.
Both the brothers say the trip opened their eyes in ways they never expected - from the realization that some people in the world have it harder in unimaginable ways to a landscape that never ceased to amaze them. “We were eating breakfast one morning and I asked for a glass of milk,” said Barry. “But the lady said I couldn’t have it because they didn’t have much left and was saving it for the people who ordered oatmeal.”
Then there were the plugs poking out of the front of every vehicle for motor warming, the miles of yellow fields so yellow, they escape description, to hundreds of acres of sunflowers, each flower head facing the northern sun, to roads so difficult to maneuver, the brothers wondered if their gear would remain intact. “The land was beautiful,” said Barry, recounting the time a bull moose with six-foot antlers ran a few yards away alongside his motorcycle. “I could see his muscles and all,” said Barry.
Then there was the ride through miles of large grasshoppers, creating splattered patterns on their clothes, the Big Horn sheep, so close, Brian “could see its eyebrows,” and giant windmills they saw for miles before they got to them, to individual “outposts” with generators to run the gas pumps. “You’d pull in and they’d say wait a minute, they had to start the generator,” said Barry. “They were so far out they didn’t even have electricity.”
As for going again, both brothers said they would love to take the trip again, but with some moderations. “Next time I’d like to have a chase truck,” said Brian, noting that carrying the additional gear was sometimes difficult. But both brothers agree that the people they met along the way was one of the most rewarding aspects of the trip. “The best part of the trip was all the people we met,” said Barry. “They were all such very nice people.”
Brian agreed. “We met all kinds of people,” said Brian. “And we met so many from right around this area. It is just odd to be 4000 miles from home and meet someone from Prentice and another from Biloxi.”
“It changes your priorities about what is important,” continued Barry, with Brian adding, “I won’t complain about our roads anymore.”
