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310 2001 Friendship I feel good, and satisfied, but vaguely down, as though something grand has come to an end. And it has. Tomorrow, for the first time in a month, Denali and I will travel without the motorcycles. There is something about making a turn in a road that has no known end. On the map, of course, the road ends. And that’s where we have been riding, on a map. But not in our minds. In our minds, we ride on a singletrack dirt path that seems to fade into the rain and mist, as though we can ride into some other dimension where all the curves are sweeping and long and the air is warm and sweet with sunshine. That’s what we dream. That’s what we do. We scream over roads never meant to be screamed over, rip past scenery that, at any other time, would have stopped us cold. Everything in Western Canada and Alaska is beyond our imaginations. For every river and lake we have ever ridden by in past years, now there are a hundred The Pale Light of Sunset 311 rivers and lakes. For every mountain, there are a hundred mountains, sheer walls, the fingers of glaciers probing the lower reaches, phalanxes of trees coming to an abrupt halt at a line beyond which only the most determined can survive. But this is not about survival. We can easily survive. This is not a test of endurance. We can easily endure—and have endured many things more stressful than this ride. In fact, it is not a test at all. This is about experience. A thing to do. A long stream of perceptions that infuse the mind. This is about the gathering wave. And we ride the crest of it. This is about friendship. ...

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