My well-travelled 1972 Moto Guzzi Eldorado turned fifty in 2022, shortly after I turned seventy. With more than one hundred thousand miles under her wheels, the old Eldorado has traversed Labrador, visited the Arctic Circle in the Yukon, and explored most of the isolated roads in northern Ontario and northern Quebec. Along the way there have been one or two roadside mishaps - some amusing, some annoying - but she has always managed to get me home. How would she fare on another epic journey?

Somehow, an early season ride to photograph some of Quebec's covered bridges, turned into a cross-country, coast-to-coast marathon. Once on the road heading west, a plan emerged to loop north, heading in the general direction of Yellowknife in the Northwest Territories. Why? It was just a name on a map - a place to aim for. But massive flooding in Manitoba ruined that plan, so another route and another objective emerged. Mountains. Yes, I like mountains. I wonder how the old girl will manage in the mountains. And if we're going that far, why not go the whole way?