ALASKA HIGHWAY NEWS THURSDAY, JANUARY 26, 2023 | VOL. 79 NO. 4
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Robby Knecht and Mag Habouzit arrived in Canada in October, and began their Alaska Highway journey by sidecar motorcycle earlier this January.
Fresh air, wide views: 3-wheelin’ up the Alaska Highway Matt Preprost editor@ahnfsj.ca
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A European couple is taking a winter adventure of a lifetime, motoring up the world famous Alaska Highway on the back of their sidecar motorcycles. Robby Knecht and Mag Habouzit began their journey criss-crossing Canada in October, arriving at Mile Zero this month to chart a course north. “Even in Europe, people know about the Alaska Highway,” Habouzit said during a stop in Whitehorse earlier this week. “We didn’t know until last week that we will take the Alaska Highway. We know where we want to go more or less, but we change our plan very often. “But then we were in Dawson Creek and we were like, OK, great, let’s ride on the Alaska Highway, and we’ve done 1,400 kilometres.” Motorbiking in the winter is old fun for the high school sweethearts. Habouzit recalls Knecht getting his first bike in 1984, when they were just teen-
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Enjoying the wildlife along the Alaska Highway: “Alone, without nothing, it’s a pleasure. With the wildlife, wonderful.”
agers, and picking her up to go skiing. Their Canadian adventure now is just one of many since those days, and part of Knecht’s ambition to travel the world by motorcycle. He started last January riding up to North Cape in Norway, and finished by crossing 34 European countries. “People said, ‘Oh, be careful in Eastern Europe, if you ride Turkey, Serbia, it’s dangerous’. No, no,” said Knecht. “Only TV shows the countries as dangerous. When you cross, people
are like you, like me, they want only peace.” “When you cross countries, all people are very cool, very good,” he said. With their three kids all grown up, and after careers working in international policing and humanitarian aid, Habouzit joined the global journey and the couple sold their possessions, buying up two of the last Russian-made Ural sidecars they could find for sale in Europe. Habouzit says they were “super lucky” to find one side-
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Enjoying a stop at the Sign Post Forest in Watson Lake.
car through a dealer they knew in France, and a second that was supposed to ship from Germany to the United States, but was instead redirected to France, as the motorcycles were under export embargo due to war between Russia and Ukraine. “When I was ready to join Robby, I said, OK, we have to have two of the same models. In case we have a breakdown, we have to have the same model, it’s a lot easier to repair,” she said. “So we have two of the last sidecars fully made in Russia... Ours are from Siberia.” The sidecars were brought to Canada on a four-day plane ride from Geneva, Switzerland, to Montreal — “Five minutes, tick, tick, tick, we got the stamps, here we go. It was super easy,” said Habouzit. They couple has since clocked more than 17,000 kilometres, travelling the country on a six-month visa and attracting the curiosity and enthusiasm of fellow motorists. “Lots of thumbs up from truckers,” said Habouzit. “Every time we stop at a gas station, we get plenty of people asking questions.” Added Knecht, “A sidecar Ural, it’s atypic. It’s a special look. A ‘wow’ look.” As for taking an Alaska Highway journey now, during the winter: “Only because there is no tourists and no mosquitoes,” Knecht said with a laugh. “We come from Switzerland; we know winter, we know snow. It’s a real pleasure to ride with fresh air, with a wide view.” “Winter brings a different atmosphere than summer,” Habouzit added. “We meet a lot more locals, true locals who live here all year long. It’s completely different. And the scenery is magical.” Continued on A16
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