Day 0


 Welcome!


This is the intro/overview to the 2013 trip “North to Alaska” (I always wanted to play the part of John Wayne).

I started thinking of traveling The ALCAN (Alaska) Highway back in the 80’s. But upon investigating I found several drawbacks. Not much gasoline or places to stay along the route. More importantly there were long distances between bathrooms, a deal breaker for my wife. Also it was quite evident it would take at least a month to accomplish the drive up and back at that time I had never taken even a two week vacation. So this was put on hold. Last year with much more time available I again started researching the Alaska Highway. I mentioned this to Cassie and she immediately went to the book store. I mentioned we do have the internet but she needs the hard copy. We learned that there are many more small towns villages scattered along the highway. We should be able to get gasoline and find a place to stay each and every day. More importantly every couple of hours we would be able to find a bathroom. So in January the planning began in earnest. This entailed a trip to AAA for more books and maps than I knew existed.

According to AAA online trip planner Euless, TX to Fairbanks, AK is 4,007.8 miles and takes 66 hrs 11 minutes actual driving time. Our route planning indicates we will travel 4,421 miles and take 80 hrs and 19 minutes behind the wheel. This includes a Marine Highway Ferry ride from Skagway to Haines Alaska. Leaving Euless on August 9, we plan to stretch this over 16 days which include a White Water raft trip in Banff Alberta and two days in Atlin British Columbia. Atlin is known as “Switzerland of the North”, not ever being to the actual Switzerland, I probably will not be able to tell the difference. But the pictures in the book looked good. After Fairbanks we will drive down to Anchorage arriving there on Aug 25. Using Anchorage as a base we will be taking the next 12 days and traveling mostly by train throughout central Alaska. More details on this part as we experience it. After day 12 of the train tour we will start toward the good old USA, specifically Washington State. This part of the trip will be about 3,604 miles with about 83 hours of drive time. You can tell we will not be traveling in a straight line. Form here we will begin making our way home but we have not determined much of what this entails. A couple of highlights will be the Pacific Coast Highway north of LA and the national parks in southern Utah, maybe even Yosemite and the San Diego Zoo. My rough estimate is that it will take another 5,000 miles with us arriving back in Euless around October 15.

Many people have said “Failure to Plan is a Plan to Fail” my corollary is “he who fails to be flexible is destined to be disappointed”. While we have spent many hours in planning, our main goal is to enjoy our trip so the motto is “go with the flow”.