We were out 88 days, sleeping in Nonnie’s Diner 80 nights and in Wood River Camp 7 nights. Of those places, 17 times we were there for just for one night. We tried not to move every day, in order to have enough time to explore where we landed. Oftentimes two days was enough to see what we wanted to see. Only once did we feel like we had overstayed and were ready to move on before we had planned to.
We moved Nonnie’s Diner forty times. Obviously Alaska was the goal, and we hurried both northbound and southbound through Canada. Our thinking was that we can easily get back to BC and southern Yukon, and it’s likely we’ll spend another entire summer exploring those two provinces. The surprising thing was how far BC is north to south, 1400+ miles. It’s further through BC than it is from Bainbridge to San Diego.
We didn’t drive long days. We’re retired and kept the drive times short. The long days on the right side of the chart are all during the delivery north and south through Canada. These are towing days only, the 0 Miles days we were unhooked and exploring without Nonnie’s Diner.
Longest Day Traveled: 470 miles from Lac La Hache north to Liard Hot Springs. This was not planned, but a bus crash caused us to stop early the night before. The trip was up and across the Canadian Rockies, and I wish we could have taken more time in that area.
Shortest Day Traveled: 16 miles from Teklanika Campground to Savage River Campground in Denali National Park. Although it was more than 16 because they made us come all the way down to the base to check in to the new spot.
There are a surprising number of miles traveled without the trailer, but Rob & I like to explore. One rainy day in Valdez, for example, we just drove around and took pictures of the waterfalls. We drove through the tunnel to Whittier from the Portage Glacier area. We drove up to Talkeetna for a total tourist day. We also drove around the Homer area on another rainy day.
Our Longest Day was 20 Hours 39 Minutes in Tok on June 27th. Our Shortest Day was 12 Hours 52 Minutes on our last night in Port Townsend. The Average hours of daylight on our trip was 16 hours 51 minutes.
Number of National Parks visited: Three
There are eight National Parks in Alaska. We had previously visited Glacier Bay in our boat, and I was trying to pick off as many of the other 7 as we could. Only 3 of them can be driven to, the remaining ones are toured via small plane. The two northern ones were totally out of reach for this trip. We did make it to Wrangell-St. Elias, Kenai Fjords and Denali. That left Lake Clark and Katmai, both of which are an easy (but not cheap) day excursion from Homer. I had been watching the weather, and finally realized those were for another visit, since the weather was so contrary when we were on that part of the Kenai Peninsula.
The wildlife count is surprisingly disappointing. I had been reading from others about sightings that seemed nearly daily. We were definitely not taking the same trip, even though I was on the lookout nearly all the time we were driving. Here are the counts:
Wildlife sightings outside Denali NP: 3 black bears, 1 grizzly bear, 2 moose, 1 sheep
Wildlife sightings inside Denali NP: 1 moose, 4 caribou, 8 grizzlies, 3 sheep
More than once I called the weather contrary in Alaska this summer. I also thought we hadn’t seen more than two days of temps over 70 degrees, but now I see that wasn’t quite right. Not far from the truth, but not quite as cold and dismal as it felt.
We don’t have the total cost of camping because we started booking six months before we left. Reservations are good when you’re traveling with someone else, and really essential for Denali. We do choose to make this more like camping and less like living in an RV park, so I booked and we stayed at either State Parks, Provincial Parks, or National Parks/Forests more than 50% of the time. That means almost never hookups, but that was fine. It also means bigger more private sites with lots of trees and natural surroundings.
We also were lucky to stay with two good friends while we were there, and Moochdocked in Anchorage at Gail’s house and in Fairbanks at Debby’s.
We knew fuel would be a significant cost on this trip. We filled up 35 times (Rob put an extra large tank in the Tundra). The most expensive fuel we bought was in Liard Hot Springs at $5,78 per gallon. The cheapest was $2.96 per gallon at Safeway in Seward using our Safeway discount points.
Our best fuel consumption was 14.64 miles per gallon in Fairbanks – mostly without a trailer hooked up. The worst fuel consumption: 6.92 miles per gallon over the Canadian Rockies.
Average cost per day for this trip was about $150 ($43 of that was fuel), not including wear and tear on the truck and trailer. For that amount we got to sleep in our own bed every night, cook our own meals when we wanted, and wake up to views like this. We did eat out quite a bit, and we did pay for a few excursions. But for what it cost us, it was worth every penny.
There is no question we will do this trip again, but probably not for a while. In the meantime, what did we learn that we’ll do better next time? What was right and what was wrong?
This was at the top of the wrong list. We brought two new kayaks, but neither ever made it out of the back of the truck. We were a couple of places where we might have used them, but the weather was not awesome, and when it was we chose a bike ride instead.
Also on the wrong list was the settee at the back of the trailer where we spend our time when the weather is bad and we’re forced indoors. The cushions are dead, but we’re planning a major upgrade and didn’t have time this year.
And this is at the top of the right list. Although we hauled them more than we rode them, every single day we had like this one is so memorable. It would be sad to be there without a bicycle.
Also on the right list is the power upgrade Rob did over the winter, adding lithium batteries and more solar. If it hadn’t been so cloudy we could likely have never used the generator. We camp often in parks without hookups so we rely on solar. This power upgrade was a complete game changer for us. Also, all the small improvements we made inside to make the bathroom and shower nicer were terrific.
Here is a live Google Map of all the places we stopped along the way this summer. Would I recommend this trip to anyone, absolutely 1000%. Every single day something made me say “WOW”. It truly was an entire summer of Wow moments.