British Columbia 2018

georgelesley wrote:

romore wrote:
That is a lot of driving for a 'short day trip'. :B B.C. is huge, I have still not seen anywhere near all of it. There is a lot of information here regarding travel on the Alaska highway. If you want to set a toe in the Territories turn north to Ft Liard then go back to the main highway to continue north west into the Yukon to Whitehorse.
Now you need to make some decisions. You can carry on to Alaska if time permits or go north to Dawson City. If time is short return to Watson Lake then turn south back into B.C. At Meziadin junction go into Hyder so you can say you haave been to Alaska. Watch out for the local adult libation, that stuff will curl your toes.:B

Sorry i was not clear on what we want. We plan to find someplace in NW BC camp several days and day trip from there if possible. I do not expect to drive the mh each place if it can be avoided. We just want to stick our toes into Yukon, Alaska and NWT. Major exploration of both Yukon and Alaska will happen on a later trip, just want to show mum as many provinces as we can this trip. I will have to wait until we dig out a decent map of Canada to track all of these great suggestions, the map I have now is not detailed enough. I would love to make it to the artic circle, but it looks like that will have to wait until a later trip.

If you want to do AK, YT, and then NT, I would say there isn't really a good central spot to drop your motorhome, and reach them all in day trips in your toad. This is just my opinion, but I was there last year, and travel isn't easy once you get north of Dawson Creek near the BC Alberta border, or Prince George in the BC interior, not that it's high speed freeway style driving getting to those places either.

That said, if you want to get your mum to see all of them, and your starting point is the Jasper/Banff Alberta area, I would head north and pick up the Alaska Highway (97) at Dawson Creek then on to Fort Nelson. The distance from Jasper to Fort Nelson is 600 miles.
Use Fort Nelson as your base to get to the Northwest Territories at Fort Liard, 130 miles one way, do your tourist thing and then backtrack out of there to Fort Nelson again.
Then pick up 97 again and head north and west towards Watson Lake YT. You will actually enter and exit BC/YT along that route several times due to the physical routing of the Alaska Highway. There's a BC provincial park at Muncho Lake with a self serve campground (C$20/night for pit toilets only), called Strawberry Flats that is very nice, quiet, and picturesque, with water access, if the drive to Watson Lake becomes a slow one. It was for us last year. Hwy 97 is very winding in spots. Few places to pass slower vehicles, and you will encounter a few.
From Watson Lake, home of the sign forest, pick up the Cassiar Hwy 37 south and keep going until you reach Meziadin Junction in central BC, then 37A west to the BC Alaska border towns of Stewart BC and Hyder AK.
Back track out of there, to Meziadin Junction, and the rest is up to you.

Some of the roadways south from there through central BC have some spectacular views. All of it is fantastic scenery, but the driving is challenging in places.
It would be a great trip if you can pull it off.
Good luck.
p.s. You mentioned Arctic Circle? There's a new highway that should be open next year, called the "Inutuk". It's actually built on top of the muskeg and perma-frost, and runs from Inuvik to Tuktoyaktuk on the Arctic Ocean. It should be passable next summer.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/new-arctic-coast-highway-opens-up-remote-tuktoyaktuk-1.4363029