Roll Call Alaska 2015

[trcgolf]

I know its early but we have been planning for the past 3 months. I know its another 15 months at least till we leave but we are just going crazy...
So here is our very rough plan overview. Leave mid June from western NY; travel west up through Ill., Wis., Min., ND, into Canada.
Diagonally across Saskatch. and Alberta, BC, and YT...
Our first destination is Fairbanks, via Top of the World Highway... thinking of doing the Dempster to the Arctic Circle. I know there will many stops... some short, some long but all will be great.
Fairbanks to Homer with the obligatory Denali stop for a few days.
Homer to Portland Or; Oregon to San Fran; San Fran to home via the Northern US.

We have so much planning yet to do but reading all the Roll Call posts in 2013, and 2014 just keeps us going. Started to plan finances which brings us to the first major question.
I have heard all the diesel advantages and draw backs of the gas engines. We invested in a 32' fifth wheel and 2013 GMC 2500 HD with 6.0L Crew 4x4. The fiver weighs about 8K empty, I would guess 10,500 loaded. ( I will get that checked for sure)Brand new to Rving

The truck is my every dayer.... need the 4 wheel drive here in winter. The decision with gas was pure economics. A Cummins diesel and matching tranny was $9500 more. Doing the math it was going to take a bunch of miles to save enough in mileage to pay for the increase in price. About 100000 mile by my calculation. We not going to be full timers; one long trip a year to Florida.
Traveling around NY and Pa and maybe Florida, that all makes sense but going on a trip like this, I am not so sure gas was the way to go. So I am asking for those who used a truck like mine to haul a fifth wheel through Canada...Alaska...et al... What kind of mileage can I expect? Sorry for the novelette...I will get better at this.

Edited to add 'Alaska' within the title.

[Firehawvvk]

Glad I found this topic. My wife and I are now retired and getting back into RVing after a LONG hiatus. We just bought a TT today and pick it up soon whenever the weather will clear for a few days as we purchased it about 8 hours away.
We are jumping right into RVing with a trip planned to AK this May. I will follow this thread and hopefully learn about what to do and maybe more importantly, what not to do.

[fanrgs]

Sure, Bob. My introduction and the Milepost "Central-West Access Route" is at MIlepost Alaska Highway Geology. The Alaska loop and return on the Alaska Highway is at Milepost Alaska Highway Geology 2.. I had to split it due to Goggle access problems on the Blogger/BlogSpot site during the trip.

I am little jealous that you are going again so soon. Our next trip won't be until 2017. But we are planning to go up on the Marine Highway ferries all the way to Whittier at that time. So, it will be a lot different experience than the 2013 trip. Have a great time!

[CA_Traveler]

fanrgs,

I've lost track of your geology website. In 2013 we were ahead of you so didn't get to observe/learn from many of your postings. Would you post a link as we're planning to return this summer?

[CA_Traveler]

fanrgs wrote:
If you try to stick to a 350-mile/day schedule on BC, Yukon, and Alaska highways, you are going to be one unhappy RVer!

As I tell my friends you can certainly drive the speed limit or faster - just bring enough money to buy a new rig! :B

[fanrgs]

Completely agree with Sue's comments.

In 2013, we had a 45-minute wait for a pilot car on the North Klondike Highway. Had time to fix and eat lunch and take a short walk. You can't plan for that, although you can use the "511" web sites in each state/province, including Alaska, to keep up with the construction zones. One section of the Alaska Highway west of Beaver Creek was like towing our trailer over the ice flows in the Yukon River--randomly angled, truck-sized slabs of broken asphalt with a top speed of 5 mph. If you try to stick to a 350-mile/day schedule on BC, Yukon, and Alaska highways, you are going to be one unhappy RVer!

We also saved Jasper and Banff for our return trip because we knew from previous Alberta-BC trips that it was a fitting climax to a "once-in-a-lifetime" Alaska Highway journey. So, we used the Yellowhead and Cassiar Highways on the way up to Alaska. The Yellowhead from PG to Kitwanga is a great road, with no heave problems, great scenery in the Smithers to Kitwanga stretch, and a fantastic FREE city campground in Burns Lake (no hookups, but water and a free dump two blocks away). All of the visitor's centers along there have free WiFi, as does the Safeway grocery store in Smithers. And do not miss the side trip to Stewart-Hyder--majestic mountain scenery, bear viewing, and a spectacular view of a big mountain glacier (Salmon Glacier) from above.

[Chiefelectusn]

That is our plan, Jasper, Banff, Glacier, Yellowstone and head towards home.
Really it's a matter of what you would like too see/visit on your way home.
My rough figures are 14000 miles in 5 months give or take.
"Go as early as you can, stay as long as you can, go as many places as you cam, see as much as you can, SLOWLY".
We are leaving May 1 to return end of September ?

[agesilaus]

I'm thinking about doing the Cassair on the way back. What about taking 16 to Jasper from Kitwanga? I'd rather end up further east since we will be heading back to Florida.

[trcgolf]

Almost forgot...we are leaving May 30th.

[trcgolf]

You bettcha..... Going over equipment...looking at routes, reading blogs of those who traveled last year. It is starting to get real!

[2gypsies1]

Aren't you guys getting excited for your upcoming trip this summer? I know we were going over our lists and checking it twice and more by this time. Wish we were going again this year. 😞

[Trackrig]

sue.t wrote:

trcgolf wrote:
I hope we are able to handle the travel this way. It is the launch to our retirement as well and we want to just take our time... that being said I have always been a point A to point B in fastest time kind of guy. It will be an adjustment but your my role model. We are in countdown mode for sure.

It will be a frustrating trip of you remain focussed on number of miles per hour. It may also result in some damage to your RV if you feel the pressure to maintain a certain rate of speed. It is one of the best ways to launch off a frost heave or dive into a pot hole.

There are 100 mile sections of the Alaska Highway we drive at 25-40 mph. It also isn't uncommon to have to wait for a pilot car for 20 minutes to escort you through a construction zone. And on occasion there are forest fires and floods that close the highway, for days.


X2

Look at it this way - don't think about going from Point A to Point B - it's the trip that's worth while. We took over 30 days to get from Anchorage to Washington. Other than having reservations for one of the larger Canadian parks that we knew would be full over the American July 4th holiday, we really didn't worry about it too much.

Bill

Just toss the schedule out the RV door. If a road widening looks like a nice spot for lunch, pull over and enjoy. If it is a real nice spot and the fishing is good, then stay the night. Really. Breathe deep and let it go!

[sue_t]

trcgolf wrote:
I hope we are able to handle the travel this way. It is the launch to our retirement as well and we want to just take our time... that being said I have always been a point A to point B in fastest time kind of guy. It will be an adjustment but your my role model. We are in countdown mode for sure.

It will be a frustrating trip of you remain focussed on number of miles per hour. It may also result in some damage to your RV if you feel the pressure to maintain a certain rate of speed. It is one of the best ways to launch off a frost heave or dive into a pot hole.

There are 100 mile sections of the Alaska Highway we drive at 25-40 mph. It also isn't uncommon to have to wait for a pilot car for 20 minutes to escort you through a construction zone. And on occasion there are forest fires and floods that close the highway, for days.

Just toss the schedule out the RV door. If a road widening looks like a nice spot for lunch, pull over and enjoy. If it is a real nice spot and the fishing is good, then stay the night. Really. Breathe deep and let it go!

[trcgolf]

....Having made trips from Hattiesburg, MS to Alaska 3 of the past 4 years, I cannot emphasize enough that to really enjoy the trip, do not think in terms of how much time it will take to get from point A to point B. I know that people who have a limited amount of time might need to do this, but if you have "unlimited" time, try to just go with the flow and see, do, stop wherever your interest leads you. On each of our trips, the only campground reservations that we made were in Denali and in Seward for the July 4th week. Otherwise, we just drove however far we wanted with a vague idea of when we would arrive and how long we would stay. An example being Valdez where we originally thought we would stay 3 nights and ended up staying 7.


I hope we are able to handle the travel this way. It is the launch to our retirement as well and we want to just take our time... that being said I have always been a point A to point B in fastest time kind of guy. It will be an adjustment but your my role model. We are in countdown mode for sure.

[mabynack]

LUVTOTRKCP wrote:
We will be leaving from Northern WI, in May. Catching the ferry in Bellingham 6/6 Spending a week in most stops. Then driving from Haines around the top Fairbanks ect. 10 days in Denali then down to Anchorage and the Kenai for a couple weeks to Whittier then the ferry to Valdez and McCarthey, should be done with Alaska late August, then we will spend most of September getting to Bella Bella, BC, then the ferry to Port Hardy and most of October on the island, Head home to Wisconsin early November.
Should be a great trip to launch our retirement.

I'm hoping to do a similar trip when I retire in three years. I'm hoping you post some stories about your travels so we can live vicariously through you until I can make the trip on my own.

[LUVTOTRKCP]

We will be leaving from Northern WI, in May. Catching the ferry in Bellingham 6/6 Spending a week in most stops. Then driving from Haines around the top Fairbanks ect. 10 days in Denali then down to Anchorage and the Kenai for a couple weeks to Whittier then the ferry to Valdez and McCarthey, should be done with Alaska late August, then we will spend most of September getting to Bella Bella, BC, then the ferry to Port Hardy and most of October on the island, Head home to Wisconsin early November.
Should be a great trip to launch our retirement.