Our Trip North to Alaska
We recruited six groups of people who drove North to Alaska during the summer of 2011 and asked them to tell their story and share their road experiences. They logged their travels using our interactive points-of-interest map, shared photos, videos and written accounts of their adventures and the places they stopped along the road. Read on and be inspired to plan your trip North to Alaska!
The Roeder-Hensleys, a family of four, are currently driving North to Alaska from central California. Their two-month trip will include such adventures as glacier hiking, touring Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, kayaking near Valdez, seeing Child’s Glacier near Cordova, a guided natural history tour with the Center for Alaskan Coastal Studies in Homer, biking along the river in Anchorage, wildlife viewing in Denali National Park, hiking and exploring many museums and historical centers throughout both Canada and Alaska.
The Vickers began their travels in early June with a ferry trip from Port Angeles, Washington to Vancouver Island, British Columbia. They are planning on traveling North to Alaska via the Alaska ferry system and making many stops along the way. Their schedule is flexible and they have a lot of exciting adventures ahead of them.
The Van Dames are four ladies who are driving North to Alaska in August. Carol, Mary and Joyce are from Texas and Gail is from Michigan. Their 5,000-mile adventure will begin in Michigan and take them through the upper Midwest of the United States. They will enter Canada from Montana and continue north touring many cities and sites such as Lake Louise, Banff, Whitehorse and Dawson City before crossing into Alaska.
The Bentleys are traveling North to Alaska with two other couples. They departed Southern California in June and are planning to spend two months exploring every nook and cranny (or crevasse and tundra) of Alaska and points north. Though free to go wherever their whims take them, they will most likely head north through British Columbia, make the grand circle of Alaska and the Kenai Peninsula and return via Alberta.
The Scotts, their two children and their in-laws are taking the entire month of July to drive to Alaska from West Virginia. They have a loose itinerary but are planning to travel north to Michigan and then head west and enter Canada through Washington state. From there, they will travel through British Columbia and the Yukon before reaching their final destination in Fairbanks, Alaska. After that, they plan on taking in all the sights and maybe even driving on to Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve.
The Dennetts are traveling North to Alaska in July. Their trip begins in Oregon. They will travel the Alaska Highway and plan to arrive in Denali National Park around July 23 to meet friends. They will take a week or so to tour Denali, Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, the Kenai Peninsula and possibly Kodiak Island. They plan to return home via the Alaska Marine Highway ferry system and will stop in ports along the way to explore.