Preparing for the Trip

We probably won't be eating like this in Alaska

We have been talking about driving to Alaska for a long time, but there never seemed to be enough time to make the trip. However, when we decided to take a sabbatical year, suddenly anything was possible. Originally the plan was to go to Alaska first, and then go to France, but after much debate we decided that it would be better for our daughter Joan to have a couple of months in France to learn to speak French before attending a French-speaking school in France. Thus, we postponed the Alaska trip until after the trip to France. Now, the time for the Alaska trip is almost upon us.

Our time in France has been wonderful (see our blog on our time in France for more details), and we probably are not prepared for the culture shock of going from France to Alaska, but we are headed to Alaska anyway. The differences in food will probably be the hardest transition. We have become accustomed to being able to walk to the local boulangerie to pick up fresh bread every day. In particular, Joan is going to miss the fresh pain au chocolat (croissant with chocolate inside). Bronwyn is going to miss the hundreds of cheeses and other delicacies at the local markets. Rick is going to miss the great inexpensive local wines. Instead of foie gras, coq au vin, and a cheese course for dinner, we may be having hot dogs and beans cooked on the fire with smores for dessert. Some changes will be welcome. Coffee will be served in bottomless mugs with every meal instead thimble-sized cups at the very end of the meal.

We will also have to adapt to living in a 28 foot long trailer surrounded by hundreds of thousands of acres of wilderness instead of a 4-story medieval home in a town that was first occupied before the birth of Christ. Of course, the trailer has some things that our French house does not have, such as a microwave and TV, but most of the time we will be in locations where we have no electricity and no TV signal so we may be living closer to the medieval lifestyle in the trailer than in our 15th century French home.

Our trailer and former truck

Our home from June through August

Because we are completely insane, we've allowed only 10 days after returning to the States to get ready for the trip to Alaska. We want to stay in Europe as long as possible and return to Charlotte in time for the start of school. The drive from Charlotte to Alaska and back will be roughly 12,500 miles and we don't want to spend every day driving so we will need approximately two months to make the trip. This leaves very little time to get ready for the trip after returning to the States. Thus, we are trying to do as much of the planning as possible before we return to the United States.

Planning a trailer trip to Alaska while living in France is not as easy as it sounds. Before we left for France we sold the truck that we used to pull the trailer and we put the trailer in storage. Thus, before we set off for Alaska we need to make sure that the trailer is still in good condition, purchase a truck to pull the trailer, get the truck ready for the trip, and pack the trailer. There will also be a million other little details such as repurchasing American auto insurance, purchasing American cell phones, getting the proper certification for our dog to go into Canada, and dealing with all of the hundreds of little problems that accumulate when you are away from your home for a year.

Another challenge has been trying to figure out when we need to make reservations for campsites and ferries. One of the advantages of traveling by trailer is that you have the ability to camp almost anywhere from a Walmart parking lot (not Bronwyn's favorite camping spot) to pullout on a dirt road in a National Forest. This creates a great deal of flexibility. On the other hand, at certain points in the trip, such as the ferry trip to Juneau, or camping in the popular National Parks, we will need to have reservations. Some spots need to be reserved six months ahead of time even though we can't be certain when we will be ready to leave for the trip.

We began planning for the trip before we left the United States, but the planning of the itinerary got serious in January 2016 because we knew that some reservations (such as the campsites at Denali National Park and Yellowstone National Park) needed to be made as early as possible. By mid-January, after many revisions, we finalized the itinerary and began to make reservations.

Dawson City - 1898

The basic itinerary (which is intended to be flexible) is as follows:

• June 1: Fly into Washington, D.C. and drive to Annapolis, Maryland to visit grandchildren (and daughter)
• June 3: Drive to Sherrills Ford, NC and pick up truck
• June 12: depart from Sherrills Ford, NC (where the trailer is currently stored)
• June 18: pick up Joan's second cousin in Pocatello, Idaho so that Joan will have a friend with her on part of the trip
• June 23-24: visit Klondike Gold Rush sites in Dawson City, Yukon Territory
• June 25 - drive to Chicken, Alaska on gravel road
• June 26-28: visit Fairbanks, Alaska and surrounding area
• June 29-July 1: visit Denali National Park
• July 1-6: explore Kenai Peninsula
• July 10-13: take Ferry to Juneau, Alaska and explore the surrounding area
• July 19-22: visit Jasper National Park and Banff National Park
• July 30-31: visit Yellowstone National Park
• August 1: visit the sod house near Spotted Horse, Wyoming where Joan's great grandparents homesteaded during the Dust Bowl.
• Make our way back to Charlotte via Mt. Rushmore, Badlands National Park, and many other places

Top of the World Highway near Chicken, Alaska

Rick also started looking at used and new trucks online to get a feel for what was available. The perfect truck needed to be able to pull a seven thousand pound trailer, with another couple of thousand pounds of gear, and to handle the notoriously bad roads of Alaska. We plan to go some places off of the beaten path that will probably require four-wheel-drive. Because gas stations can be a long way apart in Alaska, the truck needed to have as much range as possible (large fuel tank and/or good fuel mileage when pulling a trailer). With a previous truck and trailer we had run out of gas a couple of times and we didn't want to be having that problem on a remote road in Alaska. There is no truck out there that has everything that Rick wants at a reasonable price.

Our new truck - a Ford F250

After many hours of surfing the web for trucks, exchanging email with sellers of trucks, and many intercontinental phone calls, Rick finally settled on a Ford F250. Originally, he wanted to get a diesel because of its greater towing ability and fuel mileage, but to get the other features he wanted and stay within the budget, he ended up getting a truck with a gasoline engine. Hopefully, we won't end up out of gas on the side of the road.