Tag: vanlife

The Eagle has Landed! Back to Tok, Yukon, and British Columbia

September 15, 2026

Now that we’re finally done with the worst of the roads, frost-heave wise, I did a quick inspection of the interior van construction. Lucy’s bed is directly underneath mine, and it would be fairly tragic to squash her one night. The frame is built on 9 2×4 legs, with 6 steel brackets riveted to the van skeleton, 3 at the head (passenger side) and 3 at the foot. I think it’s safe to say that it was overkill. And the shelves are holding up fine. 

The exterior of the van is a whole different story. I don’t believe I’ve ever had a filthier vehicle. It’s like a geological experiment: a layer of bugs, a layer of dust, another layer of bugs, a coating of mud, more bugs. The rain didn’t make any noticeable difference, except when I climbed on top to check the solar panels and they seemed pretty clean. I can’t decide if Dad is rolling in his grave, trying to manifest himself in my head to force me to stop at a car wash. 

I say I can’t decide because I checked the prices at a couple places and just laughed. One was $2/minute, and I’d need at least 30 minutes minimum – and then I’d still have to do all the work myself – not the drive through kind of car wash (which wouldn’t get all my bugs off anyway). Bah. As dad was somewhat thrifty (“money doesn’t grow on trees!”), he may be in agreement with keeping the filth, maybe as a sort of travel badge of honor. Or – more likely – he’d buy a bottle of Windex and a case of paper towels and spend 6 hours washing by hand.

(Several day later update – I stopped in Kitwanga for an oil change. Shelves and cleanliness don’t matter much if my engine dies. The guy let me borrow his hose to wash my solar panels).

An inspection of my person did not yield as good results as that of the van. I am sore and achy everywhere, especially my neck. After an analysis of my general driving position, leaned back yet slumped forward, often employing the white-knuckle driving technique, I’m surprised I don’t feel worse. The past few nights I’ve been woken up by my neck or shoulders hurting. Every 15 minutes while I’m driving now I have to remind myself to sit up, shoulders back, head up, loosen my fingers, etc etc. And maybe firmer pillows (update so you don’t worry – all good now! 3 days and back to normal, except now my knee hurts).

Lucy failed her inspection as well. She still won’t sit or lay down while I’m driving, and is usually standing with her two front paws on the seat in the back so she can bother me. She can’t get into the front – a cargo net spans the gap between the seats so she can just poke her head over. But it’s thick elastic, so when she’s angry (quite often) she presses her neck against it as hard as she can and jams her skull into me until she cuts off her breathing and I have to elbow her back. When I get my pillows, Lucy will get a hard plastic barrier. And my too-soft pillows. She is also covered in small blobs of dried pine sap from the forest. She was taking a nap in the soft needles and now has clumps of hard sticky goo in her fur. What a pair we are. Old. And in need of a spa day. 

This photo is from last year – that’s why Lucy looks so happy. Just showing her cargo net

I am aware that our aches and pains do not make for exciting reading, but an update now and then is necessary for a whole picture of this trip. Same with my obsession with tidiness. If I let two hours go by without putting stuff back where it belongs, total chaos. I’ve generated a long list of ways I can make the van more efficient, stuff-wise, but that’ll have to wait until I’m in one place for more than a couple days. 

Geography-wise, I left Valdez (the -ez is like “cheese” not “fez”) on September 10 and took the Tok cutoff road back to Tok. I could have spent a month camping along that road if I wasn’t in a hurry. The fall colors were blazing, yellow aspens with red wildflowers and ground covers. I stopped so many places to take pictures and had to pass the same slow drivers over and over. 

I stayed twice at the Tundra RV park, super mellow place with a bar (my companion for an afternoon beer was a 6 year old boy with a large plastic angler fish that lit up and frightened Lucy). We stayed two days to do laundry and relax before tackling the frost heave roads again through the east of Alaska and back into the Yukon. In Valdez, a man said “The Canadians don’t take care of their roads very well,” but after driving the bad parts of both nations, I think I like the Canadian way better. They have a low speed limit, and put orange flags on the side of the road near worse than shitty areas. Speed, you get what you deserve, forewarned. The United States part of the frost-heave section has smooth, cared-for roads with a high speed limit – but that lulls you into a false sense of “this road is awesome” until the bottom absolutely drops out with no warning, Lucy flails off her perch, and everything in the van takes flight for a brief moment. Then when I am scanning the roadsides for moose or bear and start daydreaming, I’m going 70 again before I realize where I am. And am severely reminded. Dukes of Hazzard style.

The road from Tok is the Alaska Highway, and I drove it all the way from the start at Dawson Creek on my way here. This time, it was so empty I could stand in the middle of the highway and take photos (but I still won’t stop if my van won’t fit entirely off the side of the road, that’s just poor decision making). 

The eagle has landed – and I can’t tell you how happy I am about that. I pulled off to the side of the road somewhere in the Yukon next to a river, surrounded by mountains (omg I love the Yukon), and almost immediately saw an eagle fly by. It was fairly far away but I could see it perched in the one tree that towered above the rest. Lucy and I ran over as close as we could, but a boulder field and river were in the way of getting closer. I proceeded to take about 7000 photos. Even though it just sat there. It was like at the aquarium, tap the glass, “do something.” At some point, I heard a lot of squawking and saw another eagle flying over, a juvenile. The poor thing flew right into the tree trunk and flapped and flapped to get to a branch. The adult eagle sat right above it, watching the progress without moving a muscle. The baby hopped across a gigantic nest and tried to get on a branch on the other side, completely failed, wings flapping, feathers ruffling, talons scrambling, screeching the whole time. And the adult just patiently watched. I may have detected a resigned look of “that’s my idiot child” from the eagle, maybe a heavy sigh. I captured a funny progression of photos from the whole debacle, but again, I took like 7000 so it may be a while before I get to them all.

I really wanted a photo of the eagle flying since the backdrop of mountains and mist was so dramatic. I had to put Lucy back in the van because she let me know she was tired of sitting there, she may as well be in her comfy bed. I crouched on the rocks for hours. At some point, this ridiculously cute weasel (I think) got suspicious of me and kept trying to get close enough to check me out. But every time it poked its tiny head out from the rocks, I’d look, it would dart back in and reappear around a different rock. It was kinda unnerving since crouching down in the place to take photos gave me a definite plumber’s butt, and I didn’t want the little guy sneaking up from behind. And he’d pop out, startle me, jump back in, over and over, and was getting very close to me. As I was turned around shooing him off, that is (of course), the only time the eagle flew. So I’m happy I finally saw an eagle, but I hope I can get closer to the next one. I would have camped here much longer but with 35 degrees at night I didn’t dare.

See the one tall tree in front of the mountains? That’s where the eagles were. A little far away.

We made it through the rest of the frost heaves to the east side of Whitehorse, and I couldn’t find a good place to sleep. Pulled into a campground and it was packed (now, though, it’s Canadians out for the weekend, not tourists). And getting grumpy because I really wanted to stop driving, I found Marsh Lake. Oh, Canada, how I love you.

The Alaska Highway crosses between Yukon and British Columbia a few times, and we spent the next night in the very last section of the Yukon (where I forgot and stopped at the same gas station that charged $10.40/gallon, but I didn’t have a lot of choices). The aspen trees were as bright a yellow as I’ve ever seen, total fall glory, the leaves tinkling in the breeze. These were interspersed in a spruce-pine mixed forest, with mountains and water. I cannot begin to describe how AMAZING the scenery of this trip has been. Every time I think I’ve seen the most beautiful thing EVER, I round a bend and “are you fucking kidding me?” It’s never ending postcard views – snow-capped mountains surrounded by forested foothills, lakes and rivers everywhere, each scene better than the last. 

I finally saw stars this morning (I wrote this section a few days ago, so when I say “this morning,” it’s not). I’ve been trying, but when I first got up this way it stayed light far later than I could stay awake. Fast forward a couple weeks and it’s darker, but cloudy and rainy. But this morning I woke up at 2 am, my neck was bothering me, so I got out of the van to stretch myself out, and WOW the stars were brilliant. I’m miles from any town lights and a truck hasn’t driven by in ages. It’s about 28 degrees with totally clear skies (the coldest night I’ve spent in the van without a heater so far was 24 degrees, somewhere in Wyoming a couple years ago. I added more insulation to the entire ceiling when I installed the roof fan so it’s a bit better now). The big dipper was huge and unmistakeable, and I see why Alaska made it their state flag. I haven’t seen this many stars in a long time. Five hours later, while I’m writing this, I can’t see 5 feet in front of me for the fog. I generally get up early to watch the sun rise but I don’t think I’ll see that today. At least there was enough clear sky yesterday to make coffee indoors this morning.

I was hoping for a nice sunrise over the lake and forest at this rest stop because I was thinking about putting together an album of photos only taken from the places I’ve slept on the side of the road. So much beauty just feet from the highway. 

This afternoon we finally turned south onto Highway 37, or Cassiar Highway, into British Columbia. I believe most of this is tribal land. The road is a winding, narrow, gravel/asphalt lane without lines, with steep ravines on either side. It passes through several mountain ranges and is similarly covered with pines, firs, and aspens. The extreme fall colors of the Yukon are receding, and I was happy about a possible warmer night temperature here. Our sleep spot is on the side of Simmons Lake in a pull-off, and not many cars are on the road so it should be pretty peaceful. The lake is enormous and blue and has a nice walk down to the shore. Walking down a hill, Lucy stopped for a drink in a giant puddle which was covered in broken ice. The couple hours south we gained was apparently offset by the gain of 1000 feet elevation. I prepared for a colder night be enclosing Lucy’s bed in a towel canopy to keep her heat in, and she can wear her coat to sleep. She probably doesn’t need it all, but I worry.

September 16, 2026

After a longer driving day, we are camped on Mehan Lake in British Columbia. I pulled into a random rest area and found a trail that led to a small floating dock and fire pit. I’m always a little skeptical about driving the van on dirt inclines, but I took a chance today because the town of Bell is only 2 kilometers away and it would be easy to walk there and get some help if I’m stuck. Plus, I got those badass tires before I left (but I need to remind myself that new tires do not make this a high-performance cargo van). I haven’t had phone reception in a few days so I have no idea what the weather forecast calls for. I haven’t had a proper shower since Tok (oh, boy, how long ago?), so I set up my camp shower to wash my hair. The little things, like clean hair, make me so happy now. I stayed up late to watch stars, and heard owls and wolves hooting and calling to each other across the water.

The fall colors are receding more, and it’s getting warmer, so I’m taking my time again. Lucy will appreciate that. We stopped in Prince George to resupply at Walmart and Petsmart, and I found a shop with a dog bath (which Lucy definitely did not appreciate, but suddenly the van doesn’t smell so bad). I scrubbed, but she still has clumps of dried sap in her fur. We pulled into 10 Mile Lake campground, and the park ranger is a retired dog and horse therapist. Lucy just got her spa day, a bath and a massage, and I am anticipating my turn. 

Omg, I’m finally caught up to where I am. I know I should write more often to keep the dates of this trip straight in my head, but some days I’m so exhausted I just want to lay in bed and read. So I do.

September 21, 2026

Spent two nights at 10 Mile Lake, and now I’m sitting at a laundromat in Williams Lake. Now I’m caught up.

Another end of the line – but with glaciers

September 14, 2026

I left you last in Mat-Su Valley, thinking that I was going to head back to Canada and down to Washington. But that wasn’t to be…

It has been raining and my solar is down. For the most part, I can live without power. If it’s not pouring rain, I can make coffee with my camp stove (but reminder to myself, I need a good coffee pot for use on a fire. Using a drip system with boiling water yields lukewarm coffee when it’s this cold out, when you want it hot the most). But since it’s been pouring rain, I haven’t had coffee in two days. Caffeine, yes, but nothing warm, and I’m not quite right without coffee. But worse than no coffee would be to let Kristie’s salmon go bad. She gave me some beautiful, fat cuts, and that would be tragic. I snuggled them into the ice cube trays, so it’s okay for now. 

I spent the night on the side of the road, which is not as bad as it sounds. Except for a highway, I’m surrounded by nature. A rushing river and a forest, pretty good deal. Whenever I’m stopped for the night, which is early due to my crazy dog, I notice that most travelers start pulling over or into campsites or RV parks between 5-7. So the upside of the curvy, narrow mountain roads is that very few people drive at night and it’s dead quiet, especially far away from a town. Then I got a good look at a downside of curvy, narrow mountain roads the next morning. 

Just a random fall color pic – who knows anymore where this is.

It had been raining for a couple days, and fairly cold. Too much rain to make coffee, and it was tempting to fire up the propane grill inside the van. But without power my roof fan won’t work, and it might be weeks before anyone tows the van and finds our carbon-monoxide-saturated corpses. I should remember to research that later. Worse than the rain was the thick fog. The highway (Glenn Highway) was in a mountain pass at this point, so I’d drive up and into the impenetrable fog, rise above it, drive down and into the fog, drop below it, over and over and over. Add construction and a single gravel lane that didn’t have any markings or guard rails. The drop off on the right was steep (think Crawler’s Ledge steep), and single, sad, tiny orange cones dotted the cliffside every so often. And I was stuck behind a couple cars and a double semi. And no coffee. And my solar power alarm started screaming as I tried to make out the tail lights of the guy in front of me through the rain and fog, worst time for a jump scare. I had switched off my power for the night and put it back on for the freezer, but it wasn’t enough. Thankfully I could switch off the alarm with a switch I installed behind my head above the driver’s seat. I was starting to stress about gas and didn’t have any reception to find the next station on a map. And no coffee. It was just a complete shit morning. I’d chance a quick look out my right-hand window and see that I was driving above a glacier, and start to stress about ice on the road. It was a terror-filled morning drive.

Oh, and don’t forget Lucy – head butting me in the arm the entire time so I’d stop scaring her, but the road was too narrow for any rest stops. I think this was the only time I ever asked myself “what the fuck am I doing here?”

The only way I could deal with the driving scenario I found myself in (second to worst scenario, but only to snow) was to scream-sing with the stereo blasting. That is my extreme distress coping mechanism. So I made a short list of my favorite scream-songs from the playlist I was listening to (no radio stations). 

Top 5 scream-song list: 5. Dream On – Aerosmith, 4. Hit Me Baby One More Time – Brittany Spears (but I only have the Travis version), 3. Whipping Post – Allman Brothers, 2. Bad – U2 (and if you don’t remember that great mullet Bono had during Live-Aid or whatever fest from the 80’s you should totally watch it on YouTube), 1. Oh! Darling – Beatles. Honorable Mention: Dry the Rain – Beta Band (in honor of the John Cusack movie reference, but also a good one). Second Honorable Mention: Bend – Middle Kids (because it’s too new to bump the classics). I’m listening to music as I’m writing this and I keep wanting to change my list. Led Zeppelin just came on. 

I should have asked Santa for a better stereo when I was at the North Pole. Every time I hit a pothole, the music cuts out. I can’t figure out why, because it’s the connection to my phone, not an internal wire. How does a bump in the road interrupt bluetooth?

Anyway, I had a decision to make at Glennallen: follow the Tok Cutoff north (ugh north again) to Tok and back to Canada for the road south? Or south along the Richardson Highway (along the Trans-Alaska Pipeline) to Valdez? I quickly went from what the fuck am I doing here?” to “I’ll probably never drive this way again so I have to.” I’m really starting to worry about the weather (Denali roads were closed last week for snowfall, and all tourist bus trips cancelled), and a side trip to Valdez would add four days at least. Now if I had been actually planning this, I would have known that a trip to Valdez does not mean seeing the Prince William Sound, which I want to do. I would also have known that I could have caught a ferry from Whittier, east of Anchorage, saved myself days of driving (including the terror-filled morning), and sailed across the northern part of the Sound. But alas, done is done. The drive to Valdez was stunning, but the tourists drove worse than the usual idiots – in proportion to the level of beauty, I guess. 

(Roxanne – The Police)

I nearly had two accidents on that road: one was a sedan driving about 20 in a 65 with no flashers, just people leaning out the window taking pictures. That may not seem so bad, but coming up on them around a mountainy curve with cars in the other lane is enough to make Lucy jump up and head butt me when I had to slam on the brakes. The second was car stopped dead in the road – in a hairpin turn – in the canyon to take pictures of the waterfalls. At least I was only going about 30 at the time to navigate the curves. With the morning starting with a driving nightmare, then the afternoon filled with morons, I was glad to arrive in Valdez. 

Bridal Veil Falls

Valdez is the end of the line, too, like Homer. Alaska has a lot of them. The camping in town is limited to parking-lot style RV parks, which I hate, but since the park was closing in two days I nearly had the place to myself (I made a note that it closes on September 10, just for my date references).

Valdez is charming, a port town with docks and a ferry and seafood and cute shops. But covered in giant, nearly-empty RV parks. As scared as I am of the snow, I would have hated this place in high tourist season. It was a perfect time to visit (also, very few bugs now). The town is overrun by the cutest fluffy bunnies, cartoon-type bunnies, in all colors: black, white, gray, brown, some a mix of all colors. They lived under the buildings and hung out under the RVs and Lucy thought she had died and gone to heaven. 

(Thunder Road – Bruce Springsteen)

Valdez has a ferry, and my map shows a line connecting Valdez to Haines, another town I would love to see. A ferry would cut off the entire drive back north to Tok and put me near the road in the Yukon. So Lucy and I walked down to the terminal and there is only a ferry going to the place I came from, not the way I’m going. I have no idea what the dotted line connecting Valdez and Haines means. So if I’m going to see Haines I’ll have to add another four days along the Haines Highway, down and up. I could do it much quicker but that doesn’t sound like fun.

Since I didn’t see the Prince William Sound, I booked a glacier trip to get on the water. It only covers a teensy portion of one arm of the Sound, so technically maybe it’s not even considered “the Sound.” Lucy wanted some time apart, so I got up the next morning and made it to the boat. It was so foggy I could barely see the van. The boat captain was required to blow his fog horn every two minutes since no one could see anything. 

On the way out

On the way back

The trip visited the Colombia Glacier, arrived at by a speedy motor to a bay filled with icebergs, which slowed us considerably. A couple was getting married onboard, so the captain was trying to get as close as possible and it was COLD! The guy I bought my ticket from told me I’d be fine in “what I was wearing” the day before, when he should have told me to pack my winter coat and gloves. Jerk. But it’s a glacier tour, so my bad, too, I guess.

Columbia Glacier

We saw a mama and baby humpback whale, otters relaxing on icebergs, seals on a giant cement marker. The glacier was beautiful, the floating blue icebergs carved into crazy shapes by the wind and water. Ice chunks everywhere in the glassy water. It was a nice tour, but I’ll never need to do it again. 

I was adopted by a couple families with adult children and we stood on the top deck and made fun of a group of women below with their backs to the ocean and mountains, posing for selfies. Hours of selfies. I don’t recall seeing them actually look at the scenery. But it was cold, so they had to go inside and edit pictures until they warmed up to take more. The wedding was short and sweet, possibly because the bride wore a sleeveless gown.

(Fire Woman – The Cult)

The captain mentioned that we would not be anywhere near the Exxon oil spill of 1989, which spilled about 11 million gallons. He said you could barely see damage anymore. Most of the wildlife is back to the previous populations, but if you dig on the beach you’ll find layers of degrading black oil. So still not great. He further mentioned that two men were at the helm at the time of the reef collision, and although they later testified that they turned off the auto pilot, neither of them did. All their course corrections were overridden by the auto pilot and they didn’t notice. The sophisticated radar that could have prevented the reef collision had been broken for two years, too expensive to fix, apparently. The ship ran aground in 35 feet of water and no one started the cleanup for days as they argued about who should do it, then a late-winter storm blew in and no cleanup was possible at that point. I read later that Exxon sued both the Coast Guard and the State of Alaska for making it too hard for them to do a cleanup. Corporate greed and negligence certainly haven’t changed since then. What has changed is that two boats are now required to accompany tankers in and out of the Prince William Sound, along with the pilot – a tug and a boat capable of beginning an oil spill cleanup. 

(You Oughtta Know – Alanis Morisette)

Otter family on icebergs

I haven’t caught up yet to where I am IRL, but this is getting kind of long. More coming very soon because I have wifi right now! (Sept 18, 20206)

And hurray, it’s warm again (but this is where I’m sitting right now, about a week or so after the events above).

Homer Spit, end of the line.

September 7, 2026

I would like to start today by mentioning that it is the one-month anniversary of this trip. Here’s a sloppy map showing my route (but this map starts in Montana, I left from Cleveland).

At the moment I am pulled to the side of the road somewhere in Mat-Su Valley, with the Matanuska River directly next to the van and evergreen-tree-covered mountains across the two-lane road. I think that’s where I am, anyway. My iphone maps aren’t working here so it’s a best paper-map guess. 

I also think I’m on the Glenn Highway. I’ve noticed that no one uses the numbered names of the highways. Each segment, regardless of whether it is the same numerical name, has its own specific designation: Seward Highway, Denali Highway, Sterling Highway, Parks Highway, Alaska Highway, etc. Each of these is the road between two geographical places, like Sterling Highway, which runs to the end of the road on Homer Spit, becomes Parks Highway south of Anchorage, but both are the same (and only) road north. People ask me what routes I’ve driven and I’m totally at a loss to remember all the names. 

I see that it’s been almost a week since I’ve written anything so I’ll try fill in the giant gap between Eagle Falls and Mat-Su Valley.

While I was cleaning the van and doing dishes in Eagle Falls (while Lucy napped in the sun), my sink sprouted a giant leak which I didn’t notice at first. I have a foot pump (which I hate and will be replaced during my next time-out for upgrades), and was wondering why I had no water pressure. Lots of water coming out of the tank, a tiny dribble coming out of the faucet. The rest, apparently, was shooting onto the wall, soaking the wood and wallpaper, puddling under Lucy’s bed, drenching the rugs, you get the idea. Good thing it was sunny – I ended up taking everything out of the van to dry, all doors open, and my van cleaning turned way more serious than intended. 

Lucy and I hiked around Eagle Falls, which has tons of trails through the woods next to the river. Parts of the river had rapids and kayakers were playing in the falls. And to complete our cleaning spree, we went up the road to a combination laundromat/shower/gas station. I showered, the sheets and blankets and dog towels got clean, and that moment may have been the cleanest I’ve been since we left. I had to do the laundromat strip-tease so I could get every piece of clothing washed that I possibly could (the place was full of rough old men so I didn’t get too naked). 

It’s too cold now for Lucy’s bath, but I did see a combo car wash/dog wash/laundromat/shower place – what a brilliant idea for the RV capital of the world. If it had a diner it would have been perfect.

I have been speaking to Kristie Hudson for a few weeks (months?) about my trip out here. Kristie and I paddled (drank) together on Kauai and haven’t seen each other in about 8 years, and she lives in Kenai, south of Anchorage. Her parents are homesteaders, which is fascinating to me. Both grew up in Alaska, but then at some point just planted their flag and said ‘this is my land now’ because no one else was on it and tamed their little bit of wilderness. Totally Little House on the Prairie with -50 degrees below zero and piles of snow. Or that’s how my imagination tells me it happened. Homesteading became illegal maybe 50 years ago out here (but without internet I can’t remember exactly how long ago). It still feels so old west, but with lifted pickup trucks and boats and ORVs. 

Kristie and I met at the Sunrise Inn, had dinner and caught up, then I was back on the road south to get to my final destination. Along the way I stopped at a random pull-off with tons of open space and trails in front of the foothills. Lots of strange earth mounds. Lucy and I climbed one and saw all these people bent over or kneeling, filling buckets with something. They were picking blueberries! The little plants were about two inches tall, and carpeted the entire area like a ground cover. And they were so good. 

I have always known what a “High Bush” blueberry is, and now I’m thinking these must be the “Low Bush” variety. Again, no internet so that might not be remotely factual. I’ll probably forget by the time I have reception so if someone is interested and wants to text me the answer I’d appreciate it. 

Strange place for picking blueberries

Kristie told me that the color of the Kenai river is her favorite color. The first thing that popped into my head was the baby-poop brown of the Cuyahoga, so I was intrigued. And when I turned a bend in the road in the Kenai Peninsula and finally saw it, I nearly drove the van straight in for a super close-up. It was stunning, and I’ve been thinking for days what the exact description might be. Think of a turquoise that is glowing. Like looking at the sun through a fat slab of blue raspberry jello, maybe. I’ve never seen a color like it.

My last stop in Alaska before turning back was Homer Spit, the literal end of the line.

Kenai is the start of a peninsula, then south to Homer, then south to Homer Spit. The spit is a tiny strip of land with a gigantic harbor for fishing boats, ferries, and cruise ships, RV parks, quirky tourist shops, and restaurants. It might be 6 miles long? I don’t know.

One side borders the Cook Inlet, with the Aleutian Island Chain to the west and Kodiak Island to the south. The east side is the Kachemak Bay. If you were to sail counter-clockwise from Homer Spit around the bottom of the Kenai Peninsula you would reach Valdez in the Prince William Sound, home of arguably the most famous oil spill ever. That is another place I regret not visiting, but I’m starting to get worried about snow in the mountains and it would add at least another couple weeks. I haven’t passed the road south to get there yet (Richardson Highway) so it is still a remote possibility. The road runs along the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, from Valdez to the furthest north at the Arctic Ocean. 

Lucy and I stayed at the Homer Spit Campground, at the very tip of the land. It was not a campground that I enjoyed since it is just RVs packed together in a dirt lot, basically. I like some space. But the selling point (besides not wanting to drive anymore) was the miles and miles of beach to walk. I had a nice ocean-front spot so I could lay in bed and look at the water, with mountain chains as far as you could see. It was another of those anxiety-inducing places, so much rugged wilderness and open space. Or, it was open space when I pulled in. I forgot it was a holiday weekend so it got really crowded really quickly. Not like summer-peak-tourism crowded, but Melissa crowded. Kristie told me that the way through the Kenai Peninsula, from Homer to Anchorage, is a bumper-to-bumper affair in the summer. No thanks. 

Lucy and I stayed three days, walking for miles on the beach and napping. Lucy was happy to get some no-drive time. The overwhelming smell was fish and rotting seaweed, typical fishing village. Lucy did not trust the seaweed on the beach. We saw otters and seals, but almost no wildlife except the enormous crows. The first time I saw a seal I thought it was a person swimming and immediately wondered where my goggles were packed. But then I remembered this is not Kauai and there’s no way I was putting more than my toes in the water. Standing on the beach staring at glaciers in the mountains does not inspire me to swim. So we walked and walked.

I thought this would be a good place to see eagles, what with the thousands of fishing boats in the harbor. I saw one. A single eagle. I saw it four times, and it must have been the same one because I was out every morning before sunrise and out every evening through sunset and dusk, and only one eagle flew by, on the same path, at the same time. I’ve been camping by rivers, lakes, ponds, oceans, bays, mountains, forests, streams, borrow pits – and I’ve seen one single eagle. It’s disappointing. Kristie told me the easiest way to find one is to go to the dump, where hundreds are flying around eating garbage. Not the optics I’m looking for (photo-wise) but I should have gone near Anchorage just to see that. 

On one of our walks we stopped at a restaurant with an outdoor deck. Lucy was allowed on, so this was my stop for seafood. I got halibut fish and chips, with an Alaskan ale. Amazing. The restaurant had a dog menu as well, and I ordered Lucy a $15 dinner of salmon and rice – a little bribe because we have so much more driving to do. Her salmon looked so good I wanted to try it but I was not quick enough. 

The final day of my Homer Spit stay was rain, with days of rain forecasted on the way. I read a book and watched the crows out my back window. Every so often I went outside and left a handful of raw almonds on my picnic table. The crows flocked down and hopped off with them, stopping to hold the nut between their talons and peck it into tiny pieces. The only other birds I saw (except the millions of sea gulls) were these small, sparrow-like birds. They flew in and out of the van’s front grill and kindly cleared all the dead bugs from the clogged filter. 

I saw Kristie again in Soldotna as I started the trip backwards to retrace much of my path. I got to see Mahina (dog), and we had a giant breakfast. She left me with different types of frozen salmon and jars of preserved smoked salmon, and tomatoes and cucumbers from her garden. Which I think was yesterday, but all the days kind of blur together, and brings us to the Mat-Su Valley area. From here my next stop is Tok (unless I decide Valdez is a go), then over the horrible frost-heave road back to the Yukon and south. At some point I’ll pick the route I’ll take to Vancouver, BC, but I have at least a week to worry about that. 

I pulled out my book to see if I should go to Valdez, and remembered that I wanted to go to Haines, which is near Skagway. After Tok, I could cross into Yukon, then connect to the Haines Highway south to get back into Alaska. That entire area is comprised of islands along the coast, serviced by ferries. I might be in Alaska for another month. This place is incredible. I could drive to Haines, load the van onto a ferry, stop at Juneau, cross the border on the water, then debark at Prince Rupert in British Columbia. Or, I could drive to Valdez and take the ferry through the Gulf of Alaska to Haines, which seems like a multi-day journey just from looking at a map. That’s probably stupid expensive, and I doubt Lucy would appreciate it. Ideally, now that I’m looking at this part of the state, I should have stayed on the Sterling Highway until it dead-ended southeast of Anchorage, then taken the ferry across the Prince William Sound to Valdez. That would have saved hundreds of miles of driving. But too late for that now. 

For only having like two actual roads in this entire section of the world, there are endless travel possibilities. And now I’m completely indecisive about where to go next. Definitely east until this section of highway ends, but then… ? I wanted to drive more today, I’ve only gone about 125 miles, but now that I’ve been sitting next to this river for a few hours I can’t imagine finding a better place to spend the night. So I’ll stay here and look for eagles and moose, sleep on the travel thoughts, and maybe wake up with a good plan. 

BTW, these pics are mostly from Homer Spit because… I’m tired.

Denali National Park

August 27, 2026

The Yukon river is the longest free-flowing river in the world while being the world’s longest inland Pacific salmon run (taken from the Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council). Pretty cool. At the Mile 0 campground in Dawson City, I joked with the manager about paying for a campsite with salmon on my way back; he seemed very open to that.

The Yukon begins in British Columbia and southern Yukon and ends in the Bering Sea on the west coast of Alaska, about 1980 miles. The Bering Sea is part of the northern Pacific Ocean, and separates USA from Russia by way of the Bering Strait, which connects the Pacific Ocean to the Arctic Ocean.

And this is not today’s only geography lesson. 

Another nifty fact you may have forgotten from grade-school geography is the location of the 60th parallel, and which other countries share this latitude. And the reason I’m so cold right now. It separates the southern Canadian provinces from the northern, crosses southern Alaska, and crosses Norway, Sweden, Finland, Russia, etc. I am a bit north of it right now, at 63 according to my phone. It was 39 degrees in Tok, AK last night, and Denali has snow in the forecast in a few days.

Nothing that I’m telling you about geography is anything that makes sense to me. As you probably know, I do not have directional sense, and thank god there is only one road for the majority of this trip. I have to park facing the direction I need to go in because I can never remember where I came from. After I camped at Lake Park, with no reception to power my map, I drove up to the highway and had no idea which way to go, being surrounded on all sides by mountains, lakes, rivers, forests. I sat and considered, then turned the wrong way (as I do about 87% of the time). My compass did work this time because I could only be going north or west to get to Alaska, so I U-turned. 

Last fact (but probably not). I mentioned some time ago that I spent the night at a borrow pit. I finally googled it today. A borrow pit is an excavated area where material has been dug for use as fill at another location, per Merriam-Webster. Do only rural people and construction workers know what these are? Anyway, a ditch is a borrow pit because the dirt is used to elevate the road. And the large ones, like the pond I camped near, are often filled with water and reclaimed as a wildlife area. 

The ever-helpful AI asked if I wanted some examples of a borrow pit from the web, and promptly gave me, “Noah was found dead May 16, a day after he was reported missing, in a borrow pit filled with water near his home in Jesup, Georgia…” Super helpful.

August 29, 2026

Today I am in Denali NP, and wow is it amazing. I can’t see Denali due to cloud cover, but the rest of the mountains are out. So here are some fun Denali facts, as long as there is more name change idiocy happening (Lake Ontario will always be Lake Ontario, imo). 

Denali is the highest peak in North America, and it is “Deenaalee” in Koyukon, which means “the high one.” It was called Mt. McKinley in 1896 by a gold prospector (McKinley was president at the time), and adopted by the US in 1917. The name Denali was always used in Alaska, and in 1975 the Alaskan government petitioned for a permanent change. It was denied, of course, because Ohio has always been run by douchebag politicians (birthplace of McKinley). 

Along comes Obama, and while he did not change the name, the Secretary of the Interior did before Obama visited in 2015 (over the protests from Ohio). And the name stayed as Denali, until the 2025 inauguration of our pedophile-in-chief, with executive order 14172, changing it back to Mt. McKinley, because, “President McKinley was responsible for creating a vast sum of money.” Yes, he said that. 

And how did I get to Denali? Through some pretty horrible roads. I mentioned previously that the frost heave section was not that bad, but that’s only because I hadn’t gone far enough. If you have ever driven the road to Polihale, imagine it worse than the worst it’s ever been. The potholes weren’t too bad, but the washboard was intense. I spent a lot of time driving under 10mph so my furniture wouldn’t shake apart. 

I’m about to drive the Denali Highway (not the road that partly runs through the park), and it is only paved for 24 of its 134 miles. It will probably take me all day, and I’m going to get started since I don’t want to be stuck in the mountains at night. 

Have a great day!

Roadtrip to Alaska part 2

I’m not sure where I left off and don’t have enough reception to read my last blog, but rest assured that nothing exciting happened between my last post and Fargo, ND. 

But I would like to mention that Fargo is the only place I have ever been where every single person on the highway obeyed the 55 mph speed limit through downtown. It was a twilight zone moment. 

Fog kept me off the road for a couple of mornings through North Dakota and Montana. The 80 mph speed limit, plus visibility of about 50 yards, was fine for the locals and morning traffic proceeded as normal. But I was fairly freaked out and safely sat out the hours in random parking lots. One morning I was about to head back out after my Wordle game, and the word was “crash.” So no, I took a nap instead.

I hadn’t intended on driving this far west in the US, but wildfire maps showed too much activity above Michigan and Wisconsin, so I accepted an invitation to visit Kari, Keith, Kiara, and Kaz in Rexford, MT. I stopped at Theodore Roosevelt NP to see some bison, of which there were none. So I used the opportunity to figure out how to manually shift the van for the mountain passes. I just got new front brakes, but I’d like them to last for longer than this trip. It rained, rained, and rained from nearly the start of the trip until I got to Rexford. 

In case you’re wondering, Kaz is a dog. He’s a tiny ball of fur who looks like a Huskie, and I know his breed but I’m sitting in Canada and don’t want to waste my data on looking up how to spell it. The K’s have a cool spot on Lake Koocanusa, and we spent a couple days having cocktails on a boat and catching up. 

So fun fact: Keith told me that 90-mile-long Koocanusa lake was named via a naming contest. It is made up of “Koo” (it is in the Kootenai mountains), “can” (half the lake is in Canada), “usa” (half the lake is in US). Clever. The first day, we boated just over the Canadian border and jumped in the water. Just because we could. You may be wondering how they knew where the border was – the forest was clearcut up both sides of the mountains, making a very distinct border marking. 

After a couple days of boating, walking, and badminton, I had to head out to keep (somewhat) to a schedule. My only concern is to get back south before it snows. I know it’s only August, but still. I don’t want to get stuck. 

At the moment, I’m somewhere in the Canadian Rockies, about 250 (kilometers? miles?) south of Banff. I didn’t have reception for a while and lost my maps (and since I never planned to come this far west I didn’t print maps for the area), so I was driving by compass. The mountains all look the same to me, so I couldn’t navigate by sight. But even with my compass, I somehow ended up at a different USA/Canada border crossing than I originally crossed at. I don’t even want to think about how I managed that. 

Banff was never on my travel route, but Lake Louise has always been on my list of places to see, so it’s all good. 

So far I’ve seen an eagle, osprey, mule deer, and one cute garter snake that Lucy thought was quite frightening. It seems like every mile or so I see bear and wildlife warnings, so I hope to report that I’ve seen some big animals next time.