Driving to Alaska...the ongoing trip report

[AndyBees]

[psych-illogical]

Fantastic! What a great trip it is to the Arctic Ocean. I did it in '05 on my BMW motorcycle and it was truly the trip of a lifetime. My wife and I plan to retire in about a year and I've told her I want to repeat it in our '83 Westy. This report has been truly inspirational. Thanks.
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83 1/2 Westy waterboxer
'57 Beetle-sold
Coupla '81 BMW motorcycles (R80G/S; R100RS)
'96 BMW R1100GS

[HeftySmurf]

I got a chance to stop by and see Dave and Joe while on my way out to Seattle. Cool dudes.....

I am going to start my own Alaska thread pretty soon.....
"My Syncro Sabatacle"

[outwesty]

If you make it down near Bozeman hit me up. I was able to get the van back on the road and have discovered some amazing camp spots around here. Safe travels!

[GWTWTLW]

Travel safe!! If you make it through Portland, we'll covene the gang for a beer.
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89 Syncro Westy - GW 2.5, now with a double knob job
@gwtwtlw

[DAIZEE]

Nice documentaiton and dialoque. Have a good trip home. My trip is going to seem tame after yours to Alaska. I leave for Newfoundland on Monday.
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'09 2.5L Jetta 5 cylinder, 5 spd, super turbo, see thread in H2O Cooled Jetta, etc...
83.5 Vanagon L Riviera Model with 98 1.9L TD AAZ 4 speed Daily Driver 3 out of 4 seasons (sold)
84 Vanagon GL Wolfsburg Westy WBX 4 speed (sold)

[tschroeder0]

Hey all, Just a quick thanks for all the encouragemnet and good thoughts. We have made it through our time here in Fairbanks and will be heading home tomorrow, it's another long trip back down of about 3,300 miles!!

I'll be looking for you all on the road Thanks, Todd/Georgia.

[AndyBees]

Awesome photos of the scenes along the haul road to Prudhoe Bay! We've done the Arctic Circle over in the Yukon all the way to Inuvik! Would love to do the haul road.

Gees Outwesty! As I have previously stated in this thread and others, you must go to Hyder!........... Do they still get Hyderized at the local Motel and Bar there?
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'84 Vanagon Tin-top, ALH TDI. 1989 Tin-top
1983 Air-cool, 225k miles, 180k miles mine. Seven trips to Alaska from 1986 thru 2003.

[GWTWTLW]

All I can say is "WOW". That is an unbelievable journey. Thanks for keeping us up to date.

I cringed when I saw the pic of your tire. That's pretty close to what I pulled off the AW. I'm glad that didnt cause you problems! Shiny side up man!!
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89 Syncro Westy - GW 2.5, now with a double knob job
@gwtwtlw

[outwesty]

Great Pictures you guys! We made it back to Bozeman, MT yesterday. I will have to second that Hyder AK can not be missed. This was the AK we had been looking for. It was our favorite place. Its not a blown out tourist town and the bears are everywhere. If you keep going down the dirt road past town you will eventually come to an old abandon mine. We walked in and had a look, pretty cool. As you are driving the road you will see two tracks all over. You can camp anywhere on them...

Unfortunately we cracked the head yesterday (9,400 miles since leaving G Rap) and I'm stuck in Bozeman. I am trying to find a garage I can rent for a few weeks to repair it. The guy who rebuilt the head is sending me a new one. bummer deal but I'm stoked it happened here and not on the cassiar!

Heres a couple pics to give ya a taste...Eating at the bus is a must....

[VwMomofthree]

Thanks love to see your adventure!

[jerrydog411]

Absolutely Fabulous!! Thanks for sharing.

[tschroeder0]

Hey all. In this part of the journey we went from Fairbanks all the way to the bitter end...Deadhorse and the Arctic Ocean.


Along the way we met fellow travelers/van lovers David and Tiana, who we laughed with and shared some beer and talk of our travels, so much fun and so needed for us to meet some people of like mind. Thanks you both!

We left them at the Arctic circle and continued on through the incredible ever changing landscape. From monolithic monsters of Granite to rivers dissecting in every direction, through the tundra pocked with Caribou, Arctic Fox, and even Muskox!! There is just so much to take in here!

Along the way, and truly, until we returned,, we scared ourselves and learned some great lessons on self sufficiency. We destroyed a tire,bent a rim and also found some great people willing to lend a hand to make sure we got back ok.

The "town" of Deadhorse feels more like a post apocalypse movie set. The town is composed of stackable army barracks type buildings and surrounded by all of the machinery and vehicles necessary to survive in this part of the world.

On the way back home we drove almost the entire way in the rain and mud, more greasy mud than I have ever seen, it reminded me of when I used to motorcycle race in Enduros in the midwest. I don't know if the van will ever recover. It took us 50$ to get the van clean at the car wash!

All that said, I would not have missed this for anything, we both felt it was the best part of the journey so far.


Our trip to the end begins, this is the Yukon River just after the start of the Dalton, btw this is about 10pm

Hey, is that another van?

It turned out to be David (outwesty) funny we had both read a lot of each others posts on the samba, very fun to meet another van guy.

We all decided to camp together at the Arctic Circle so down the road we went, btw David's TDI is a really nice piece of work.

David and Tianna - we made it to the Arctic Circle!

After a "night"(remember the sun is always up) of laughing, and some beers we all said goodbye and promises to try to find each other down the road, Georgia and I headed north for Deadhorse and David and Tianna headed south. Great to meet you both!

About 260 miles from Fairbanks we made it to Coldfoot. The visitors center there was fantastic, but other than that you really got the feeling that you were really out there, and there was even less of "there" ahead.

we made a detour to the gold rush town of Wiseman. A look back in time, log cabins (still being used) and bush plane wings hanging on the sides of garages...even an emergency "phone booth"

phone booth

Back on the road...the semi in the distance gives you the scale...incredible!
[img]http://lh3.ggpht.com/_8qsxI8WnoTI/TDJjq24dQtI/AAAAAAAAAS8
/BtckDU-gY9U/s800/DSC02036.JPG[/img]

The dot down there is a huge moose having some lunch, the trees that look as if the regrowing from a fire are actually "old" trees growing on the permafrost. These trees could be as old as 100yrs!

and just to keep our ego's in check...how about pedaling a bike from Deadhorse to Argentina...yeah!

the ever present pipeline, always makes for a crazy contrast to the natural beauty around it;

and then things changed. The whole time I was worried about gas, as it turned out I never need any, but we had read that carrying two spares was a very good idea...I learned why....again, keep in mind we are 400 miles away from Fairbanks and there are no tow truck, or gas stations or anything around... it'll make you think real hard

The road was so rough I couldn't even tell I had a flat, until it was almost on fire, notice the sweet bent rim,urghhh!

After a bit we were on track and still smiling, we were now up high and the Caribou were there to keep us company

We finally rolled into Deadhorse that evening...nothing to really greet you, not much sign of life happening anywhere, and at the same time it seemed so strange that you just couldn't stop looking around and wondering why and how anyone gets up here....

and finally we went to sleep (wondering if we were going to find another spare) it's about 1am...I haven't seen the darkness now in 3 months.

We took the "tour" into the oil fields and to the Arctic Ocean, It's the only way to actually get to the ocean. Our tour guide was a 25 yo guy who just got out of training to be a security guard. He must have thought that if he turned his mic on that it meant he had to talk. So, most of the tour went something like...
"...um, the guy coming up here is called "big daddy",yeah, we call him that...um, I'm going to be working here for my first anniversary, um, hopefully my wife will be out of nursing school and then I won't have to stay here much longer...um, if that building up there caught on fire, it would probably kill us all..... if I blow my horn make sure you get back fast, it means I saw a Polar Bear...yeah"

We made it anyway

Georgia touches the Arctic ocean Yeah!!!

After that we had to find a tire, and it wasn't easy everyone pointed us to this guy Rick. Rick was one of those guys you dream about when your nervous and think you bit off a bit too much. He found a tire after looking for a long time, straightened my bent rim as best he could and then tried to even find me another tire! All for 40$!!! (we gave him 60 and should have given him more!) Thanks Rick!

When we left it was beautiful for a little while and then the rain came and it never stopped....

Loons on the tundra

This is true; I say" man!, that is so beautiful we should get a picture" Georgia says " I've already got one" and she hold up the post card she bought

the rain came and did not stop.

goodbye Mr. Dalton, thank you for the ride

Hope you all enjoyed this...more to come

[outwesty]

[outwesty]

Looks like we missed each other by a little bit. We are down in skagway now. Got a few turns in down in Valdez yesterday.... If you you head down to the peninsula again there is a cool free camp spot on mile marker 13 of the hope hwy. This is exactly where the bore tides meet. The visitor center has a schedule. safe travels.

[tschroeder0]

Hey Smurf, when you get up here feel free to send us a pm, maybe we can find each other somewhere up here, good luck on the drive up, it sure is beautiful.

[fastwagens]

^^^^ Bad A$$ ^^^^ BTW I am thinking about coming over this weekend.

[HeftySmurf]

Super stoked, leaving in 2 weeks!
Just got a whole new suspension form Burley and Eric.
Also had all the wirring harnesses upgraded (thanks kyle)
Only about 4200 miles one way

[tschroeder0]

Rhinoculips-thanks, it is an amazing place,sooo much to see. Some time in the future it will be a place we will come back to and spend a few weeks hiking,flightseeing etc...Todd.

[Rhinoculips]