We finally got to do this.
Years of delays.
Then figuring out how to get the time off.
Planning.
More planning.
And then there was the money aspect.
Once all of these were set, we drove to Alaska.
It has always been a dream of Charlene to see Alaska. This seemed to be an unattainable goal for her, that is, until she met me, and we both discovered the joy of travelling. Alaska became our mutual goal.
The problem we had was threefold: time, distance and money.
Time was one issue that was very hard to factor in. A straight drive from our house to Alaska is over 70 hours. Even with the heaviest lead foot, driving takes a lot of time. If I did 10 hours daily, that is one week there and one week back. Something that can be done, but it would have been exhausting for a vacation.
The distance was the second problem. At the farthest, we are a long way from home. Even at the halfway point, there would still be a lot of distance to travel.
Money was the third inhibitor. Gas, food, lodging, admission, souvenirs, and whatever else would be expensive, and neither one of us would be working at the time to pay for this. We were going to have to save a lot of money.
A few years back, things began to work out in our favour for a trip to Alaska. I had spent decades of my life disabled and unable to work. That changed when I had surgery and found a decent-paying job. I was able to start contributing to the household wealth. This included saving money for vacations, big and small.
But having a job made time more of an issue than before. I couldn’t just leave whenever I wanted. It doesn’t work that way. I would only have two weeks of vacation time per year, and Charlene would earn almost six weeks each year. It would be easier for her to get the time off than for me.
Money is a factor in everything in life. This vacation was going to be expensive. I was able to employ several tactics to lessen the cost of driving far. When we first started travelling, it was exclusively with hotels/motels. The price would add up quickly, limiting how far and how often we could go out and see the world. Then we discovered tents. At first, there was a lot of hesitation about sleeping outside and the initial expense of getting everything we needed, but even that worked in our favour. My daughter had a tent she wasn’t using, and I set it up one day as a “proof of concept” to my wife that we could do this. Charlene agreed, and now tenting is our preferred method of staying over. The price of one night at a motel would equal one week of camping. Plus, camping isn’t gross. If there is even the smallest amount of dirt or garbage in a motel, it s disgusting. But at a campground, that is all part of the experience. After all, travel is all about the experience.
Things worked in favour of a big trip to Alaska. I began planning a 28-day round trip to Seward, Alaska and back. It was attainable, affordable, possible, achievable and wonderful.
COVID-19.
Don’t get me started on COVID-19.
Possibly the stupidest, maddest, craziest time in human history. Rules, regulations, and restrictions of all kinds. Some even contradicted each other. One of the dumbest was that it was acceptable to go shopping, but to go outside and walk in a park, you could actually go to jail.
Travel plans stopped.
Travel plans would be affected for three years as society allowed itself to be ruled by restrictions that made little sense.
Even when travel was open, so many of the places we visit are run by volunteers. These locations could not open because they lost their volunteer base and needed someone to provide tours, maintain the property and the other necessities of running an attraction.
It would only be in the summer of 2023 that things had essentially returned to normal, and travel through the country and in between countries was allowed. Attractions still had employee/volunteer shortages, but at least they were now open.
One day, as we were visiting my parents and we talked about one of our main themes: Travel. Alaska would always pop up. I stated why don’t we go this summer? Why wait anymore?
Charlene did stare at me in disbelief.
I assured her I would work on a plan and budget to prove it would be feasible. As soon as I got home, and every evening after work for two weeks, I formulated an itinerary, a budget and maps of where we would go. I converted the four-week trek to a six-week journey that included returning through the USA.
It was agreed. We are going to Alaska!
Money was saved. Our little weekend trips were reduced. I started booking what needed to be booked. I was buying what needed to be bought and fretted repeatedly, making sure everything would run smoothly on our upcoming trip.
The date was July 1. The wake-up time was 1:45 AM! That was the plan.
Unfortunately, it was four months away still. Oh, the time moved so slowly. I would go over my itinerary again to add a few more stops because I thought my last week was too rushed. I even had a countdown timer on the phone to obsess that way.
And to my surprise, it became June 30th.
In disbelief that it was time to go, I went to bed super early. Set the alarm for the ungodly time of 1:45 and fell asleep.
The alarm goes off, and we are in the car.
We are doing it!
Alaska was only 18 days away, but we were on the way. Nothing was going to stop us now.
20-Foot Tall Guy- Paul Treefall
Our first stop would be High Rock Lookout Park. This would be our first time attempting to see the sunrise. We have seen so many sunsets but never a sunrise. We would arrive at the location, being the only ones there; after all, it was not even 6:00 AM yet, and our first mini-disaster. The sun was rising behind a hill, so we could not watch this event. The park was nice and still. Haze filled the view because of the record number of forest fires polluting the atmosphere. We would leave the place and then, at a flat spot, see the sun rising. It was like a sunset, in reverse.
According to my itinerary, we were to see Wasi Rapids and Black Forest Park. I changed that plan because we took my mother to those places a couple of weeks earlier, and I had already printed off the itinerary at Staples. Instead, we would hike through Laurier Woods Conservation Area in North Bay.
Arctic Watershed
I had crushed the nerves in my feet at my job. It was getting to the point that walking was becoming difficult. I had seen the doctor a week prior and feared that I would be considering cancelling this trip because my feet were just suffering. He told me that uneven surfaces would be good for my healing. He was right. I have spent over a year on hard concrete floors with hard steel-toed shoes. Walking on dirt, mud, rock, and roots was an instant relief. I can not even begin to describe the freedom from pain and numbness that I was experiencing. This one hike assured me that I did not make a mistake in sticking to the plan. It would take a month of healing for me to undo 18 months of damage from working.
Fauquier-Strickland Heritage Park
Elated that I could feel my feet, we continued our journey. We were adding stops if time allowed. We were removing stops because they were closed. And we were driving a lengthy distance. On day one, I wanted to have a healthy lead to Alaska and drive along the entire length of Highway 11 on Ontario.
Fushimi Lake Provincial Park would be our final stop of the day, and it was beautiful. When I started planning the Alaska trip, I saw that a lake-side campsite was available and immediately booked it. When we got there, it was as stunning as I had hoped. This location became my all-time favourite place to be. Too bad that it was only for one day.
Here is a summary of what we did:
- High Rock Lookout
- Laurier Woods Conservation Area
- Black Forest Park
- Marten River Pickerel
- Arctic/Atlantic Watershed
- 20-Foot Tall Guy-Paul Treefall
- 49th Parallel Park
- Fauquier-Strickland Heritage Park
- Moonbeam UFO
- Kapuskasing Cenotaph
- Kapuskasing Internment Cemetery
- Reesor Siding Memorial
- Voyageur at Missinaibi River
- Moose and Wolves statue in Hearst
- Our Veterans Park
- Fushimi Lake Provincial Park
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- To find this and all the other locations we have visited, check out Featured Map for directions on how to get here.
- To see the original map of our Alaska trip, click here. Some of the places we could not go to (for various reasons), and some areas we added which are not included in this map. To see those, click on the Featured Map.
- The original itinerary for this trip can be seen here.
