Thinking of heading to Alaska for two weeks in September with the other half. I’ve never been before but somewhere thats always interested me.

Any advice for a route? Any must see/do’s?

Is hiring a car the best way to travel around?

What sort of weather should we expect? I imagine it has the potential to get pretty wet.

At the moment I’m thinking either fly into Anchorage or Fairbanks, both of these are around the same cost currently but am open to other suggestions if they are also similar cost.

Any advice much appreciated.

Day light hours and temps might be going a bit south by September. Worth checking though. Distances are massive, and car is king.

Why not go a bit later and see Alaska in the snow? Then, if you go to Fairbanks you could visit Cheena Valley Hot Springs and swim outdoors at -40 or so, go downhill skiing on moose mountain and do some xc skiing on the university trails. Not to mention the northern lights, ski mobiles, huskies etc etc.

We went years ago, flew to Vancouver for a few days then up to Prince Rupert where we caught state ferry to Juneau. Eventually left Alaska for Whitehorse via Skagway and the Whitepass railway.

Ferry was excellent..cheap as chips at the time, same route through inside passage that the cruise liners go and at a fraction of the price. Free whale watching. Ended up getting tiny light aircraft … Effectively air taxis but to a schedule to Skagway and Gustavus from Juneau for a Glacier Bay trip. Air travel in Alaska was surprisingly cheap and an experience in its own right. However that was all down in the panhandle..we never ventured further north as not enough time…..and info probably out of date now.

13 years ago I kayaked from Vancouver to Juneau via the inside and outside passages, crossing into Alaska and the US a day out of Prince Rupert near the Boston islands. When we got to Juneau we got a ferry to Skagway then hired a car and drove north and did the arctic highway across alaska, the yukon and up to the Arctic circle on the Inuvik Road – The Dempster Highway. It was truly awesome, the enormity of the land is the only thing I remember – tourist attractions are unnecessary although the remnants of the goldrush were a surprising point of interest.

Everything is miles away. The roads are gravel so don’t be surprised when the windscreen gets chipped and all the paint is stripped of the wheel arches and bonnet! Also other drivers think nothing of 70mph on a dirt road as you pootle along at 35!The guy we hired off was not fussed about the damage but we spent a nervous few days worrying about excesses! There are lots of proper camping areas but you need to be clued up on Bears. Bears! They are everywhere. And Moose. Didn’t see caribou sadly. I would definitely recommend the Ferry trip along the coast, at the time you could sleep on the deck watching the northern lights behind you. Which we did! After 63 days kayaking I had already seen more whales orcas sealions sea otters and sea eagles than I could shake a stick at so I was a bit blase’ by then, even so the wildlife was amazing and the captain would divert or point out ‘humpbacks off the starboard bow!’

I was there mid to late august, it was warm and plenty light. On the coast expect rain and the bugs from hell. Inland I dont remember any, maybe I was used to them by then. Oh and did I mention bears? If you can get a chance to visit annan cove you can watch bears 6 feet away feeding on the running salmon. They are wandering around in the forest next to the creek and jumping in the waterfall after the fish, Attenborough style. You are right next to them, no fence or protection. They are completely obsessed by the salmon so not interested in you. Apparently 😯

Alternatively you could spend your holiday learning this. Think I managed four verses!

The Cremation of Sam McGee
BY ROBERT W. SERVICE

There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.

Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows.
Why he left his home in the South to roam ’round the Pole, God only knows.
He was always cold, but the land of gold seemed to hold him like a spell;
Though he’d often say in his homely way that “he’d sooner live in hell.”

On a Christmas Day we were mushing our way over the Dawson trail.
Talk of your cold! through the parka’s fold it stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we’d close, then the lashes froze till sometimes we couldn’t see;
It wasn’t much fun, but the only one to whimper was Sam McGee.

And that very night, as we lay packed tight in our robes beneath the snow,
And the dogs were fed, and the stars o’erhead were dancing heel and toe,
He turned to me, and “Cap,” says he, “I’ll cash in this trip, I guess;
And if I do, I’m asking that you won’t refuse my last request.”

Well, he seemed so low that I couldn’t say no; then he says with a sort of moan:
“It’s the cursèd cold, and it’s got right hold till I’m chilled clean through to the bone.
Yet ’tain’t being dead—it’s my awful dread of the icy grave that pains;
So I want you to swear that, foul or fair, you’ll cremate my last remains.”

A pal’s last need is a thing to heed, so I swore I would not fail;
And we started on at the streak of dawn; but God! he looked ghastly pale.
He crouched on the sleigh, and he raved all day of his home in Tennessee;
And before nightfall a corpse was all that was left of Sam McGee.

There wasn’t a breath in that land of death, and I hurried, horror-driven,
With a corpse half hid that I couldn’t get rid, because of a promise given;
It was lashed to the sleigh, and it seemed to say: “You may tax your brawn and brains,
But you promised true, and it’s up to you to cremate those last remains.”

Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code.
In the days to come, though my lips were dumb, in my heart how I cursed that load.
In the long, long night, by the lone firelight, while the huskies, round in a ring,
Howled out their woes to the homeless snows— O God! how I loathed the thing.

And every day that quiet clay seemed to heavy and heavier grow;
And on I went, though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low;
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
And I’d often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin.

Till I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge, and a derelict there lay;
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice it was called the “Alice May.”
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit, and I looked at my frozen chum;
Then “Here,” said I, with a sudden cry, “is my cre-ma-tor-eum.”

Some planks I tore from the cabin floor, and I lit the boiler fire;
Some coal I found that was lying around, and I heaped the fuel higher;
The flames just soared, and the furnace roared—such a blaze you seldom see;
And I burrowed a hole in the glowing coal, and I stuffed in Sam McGee.

Then I made a hike, for I didn’t like to hear him sizzle so;
And the heavens scowled, and the huskies howled, and the wind began to blow.
It was icy cold, but the hot sweat rolled down my cheeks, and I don’t know why;
And the greasy smoke in an inky cloak went streaking down the sky.

I do not know how long in the snow I wrestled with grisly fear;
But the stars came out and they danced about ere again I ventured near;
I was sick with dread, but I bravely said: “I’ll just take a peep inside.
I guess he’s cooked, and it’s time I looked”; … then the door I opened wide.

And there sat Sam, looking cool and calm, in the heart of the furnace roar;
And he wore a smile you could see a mile, and he said: “Please close that door.
It’s fine in here, but I greatly fear you’ll let in the cold and storm—
Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it’s the first time I’ve been warm.”

There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.