Finish my Alaska adventure
47 days away from home
13682 miles driven
states & province visited = CO, UT, WY, ID, MT, AB, BC, YT, AK, WA, OR, CA, NV, AZ
parks visited = Arches, Grand Tetons, Yellowstone, Glacier, Banff, Jasper, Denali, Chugach, Wrangler-St Elias, North Cascade, Olympic, St Hellens, Redwoods, Yosemite, Death Valley, Zion

daily log here (might of missed a few things, but got most of it)
Alaska 2014

Not sure how much I spent on gas, food, hotels or other stuff, not planning to add it up. I will say that I used my bank card the most and my credit cards are paid off, except for my last couple of hotel stays and cost. by looking at my account, it is down around $3000

Having my sister & brother in law along for part of it helped a lot on the cost. Camping also lowered the cost a lot, most camping was $12.00-25.00, high side being RV sites.
Over the last month, I have avg 17.5MPG, which is good pulling the trailer and some of the roads I was on.
A friend was talking about doing this trip on bikes in 3 years, but most big dual purpose bikes get around 45mpg when loaded on a trip like this, so with 2 people splitting the cost, my JK would equal to about 35mpg for each person, or 52.5mpg if there where 3 people sharing the cost and we could have just about everything we need. So the bike would be because you want to do it.

The trailer took a beating, I know there where times, the tires where a foot or more off the ground. I know it would of been impossible to do the trip without it. I had too much stuff. I have worn holes in my chair bags, my mattress bags, the paint has been worn off on parts of the inside of the trailer. The Yeti did a great job, I used block ice if I could get it, but being exposed to the sun, when through ice faster than I thought it would. part of that was keeping the stuff above the ice cold (eggs, lunch meat, cheese). The roads also beat up the stuff in the cooler, had eggs break, cans get puncture by ice, beer bottle cap start to come of.

Also noticed the JK worked hard pulling some hills, going through Death Valley, there is a hill they advice that you turn off your A/C for the next 10 miles, about 6 miles into the hill, the Jk went into a safe mode, the engine would not rev over 4000 rpm and the temp gauge was at 3/4 and holding there. The temps came down quickly after topping the hill. The engine temps did go up pulling hills before this, but this was the first time it would not rev higher than 4000 rpm's.

The Jeep GPS was not worth the cost, many times it was not sure where I was. The map is over 18 months old and Jeep says it is the latest map. Going through WY, the map did not even show the Snake River, going out of Reno, I was on a 6 lane highway that the GPS had me in the middle of a field, it took me down dead end roads, told me to turn where there where no roads, so have a better GPS system or just use maps. Sirius stopped working continuously somewhere around Whitehorse, YT, it would fade in and out, so it was good I had a iPod along.


all the pictures are up 632 of them, so some didn't load over the last 45 days

http://s1371.photobucket.com/user/co...?sort=3&page=1

 

Awesome trip. I hope to do something similar in 2016. Pic link didn't work, BTW.

 

Here is The Vaughn Family Adventure Episode 3!! Check it out, I should have at least 3 more episodes to make to cover all the places wee were.

http://youtu.be/g7o2BwXykb0

 

hope this works

coop2014's Library | Photobucket

 

I did that Alaska trip from Dallas tx to Fairbanks Alaska on a honda 750, loved every second of it. Doing it in a jeep would be great having all that extra space, but there's something to be said about doing it with only what can fit in a backpack. We did 9500 miles in 22 days and only stayed in hotels for 3 nights. The rest we camped in city parks and dirt cheap campsites when we needed a shower. Upside to doing it in a jeep - your exhaust won't catch your saddle bags on fire... I'm jealous of your journey

 

It does. And I'm going to admit scrolling pretty quickly through so many photos. I hope that you pick out a few dozen of the best and repost here on JKF, along with explanations of what we're seeing. But, looks like an incredible experience!

 

Would love to have one of these trailers, very nice!!!

 

I think doing the trip on a bike would be fun. My main concern would be the muddy roads that you might have to travel. Meet 3 guys doing the haul road on street bike & a trike, they where working a lot to control the bike and then a heavy rain came.
It was nice having all the equipment we needed and that allowed my older sister to do part of the trip too.

 

top of the world highway

Dalton Highway

JK & trailer after the Dalton Highway

move 400,000lbs on the Dalton Highway

my favorite pick, might a second posting

 

Across the Cook Inlet

A landing in Homer

In flight by Vadez

Eagle tree??? Vadez

Sea Otter Vadez