Dream Trip To Yukon and Alaska By Road, To Anywhere Else By Any Means At All

My top 10 links for planning a
Yukon / Alaska trip...

Here are the top ten websites (actually, a few more than 10) that I used for planning my 2006 over-the-road trip to Northern British Columbia, the Yukon Territories, and Alaska.

Use them together with the links on the previous page to make your dream trip to the Far North safer, better, and truly memorable. And check out their links, and you will probably be further ahead of the game than I was!

With only a couple of exceptions (like The Milepost), I’m not including websites that are primarily commercial or corporate-owned, such as sites for cruises, restaurants, hotels, and the like. They are easily accessible by using any internet search engine.

I’d like to make this list better. So, please email me with any recommendations you’d like to make. If you’d like credit, let me know explicitly, and I’ll include your name or initials.

Thanks.

(If you find that any of these links no longer works, please email me and I'll make the needed changes ASAP.)

• TravelAlaska.com, http://travelalaska.com/index.aspx, a very well-designed website offering not only great maps but also up-to-date tourist information. A great place to start planning any trip to Alaska.

• The Alaska Marine Highway System, http://www.dot.state.ak.us/amhs/index.html, presenting all you need to know for using the Alaska Ferries system to get from here to there.

• Alaska State Government Sites, including Travel Advisory Website, http://511.alaska.gov/ (the best single resource for up-to-date road information, and really a whole lot more!), and the wonderful Alaska's Scenic Byways site, http://www.dot.state.ak.us/stwdplng/scenic/index.shtml, with ots great photos and well-written introductions to Alaska's scenic highways.

• National Scenic Byways Program, http://www.byways.org/, for example, page for US 212, Beartooth Highway in Wyoming, http://www.byways.org/explore/byways/2281/stories/47549. As a whole, this website offers you a wonderful collection of America’s most scenic two lane roads, and a whole lot more. This site is a real gem, great for planning a trip anywhere in the entire United States!

• Canada Geographic’s superb interactive website, http://www.canadiangeographic.ca/atlas/intro.aspx?lang=En#, which lets you drill down to see not only geography and places of interest, but also the road system that gets you there. Click on the "Explore The Maps" link at the left side of the page, and then play with every one of the unique map tools this site offers for zooming, panning, measuring distances, and a whole lot more. An absolutely first class planning resource.

• The Canadian Government map atlas website, http://atlas.nrcan.gc.ca/site/english/index.html, which offers free access to a vast collection of maps extremely well-organized to meet your particular needs.

• British Columbia Government road reports, http://www.drivebc.ca/, which offers the same information for British Columbia. Explore the site fully!

• Yukon Territories Government Daily Road Report, http://www.gov.yk.ca/roadreport/, which also contains useful phone numbers. Its layout will cause you to look at road maps – one right there – to learn which named highways go where – and that’s a good thing to know!

• The Milepost website, http://www.themilepost.com./ while clearly focused on selling you The Milepost, shares a long list of links to find out what’s going on in Alaska and the Yukon, including a useful driving distance calculator.

• The Canadian Automotive Directory, http://www.cdnauto.org/, and its province-by-province directories of auto repair shops (Yukon example: http://www.cdnauto.org/provinces/yukon/yukonlist.asp). Explore this site carefully if you’re driving anywhere in Canada: lots of useful, practical information!

Finally, when you actually drive the Alaska Highway and other roads in the Yukon and Alaska, you'll find many free "give-away" printed area guides at motels, hotels, restaurants, gas stations, and convenience stores.

Virtually all of these guides have useful maps, tourist notes, and advertisements offering readers a helpful sense of what's to be seen, found, and had along the route.

Although these guides are commercial ventures and, alas, generally not easily found outside the region, they are good for trip planning.

Without meaning to endorse it in any way, and assuming that there are others on the web, here's a good one for all of the Yukon and Alaska that I recently found on the internet: The Last Great Road Trip Travel Guide, at http://www.thelastgreatroadtrip.com/. Follow the instructions there to download the guide.

Click arrow to read the BMW Car Club of America July, 2007 "Roundel" magazine article about my road trip to the Yukon and Alaska.
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