Below right: The Alaska Range reflects in Summit Lake (3210 feet elevation) on the Richardson Highway.

Suggested Alaska Itinerary:

• If you have 1 week: A great way to see Alaska in a short visit is to fly to Anchorage, rent a camper or RV, and drive for a week or more (about 600+ miles) to see everything on the Kenai Peninsula, which is a great microcosm of Alaska.
  • I highly recommend the Phillips 26-Glacier College Fjord Cruise, which we booked one day in advance.
  • If the weather is good, flightsee the amazing glacial wilderness over Denali from Talkeetna or Anchorage Airport.
  • Instead of renting an RV, many people enjoy taking the Alaska Railroad train which connects Anchorage to Kenai Peninsula, Denali National Park, and Fairbanks.
• If you have 2 to 3 weeks: Do the above, and add a ~1200+ mile driving loop seeing Valdez, Fairbanks, & Denali National Park (red tundra fall colors in Denali reach their peak from the end of August to early September, ~350 miles one way from Anchorage). 
  • I recommend booking a side trip (off the Richardson Highway) to visit McCarthy and Kennecott Mines National Historic Landmark (use the Kennecott Shuttle to avoid 120 miles round trip on a rough potholed road; although the road has improved over the years).
• If you have 3 to 4 weeks (same as above except spend more time for hiking, relaxing, and sidetrips).
• Alaska Time Zone = Seattle (or Pacific Time Zone) minus one hour.

Camper, Motorhome or RV Rental:

Traveling with a pickup camper or RV has distinct advantages over tenting or lodging, if your goal is to experience the great Alaskan outdoors:

• Car + Tenting is the cheapest way to see Alaska. However, Alaska is a bit too rainy & buggy to sleep in a tent regularly (unless you are young or hardy). Tents are very exposed to the whims of weather.
• Car + Lodging:
  • Car plus lodging costs about as much as renting an RV.
  • Disadvantages of staying in hotels/accommodation:
    • Lodging often must be reserved well in advance in popular areas of Alaska.
    • Lodging can be scarce in the beautiful areas where you may most want to experience nature, whereas RV camping or overnight parking areas are much more plentiful.
  • Advantages of camping:
    • Campground slots are very much easier to obtain spontaneously compared to finding open lodging. The only campgrounds we needed to reserve ( during our trip August 15 to September 8, 2006 ) were Teklanika (RV) and Wonder Lake (tent) in Denali NP.
    • Camping puts you in closer contact with nature than a hotel room. An RV is just as comfortable, and more convenient, than a hotel room.
    • Once you unpack your luggage into an RV, you don’t need to lug around your belongings for the rest of the trip.
• Pickup Camper or RV:
  • A pickup mounted with a camper shell will take you over rougher roads to more places than a motorhome or RV.
  • A pickup camper gets much better gas mileage than an RV, but its daily rental rate can be higher than a small RV. The net cost may end up about the same for pickup camper versus RV, even in the off season.
    • Save 20 to 30% on your motorhome RV rental by renting before or after high season, which runs from about July 1 to August 15.
    • As priced in 2006, pickup campers offered no off-season price savings.
  • ClippershipMotorhomes.com gave us an excellent value RV rental in 2006: 
    • Clippership Motorhomes gives free airport pick up (907) 562-7051 or 800-421-3456. 8-5 pm every day.
    • 20 or 22-foot Economy Class $2200 for 24 days August 15 – September 8, 2006 = $90/day plus gas (includes 8% MOA tax & 3% state tax), 2400 free miles then $.15/mile; housekeeping package $15 each. Reserve with deposit $250, then upon arrival pay $250 more deposit.  All gravel roads are prohibited, though you can of course drive into gravelled campgrounds or short access roads. It only gets 9 miles per gallon of gasoline or less. Ouch!
    • Includes: Sheets, blankets, pillows, towels, pots and pans, knife, fork and spoon for each traveler, pancake turner, measuring cup, baking pan, scrubber, cooking spoons, can opener, grater, colander, paring knife, butcher knife, coffee pot, mixing bowls, pot holders, cutting board, potato peeler, broom, dust pan, water hose, level, trash can and instruction manual. Add the convenient HOUSEKEEPING PACKAGE: $15.00 per person: dishes, glasses, pitcher, kitchen towel, dish cloth, first aid kit, dish soap, paper towels, toilet paper, bath soap, toilet chemical, matches and hangers.
• Fly to Alaska + Rent a Vehicle:
  • Flying to Anchorage and picking up your reserved vehicle saves at least 4000 miles of driving time & expense getting to Alaska from the Lower 48 States.
  • We cashed in Northwest Airline miles for free flights to Anchorage, where we rented an RV for 24 days (August 15 to September 8), which plunged us directly into the big Alaskan scenery, while avoiding two weeks of extra driving round trip from Seattle.
    • Seattle to Anchorage is 5000 miles round trip. Driving to the first Alaskan town of Tok would take 4000 miles round trip, which would have added two weeks of steady driving, campground & food expenses, plus wear and tear on our own vehicle.
    • Although the Alaskan Highway is a famous journey, much of the drive is actually monotonous forest. The time and expense saved (for not driving 4000 miles round trip to Tok) easily pays for renting an RV for a significant block of vacation time. The break even point may be 1 to 3 weeks RV rental. Driving your own vehicle from the Lower 48 can be worthwhile if staying more than a month.
• Southeast Alaska travel tip: 
  • On a future trip to Southeast Alaska, which is significantly closer to Seattle than Anchorage, we plan to drive our own camper to Prince Rupert, Canada, from where we will ride the ferries (without our vehicle) to Juneau and back to Prince Rupert. (Bringing a car on the ferry would cost $800+ and require reservations 4-6 months in advance.) With our savings from not bringing a car, we can flexibly rent cars or take public transportation along the ferry routes. We can board ferries more spontaneously as passengers without a car. Locals say April/May has the best weather and fewer tourists.

Right: Female moose with two calves at Eagle Creek Campground, on the Glenn Highway, Milepost 11.6 from Anchorage.

Weather/When to visit:

• May 10 to September 15 is generally a good time to visit most parts of Alaska.
• Long daylight: June 21 is the longest day of the year, with 19 hours of daylight in Anchorage, 22 in Fairbanks, and 18 in Southeast Alaska. Any time between Spring and Fall equinoxes, the days are significantly longer in Alaska than at lower latitudes.
• Peak tourist season is mid-June to mid-August. Before and after that are “shoulder season” discounts 10 – 25% at some hotels and tour operators.
• Hiking season: Snow in high country or Arctic regions does not melt until about late June. June is “post-hole” season, so named for walking through melting patchy snow.
• Fall colors: Peak fall colors of the red tundra in Denali are late August to early September. On the Kenai Peninsula, aspen tree yellow & gold leaf fall colors usually peak September 15-18th, a few days after Denali National Park. The Glenn Highway (from Anchorage to Glennallen) has great gold aspens against rugged mountain background. Just a few days after Kenai comes the Anchorage area’s yellow color peak, which is the last turning of leaf colors in south-central Alaska.
• May is generally drier in Alaska, with about a 25% chance of measurable rain on the average day. Alaska gets rainier as the summer progresses. By August, the chance of rain increases to about 50% on a given day.
• Climate zones:
  • The rainiest areas are on the ocean side of the mountain ranges.
  • In south-central Alaska‘s summer (such as in Anchorage & Homer), expect rain one third of the time, cloudy one third, and sunny one third. Peak mosquito season is the end of June and the first part of July in marshy lowlands, but no problem on breezy alpine ridges. Bugs are no problem after late July. South-central Alaska has 70% of the state’s population, the most roads and the most hiking trails. The varied climate transitions from the mild and wet southern coast, to the colder and drier interior to the north.
  • Fairbanks and the interior north of the Alaska Range have significantly sunnier weather than further south. The snow melts faster in the interior in Spring than in south-central Alaska. Early summer season has thunderstorms and forest fires. The interior of Alaska has more mosquitoes than south-central Alaska, starting in mid-June, but the bugs die away after the first frosts in late July. The best hiking is in the Alaska Range and the Yukon-Tanana uplands near Fairbanks.
  • Southeast Alaska (Juneau to Ketchikan) is the rainiest area in Alaska (with local variability). Locals say April/May has the best weather with the least rain (and fewer tourists).
  • Southwest Alaska (including Katmai National Park) is wet and windy, and stretches 1400 miles down the Alaska Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands.
• Weather Radio: When traveling in Alaska, check weather forecasts frequently, such as by using an inexpensive NOAA weather radio, which is built into many 5-to-10-mile “walkie talkie” style radios. Or check weather on the internet. By checking the NOAA radio’s two-day weather forecast (which is surprisingly accurate if you check the latest update every 6 hours), we were able to book spectacular sunny days for our 26-Glacier College Fjord Cruise, and for our flightseeing trip over Denali starting at Talkeetna.
• Keep your schedule flexible: Near the end of August 2006 (the beginning of our trip), a steady downpour washed out a critical section of the Parks Highway from Anchorage to Denali for 2.5 days. By reversing our planned route, the road was fixed by the time we looped through.

Bring to Alaska:

• A NOAA weather radio (such as found in walkie talkies with 8+ mile range) or internet connection for the latest 2-day weather forecast. The most recent forecast is critical for hikers and backpackers, and is surprisingly accurate for 1-2 days out. NOAA weather radio reception is available within about 10 or 15 miles of main cities.
• compass
• binoculars for wildlife viewing
• Sleep mask – even on September 1, skies are surprisingly light for 16 hours in Anchorage!
• If mosquitoes concern you, complete your trip before they hatch in mid-June, or visit the last week in July or later when the first night frosts eliminate most insect problems. If visiting during mosquito season (mid-June to mid-July), bring DEET, which is the only proven repellent.
• Motion sickness remedy (a prescription patch works best) for sea & air (we didn’t need it).
• If camping overnight at Wonder Lake or elsewhere, bring camping gear: tent, stove, pots, sleeping bag, pad, backpack, safety matches, etc.
• Hiking books:
  • 55 ways to the Wilderness in South Central Alaska, published 2002 by the Mountaineers Books. Excellent details on the best 55 hikes within about 4 hours drive of Anchorage.
  • Hiking Alaska, by Dean Littlepage, A Falcon Guide published 1997 by The Globe Pequot Press. This book is a helpful overview of the best hikes throughout Alaska.

Above: Mt. McKinley / Denali (20,320 ft) seen from the Denali Park Road near Eielson Visitor Center, accessible only by bus.  The friendly shuttle driver will stop most anywhere upon request to let riders out for photographs.
     Mt. McKinley is only visible 1 out of 3 days. Rain falls half of the summer days, as light showers or drizzle. The least cloudy time is early morning, which requires overnight tenting at Wonder Lake (because even the earliest shuttle bus doesn’t reach Denali views until mid morning).  I was lucky to see Denali on five different days during a relatively sunny week, August 27 – Sept 3, 2006.  Photography is best on Denali National Park’s road at early or late daylight hours since Denali is backlit much of the afternoon (but it is nicely front lit from Denali State Park, which is closer to Anchorage, on the publicly accessible Parks Highway). 

Alaska Index for Photoseek.com: pages 1 ~ 2 ~ 3 ~ Alaska map ~ Travel tips

• Alaskan animals: Brown Bear (Grizzly) , Polar Bear , Moose , Musk Ox , Mountain Goat , Dall Sheep , Caribou vs Reindeer , Snowy Owl , Sandhill Crane , Kittiwake Rookery , Tufted Puffins , Steller Sea Lion , Anenomes
• Page 1: Anchorage & Glenn Highway: Knik Glacier , Matanuska Glacier ; Kenai Peninsula: Whittier ( College & Harriman Fjords , Prince William Sound , Portage Glacier ) ; Seward ( Alaska Sealife Center ) & Kenai Fjords NP ( Exit Glacier , Aialik Glacier ) ; Russian Churches ; Homer
• Page 2: Mount McKinley / Denali National Park ( Flightseeing , Northern Lights , Husky Sled Dogs ) ; Talkeetna , Denali State Park , Fall Colors & Patterns
• Page 3: Richardson Highway, Valdez to Fairbanks : Worthington Glacier , Wrangell-St. Elias NP ( McCarthy , Kennecott Mines NHL , Copper River ) Trans-Alaska Pipeline , Alaska Range
• Click here to view slide show (August 15 – September 8, 2006).

Map of our 2006 RV driving trip, about 2300 miles: