RVing to Alaska comes with many challenges, and there are lots of great resources out there for information. We learned a lot on our trip in 2018, and these are some off the wall tips/ideas to help you on your Alaskan RV adventure.
Having reliable cell service throughout this trip is definitely a challenge. There is definitely service when you’re in or around towns and villages from the lower 48 border all the way up and back down, but there are also long stretches between them that are without service of any kind.
Alaska BLM Maps – We boondocked almost exclusively during our Alaska road trip with much of our stays being outside of cell service. We went to the Alaska BLM website, and downloaded all of the maps for BLM lands throughout the state of Alaska to our laptop. Then when we were exploring BLM areas, we had a PDF map with us. Alaska BLM Site: https://www.blm.gov/alaska
Camping spots – We would research places to stay via Allstays or Freecampsites.net when we had internet service, and then screen shot the info card with the GPS coordinates and any special instructions.
Weather – The weather can be a little bi-polar during your journey to the last frontier, almost as sporadic as the cell coverage. When you have cell service, pull up the 10 day forecast for the region you are traveling, and screen shot it with your phone. Then you can look at it whenever you need to, without cell service.
Tourist publications – Anyone planning this adventure, knows about the Milepost, coupon books and a couple of the other RVing to Alaska Publications. Those are all great, but as you are making your way through British Columbia, the Yukon and into Alaska, be on the lookout for more location specific brochures. These are great for digging a little deeper into those local areas. Also, they are usually packed with useful information. A great example is we picked up an RVing to Alaska Newspaper print ad from a rack at a gas station in TOK, and on the last page there was an extensive list of dump stations throughout the state of Alaska, broken down by city and in alphabetic order. Sure we can find all that information on an app, or even in the Milepost, I tore it out of the paper, and folded it up and put in the pocket by the steering wheel making it easily accessible for when we would pull into towns.
Water Filter – We found a backpacking water filter that allowed us to get water from lakes and rivers to fill our tanks and drink. Since our tanks were so small, this allowed us to stay out for extra days.
The Dump Shower – Our RV only had a 43 gallon fresh water capacity, and for a family of 7, that goes quick. So when we would pull into a place to fill our tanks and dump we would fill, dump, shower, fill and dump again before leaving. This way, we were all clean and pulling out with full fresh water tanks, and empty waste tanks.
***The bonus tip – Leisure Centres. Most larger towns in Canada have what they call leisure centers. It’s really no different than in the US, as these Leisure Centres are like YMCA’s, Civic Centers, Rec Centers. The ones we found in Canada on our way up to Alaska included pools, water slides, hot tubs, showers, etc. These were great on longer driving days, we could get out of the RV, burn off some energy, and hit the road clean without wasting any water or using the RV shower. They ranged in price, for a family of 7 we paid anywhere from $12 to $20 Canadian. Wasn’t bad at all! They all had large parking lots, so bringing the RV (27′ class c) was never a problem.
Thanks, Doug, for some interesting and helpful information!