Advice for a Winter Camping Trip on the Alcan Highway

Before we planned our winter RV trip up and down the Alcan Highway, we availed ourselves of blogs and videos of other travelers.  They were very helpful in many ways.  HOWEVER, since there are so few detailed reports of travel in the winter, I hope that our experience (which was very positive) will help fill that void.

Based on our experience, I have penned three related articles.

This article provides comments about weather, road conditions, fuel, communications, supplies, and prices.  A second article (link) outlines our itinerary and describes where we camped.  A third (link) focuses on the travel aspects of bringing a dog in an RV across national borders and for 65 days.

I welcome your comments beneath this blog or write me through my email, listed on my home page.

WEATHER:

Temperatures:

The lowest daytime temperature (on March 1) was 0 F in the Copper River Valley.  Temperatures were below freezing both night and day except for a balmy 42 F at Liard Hot Springs in Yukon (with snowy berms around each campsite).     Heading north in late April, we awoke to temperatures 28 – 34 F many mornings.  Temperatures rose quickly on sunny days, to a high of 61 near Chetwynd, but most days were overcast and topped out in the mid- 40’s.

Snow:

This was a low snow year for Southcentral Alaska (the latitude of Anchorage) as well as Yukon Territory, British Columbia, and Alberta, Canada, through which we traveled to cross the border into Montana, USA.  For people not from this part of the country, though, let me clarify.  We routinely have 4 – 8 feet of snow on the ground in my part of Alaska and Yukon.  On this trip, where I walked into the snow off the road, it was 18 inches to 2 feet deep. Snow berms around parking lots were 3 – 4 feet high.  Naturally, both were higher and deeper in the higher elevations and receded to brown grass with patches of snow at the southern end of the route, around Dawson Creek and Ft Nelson.   

We did not encounter any icy conditions the whole way.  We did drive through short blizzards in steep terrain near Banff (beyond the Alcan).

Road condition:  We drove with studded tires.  The Alcan was well plowed, including frequent rest stops with dumpsters (sometimes locked) and pit toilet bathrooms (often locked) for the season.  Yukon Territory had the most frequent of these rest stops, often occupied by long haul trucks.  Roads were very good EXCEPT for two hours of infamous washboard conditions on either side of the Alaska/Canada border, but primarily on the Canadian side.  GO SLOW!  Here the road is laid over bogs that were considered the most challenging section of construction back in 1942 when soldiers worked in arduous conditions for 10 months to build this road.    (I definitely recommend that anyone read the history of this engineering feat.)

WILD ANIMALS

One of the treats of driving the Alcan is seeing lots of wild mammals.  We saw wild horses, bears (in late April), and lots of bison, sheep, and caribou on either side of the road.  We saw one dead bison, but no road kill and no vehicular accidents with animals.   A logical piece of advice is to avoid driving this dark, remote, and animal-traveled highway at night.

SEASONAL DIFFERENCES = CLOSED CAMPGROUNDS: 

The winter season makes a big difference in where you can spend the night. MOST campgrounds, public and private, are CLOSED from sometime in October to sometime in May.  Of these, some are gated and locked.  Others may be accessed by long, narrow dirt roads that are simply not plowed and therefore inappropriately deep for campers and camping vehicles.  This means that travelers should be prepared to dry camp (not plug into someone else’s power supply) in winter.  Campgrounds and day use parking lots that service winter sports, like cross country skiing and snowmachining, were more likely than others to be open and plowed.  In April, campgrounds that offer boat docks tend to open earlier (‘as soon as the snow is gone”) than those that do not.

Similarly, many of the highway adjacent motels are closed for the season (usually Oct – May), and with them, their gas pumps, water hoses, and dump sites.  We passed a lot of derelict motels and lodges that were moldering away.  Call ahead if you wish to sleep in a commercial bed. Even in northern cities with winter-open RV camps, dumpsites and water hoses were usually turned off until the temperatures warm up.  This means that travelers should be prepared to drive hundreds of km (through Canada) without outside sources of gasoline or water.  I think the longest stretch we noticed was 300 km.  We traveled with an extra 5 gallons of diesel and 10 gallons of water (We did not fill our camper’s water tank until the coldest temperatures were above 25 degrees.).   Note:  Milepost may identify motels, restaurants, and gas stations that DO EXIST but are NOT OPEN half the year.

FUEL PRICES:

Fuel prices vary dramatically.  Canada charged MUCH more for gas and diesel than the USA.  Probably 3x as much.  The most we paid along the Alcan was C$2.09 per LITER at Pink Mountain.  US prices close to the border were about $3.60/GALLON.  Chevron was routinely the MOST expensive in any locale.

I highly recommend loading the apps Gas Buddy and/or Gas Guru before departure.  With them, you can search for gas prices by your current location or for a target location.  Recent price confirmation is time stamped.  Prices routinely vary by up to $.50/gallon in the US and less per liter in Canada, within the space of 2 miles on/off the highway.  For a 10,000 mile trip, these savings added up to expenditures on purchases we valued more.   

Propane prices varied widely, too.  The most common price range was $21 – 28/20 lb tank.  To help the propane last longer, turn your water heater on only in advance of doing dishes or taking a shower and then turn it off right afterward.  For us, this took about 20 minutes.

COMMUNICATIONS:

Telephony and Internet: Because of the remoteness and the mountainous terrain as well as the absence of open visitors’ centers and motels, internet and telephone may not work for hours at a time or at your selected stop for the night. We had Verizon as our telephone provider and we newly bought Starlink for this trip.  Both worked some of the time.  Neither was consistently reliable along this route.  

Starlink:  We had a tough time getting Starlink up and going because of limited technical support by the company.  BE PATIENT.  We thought that by plugging in and connecting through WiFI, all would work immediately.  No.  It sometimes took up to 30 minutes for the satellite to sync.  Starlink is not kidding when it says you need access to open skies.  Trees impede service.  We learned to move farther away from the trees and camper.  Some people report that Starlink does not work in a moving vehicle.  We disagree.  Over the course of thousands of active driving miles, Starlink worked, sometimes.  We have connected Starlink to our cigarette lighter in the truck and left it pointing out the window all night long.  It sips power and did not drain the battery.  In long stretches of Nevada desert, we pointed the antenna out through the window which gave us intermittent Internet as we drove.  You might want to test a different antenna configuration than we had.  We just pointed it out the front truck window. 

If we set up Google Mapping in a place with internet, it correctly showed our location and movement even along routes that lacked Internet, but I could not START a search or map a change out of cell or internet range.  So it is prudent to plan your route in advance and print or save any maps, distances, and target resources.  It is also wise to tell someone to expect to hear from you every other day or so.  If not, suggest a follow up plan.  On my first leg (south from Alaska) I texted my sons each day and let us know where we left and where we were headed, as well as info about our truck and camper.  I gave them the number of the Mounties in Yukon and BC.  On our route back, I wrote them only occasionally, because I felt more confident and familiar with the route and where we could stop.   

 

With these caveats and observations, I can say that we enjoyed a wonderful trip, from Alaska to Dawson Creek during the first half of March, and then back north in the second half of April, with an alternate route part of the way back north that we found more attractive than the Alcan all the way.  (See Itinerary article link). 

Fuel prices:

Gas and diesel costs a LOT more in Canada – 3 times the prices in US states on either side of this route.  The most we paid was C$2.09 per LITER (so about C$8/gallon).  In our part of Alaska, the price of Diesel was $3.22/gallon.  In parts of Montana and Wyoming, $2.99/gallon during that same trip.  California charged over $6/gal.

MPG:  Hauling a camper takes a toll on mileage, naturally.  We averaged 12 mpg with the camper vs. 17 mpg without it. 

The currency exchange rate benefited Americans, which took some of the sting out of their diesel price.  Some supermarket, wine, and beer prices were lower than the US.  Noticeably: eggs were half the price.  I guess they did not cull their flocks during the USA’s reaction to bird flu. 

Vehicle performance:

Our truck, a 2005 Dodge RAM 350 dually, exceeded expectations on this trip.  We suffered no damage, not even a ding to the windshield.  But that is likely because we drove hours a time without seeing another vehicle and we crawled slowly over washboard asphalt.  Why go fast when there is no one to help you and you can’t call them from there anyway?

Camper performance:

We bought our 2019 Adventurer camper a few days before our trip.  We drove it around town and camped in a friend’s driveway two nights to get the hang of it before departing. 

Our 2019 Adventurer is labeled as a four season camper, but I am not sure what that means, since it loses heat very quickly after we turn off the heater.  En route, we discovered that if we plugged into shore power one night, we could boondock with heat the next two nights.  However, the third night the heat conked out.  We found an expensive midway spot to plug into a heater one night, but spent some cold nights under a heavy quilt on either side of that until we got to Whitehorse, YT, where the Dodge service center noticed that the camper dealership had not connected the camper’s batteries to the truck’s generator to charge while driving and one fuse was burned out. 

DUMPING:

Rvdumpsites.com was very helpful in finding dumpsites en route.  In addition to these, we found that private RV campgrounds often allowed dumping for a modest fee, like $10, but less often in winter.

For the first two weeks of our trip, we relied on 2 – 5 gallon jugs of water rather than filling our camper’s tanks in below freezing temperatures.  

We have never flushed toilet paper down the toilet.  We also throw it in a trash can. 

Our camper does have a functional shower, but the tank fills after two people shower twice plus gray water from the sink.  So when we could, we showered outside the camper. 

Advice:  If you have not previously camped in your vehicle/camper, take a short sample camping trip before a long one through remote (and therefore, expensive, locations).  Measure how long a propane tank, fresh, gray, and black water tank lasts.  Check your MPG. 

Twice we were slow to find a dump station and had some gray water sloshing around in the sink and bathroom floor, but that was our mistake. 

The only damage we sustained was to the roof window above the bed.  The plastic housing cracked, loosening it at high speeds, which, of course, cracked it some more.  Fortunately, no rain penetrated, but it will need to be replaced.  Since we never climbed up on the roof before departing, we do not know if there was a thin crack at the time.  Lesson learned.  We DID scrape some branches on a few early campsites, but I can’t see how damaging those could be. 

This was a wonderful trip and I look forward to repeating it in different seasons. 

 

10,000 Mile RV Trip with Our Dog (from Alaska to Texas and back)

Recently, we finished traveling 10,000 miles in 65 days of RV camping (in a truck camper) with our dog, a 4-5 year old Chocolate Labrador mix.  Leaving home Feb. 27 and returning in early May, we traveled through a variety of ecosystems and climates, with temperatures ranging from +3F to +93 F. 

Utah

We traveled through parts of Alaska, where we live, down the Alcan Highway to Dawson Creek, BC, then SE to Montana, south to Texas, and then NW through Grand Canyon and related National Parks, up through Idaho to Canada, and then back to Alaska.  

Below is advice for others who are considering extended road trips with their dogs.  (To read our evaluations of the specific campsites and their amenities (or lack of them) we visited in March, April, and May, 2025, see companion article:  Our Itinerary up and down the Alcan Highway in March/April). 

1.       Recommended Resources: 

a)       www.freecampsites.net identifies free and inexpensive, natural locations, such as forest roads, beaches, as well as some organized dry campgrounds.

   www.rvlife.com lists paid, primarily private, RV parks and lets readers rate them.  You can add search criteria, like “pet friendly.”  

b)      www.bringfido.com lets you search for pet friendly restaurants (those with outdoor seating, in season) and dog parks.

c)       www.petsmart.com offers pet sitting and overnight stays.  We used this service for a graduation ceremony and related celebrations.  The price was very reasonable – about $20 for 4 hours in 2025.     The company does require proof of vaccinations required by their state/facility.  Because this varies!!! check in advance before you leave your home veterinarian.  Texas, or at least this boarding facility, requires two shots that Alaska does not.

d)      www.cdc.gov:   If you plan to travel from the US to Canada and then back again, find the pet form on the CDC website.  You will need to fill this out in advance and show it at the border, along with proof of rabies vaccination.  

         Sites for national and state and city parks in your target regions.  Note:  many national and even state parks can be huge.  Searching near your target route will help you find campsites on THAT side of the a park that may be thousands or hundreds of thousands of acres in size.

 

Bay Area

2.       Campgrounds and campsites vary widely in their pet friendliness  (from worst to best, below)

a)                   The worst are private or city owned RV/camp parks that are basically parking lots for closely spaced vehicles, with no shade or privacy between spots. The closeness, the noise of vehicles coming and going, dumpster lids banging, garbage trucks arriving can contribute to anxious and noisy dogs.  These are common in and around cities and tend to cost the most.

 

We paid for 3 ($77 in Golden, CO; $61 outside Grand Canyon, AZ; and $39 in little Bowie, TX) that fit this description.  We also spent a free night in a city lot in tiny Vulcan, Alberta surrounded by commercial parking lots. I avoid these city and private parks when alternatives exist. They are not dog friendly, are crowded and unattractive. 

 

g)       The good news is that in summer months, most of these have electricity and water and often a dump site, as well as laundry (for a fee) and showers (sometimes free).  In cold weather winter locations, many of these campgrounds are closed altogether, or they offer electricity but no water services. Most of these were closed from mid-Oct to end of May in Alaska and along the Alcan.

 

b)      Other city or town owned campsites are much more appealing, within larger, natural settings.  We enjoyed locations next to a lake, river, golf course.  Many had day use areas for picnicking, maybe with playgrounds, boat docks, etc.  These are better suited to dogs and usually cheaper, too!  We enjoyed lovely ones in Austin, TX  along the Colorado River, Minersville, UT ( at a lake), and next to a municipal ski hill for children near Grande Cache, Alberta.  Some do and some do not offer utilities.  Prices varied from free to $30.  The spaciousness and water body offered exercise options for our lab. 

 

Grand Canyon

c)       The best public campsites for dogs (and us) were, without doubt, state and national parks, preserves, and forests. The most common camping price was $20/nt for dry camping and $30 with electricity for our truck camper.  Other prices vary by the size of your rig and the amperage you desire.  All of these offered natural landscapes and often lovely views of lakes, rivers, reservoirs, deserts, lava fields, mountains, and forests.  Many had cleared trails.  If they did not, you could walk along the shore or in the woods with your pooch. Yes, the rules say a 6 foot leash, but in March, we were usually the only camper there.  In April, there were a few other people who scattered thoughtfully away from each other.

d)      Our favorite campsites were ones where we boondocked in a pretty setting that is not an intentionally designed campground.  This is allowed in most National Forests and often a mile or so from designated campgrounds of State and National Parks.  We might drive down a forest road until we found a spot to pull over.  Since many park services in northern, snowy regions are closed until Memorial Day, we occasionally camped behind a visitor center or near the locked gate to a campground.  Other sites included a woodsy parking lot to trails frequented by snowmachiners and cross country skiers, a unplowed rural airstrip, side roads that dead ended in a berm of snow, and parking lots for day use access to trails that are not cleared or used much in winter.    

 

The website, www.freecampsites.net, was of enormous assistance to us, and we added our reviews to it, too. 

 

From the dog’s perspective, there were rarely other people/dogs at these sites, so he could roam freely, nearby.  Other boondocking sites were much larger and better known, so we did find a number of vehicles there, such as at Lake Powell and south of Zion National Park down a rutted dirt road to public land. But since the nature of boondockers is to avoid crowds, we all politely spaced ourselves far apart. 

 

3.       Driving with a dog

a.       Routine: Our dog rested in the cab of the truck with us as we drove.  About every 2 hours, we stopped to stretch our legs and offer him water and a snack.  If a gas station was not adjacent to a fringe of grass or meadow, we sought out a more natural, dog-safe location later, for lunch or a bit of a walk, such as short drive down a rural road that crossed the highway.   In urban areas, we looked up dog parks or walking trails.  These vary widely in appeal from fenced meadows to woods traversed with dirt trails, to parks with ponds and hardscaping for people and dog washing areas just outside the gates.

In our yard in Alaska

 

b.       Supplies:  We kept a collapsible water bowl and water jug and dry dog food in the car with us, along with small rags to wipe his feet and a cloth mat to lay over our laps for him when he was damp.  He seemed to like chewing on rawhide bones especially when he was a bit nervous; they served as pacifiers.  When we made camp for the evening, he was interested in playing with toys or he would find and bring us a stick or a bone. 

 

c.       If crossing the border between USA and Canada:  The Canadian border patrol did not want us traveling with an open container of dry dog food.  Cans are fine.  

c)    Health:  An older dog might have trouble jumping in and out of a car, truck, or camper several times per day.  The only issues we faced were ticks and burrs, which we found and removed quickly.  However, other travelers could encounter issues with temperature regulation in hot or cold climates, hot sand or asphalt, dog fights or other animal injuries, such as snake bites for dogs not familiar with those reptiles.  Another possibility is cuts from broken glass or bits of metal in some poorly maintained campsite.  Keep your veterinary information handy, and, if you are concerned, find local veterinarians in your target location, especially if you plan to linger there.   I have no idea if dogs ever suffer from motion sickness.  Maybe?

Our dog was a good trooper on this long trip.  I doubt he got as much exercise as he does at our rural Alaska home, but enjoyed exploring new scents every time we stopped at a new place.

Tracks and Scat: Noticing Nature

Engagement with nature is the same as with people. It requires slowing down and paying attention to details. It isn’t driving past and enjoying the view. It isn’t jogging through a park while chatting with a friend or listening to music. Engagement means walking, looking, pausing, noticing, analyzing, comparing, and appreciating.

In this regard, one of my favorite pastimes in the remote part of Alaska where we live, is to identify and interpret the scat and tracks of the wild animals that live here. In winter, the tracks are clear for several days in the snow, but the warm excrement slips below the surface and disappears, so that clue is lacking.

In summer, ground cover obscures the tracks, other than in mud. But I see vague footprints in gravel along creeks, and of course our forest is riven with myriad animal trails and the occasional matted grass where one bedded down for the night (or day). Among bushes and trees, I notice branches stripped by moose, berries scattered by bears, trees gnawed by beavers, and tree trunks rubbed raw by bull moose as they shed their velvet and paddles (antlers). Bears leave swatches of coarse hair where they rub against trees (and our cabins). In summer, animal scat lasts for days, and I can infer how recent it is and what the animal ate.

By paying attention, I learn about my largely silent neighbors: where they travel, if they are moving fast (in fear or in pursuit) or slowly (feeling safe), what they have been eating, how recently they have passed through, and the conditions for their respective dens.

In the spirit of the season, this article focuses only on WINTER TRACKS. A summer article will describe SUMMER clues.

Every afternoon above about 0 degrees F, my husband, dog and I take a walk. We prefer the frozen, windswept lake for easy walking in shallow snow, but we also go into the woods on snowshoes (to cut firewood). Either way, we look for tracks, point them out to our chocolate lab mix dog, Buddy, and try to interpret what we see.

VOLES, HARES, WOLVERINES, BEARS, MARTENS, WEASELS, LYNX, ad WOLVES

VOLE

This week, in the flat light of an overcast day, we barely saw the close, shallow tracks of a vole (meadow mouse) heading away from the woods and out toward the middle of the lake. Why? Any dark colored creature on the white expanse would be an obvious appetizer to an eagle eyed carnivore – avian or otherwise. Usually, we find their serpentine trails in spring when the snow melts, in long stretches dug slightly into the mud and slightly into the lowest layer of snow, where they are insulated to a balmy 33 degrees F. Why would one venture out into the cold exposure of a windswept lake? I do not know.

Our dog and other animals hear or smell the voles beneath the snow. Buddy sniffs and digs where he can reach under the chicken coop, where I am sure voles hole up during the winter and gather occasional bits of food and straw.

MARTEN

A more dramatic occasion occurred with a marten. These animals (whose fur is the ermine you associate with royalty) are about the size of a cat, but with shorter legs, all brown/black, with cupped ears. They have been referred to, evocatively, as “nature’s most adorable assassin.”

Moose on our frozen lake

My husband was soaking in our outdoor, wood fired hot tub mid-winter. I happened to be looking out our kitchen window and saw the following, too. A black marten left the shelter of trees (which they can climb) and trotted out to the middle of a meadow. There he stood for a moment and then jumped up into the air and straight down into the snow, emerging with a vole in his mouth. He returned a while later for a second course, but the voles had skedaddled. Instead, he was attracted to the sound of Bryan splashing water over his head in the tub. Did he hear another meal? The marten bounded toward him and even climbed up the lowest two steps to the deck surrounding the tub! Adorable or not, my husband was disinclined to be so close to those sharp teeth, so he splashed water onto the marten, who ran away into the woods. He has his space; we like ours.

HARE

Hares, being a prey species like voles, usually stay in the woods, but one time we watched from our front porch as a hare raced out of the woods and along shore, as fast and straight as I have ever seen one move. Sure enough, a predatory marten was chasing. Before they disappeared beyond the trees, it looked like the marten was gaining. It is a dog eat dog world out there. When we walked down to the lake to analyze the tracks, the distance between the leaps of both creatures was greater than we had ever seen, reflecting their speed.

Usually, hares stay in the woods, sheltered among the roots of birch or under the snow weighted boughs of spruce or a thicket of alder laid low by the snow. When they venture out for forage, like dead grass or berries, they move from one sheltered tree to another. Their tracks are distinctive from the way they jump – their big back feet tend to obscure their smaller front foot prints, like a frog jump.

In spots illuminated and warmed by the sun, the older tracks (of any creatures) expand in the snow, looking much larger than is true. This is one way to assess how much time has passed. Tracks in shaded areas tend to remain true to size longer.

The tree canopy protects the hares somewhat, but since the deciduous trees shed their leaves in autumn, they are particularly vulnerable to predators in winter. One year, we spied a bright red (so fresh) blood pool at the base of a tree, and a light blood trail leading away, but no footprints at all! Our interpretation was that an eagle or hawk dove down to grab a fleeing hare just as it emerged from its sub-nivian hideaway. I doubt it was an owl because those birds are so light. I have seen them dive to break a duck’s neck, and then sit there to feed on the large bird that it could not lift.

LYNX

Here, the lynx/hare population follows a predictable 10 year cycle: more hares = more lynx. Last year was the trough, so we anticipate seeing more of both in upcoming years. Only once have I seen what I think were lynx tracks. Their feet are so insulated with tufts of fur that you can barely see the toes and claws. The tracks looked to me almost like a big softball shape slightly indented into the surface, surrounded by a softened snow edge.

MYSTERY DECODED

Perhaps the most joyful discovery occurred shortly after Freezeup this year. When the lake ice was thick enough to support our weight (4 – 6 inches) and barely covered with an inch or two of snow, we ventured out, wearing ice cleats since the ice was so slick, and carrying a rope in case one of us fell in. Can you can interpret what we saw before I answer the question?

Along the perimeter of the lake, maybe three feet from shore, we saw what looked like a single tire track that scraped the snow down to the ice. It was about 6 inches wide and 6 feet long. Then a gap of 10 inches of snow, and then another track of ice, then snow, then ice, for 1/3 to ½ a mile! Two or three times, the track veered right up to the shrubbery along shore. What was this?

We bent down to get a clearer view, because in the flat light of winter, there are no shadows to illuminate nooks and crannies. Then we saw it: two small foot prints at the end of each icy track. Of course! This was a river otter sliding and then leaping and then sliding along shore! Wouldn’t you have loved to see that in action! How fun! Perhaps its forays to the shrubbery were to find any remaining open pools of water. On the far side of the lake, two such pools remained liquid for another week where little creeks drizzled into the lake. Sure enough, we found evidence that the critter slid into the water and disappeared into the woods. What a delightful discovery and happy memory! Had it snowed before our walk, we would have missed the evidence.

WOLVERINE

A few years ago, a wolverine hung around our place. These are creatures that look like small bears and are noted for their fierce temperament. We used our scat and tracks book to identify the animal by the size of the feet and the distance between steps. We found two trails, on two different days, where it wandered out of the woods, in a loop along the lake, and then back into the woods about ½ mile north of our cabin.

A night or so later, our dog alerted to an exterior visitor. The next morning, we found that the wolverine’s tracks led from the woods north of us, under our cabin’s front porch, out the other side and down to the lake. Because of the dusty dirt beneath the cabin, its dirty paw prints left a clear trail in the snow where he exited. We even saw sharp front claw marks in the icy snow berm that he had to climb up from under the cabin. Did it smell the gray water line under the sink? Did our dog leave a bone somewhere? I do not know why it paid a visit, but I am glad that we did not let our dog out that night. He surely would have lost his life to this apex predator.

MOOSE

Moose prefer riparian landscapes where rivers offer open water longer than our lake in the winter, and shore plants like willows can feed them. When they travel through snow, they, like we, travel along hard packed snowmachine tracks for easier walking. Imagine the caloric stress for a 1200 lb pregnant herbivore laboring through belly high snow, looking for food for 6-7 months! They are understandably ornery and often unwilling to cede the trail to an oncoming snowmachine or dog sled. For this reason, it is common to carry a gun to startle the huge ungulate into moving away a few dozen yards so we can pass.

For the same ease of transit, moose are often seen walking on roads in Alaska. As you may imagine, collisions can be fatal for both beast and driver. In the populated area around Anchorage, volunteers are on call to collect the enormous road kill, butcher it, and deliver it as food to homeless shelters and other food charities. Nice.

In winter, we see moose when we near rivers, and less often on our lake, especially now that we have the dog. I recall seeing one curl up, rather miserably, it seemed to me, out of the wind below our cabin, after nibbling whatever she could reach on low birch and ash branches. The next morning, we saw that she had traversed the snow paths on our property, sampling adjacent tree branches, before heading into the woods, which protect her from wind. Off the path, her footfalls in the snow were so deep that we could see her belly scrapes in between them.

If reincarnation exists, I do not want to become an arctic moose. It seems to be an arduous and vulnerable life.

BEARS

Bears hibernate, of course, so we were astonished to see the unmistakable footprints of a large bear in a glen low on our property one New Year’s Day. Naturally, we were disinclined to follow in our bulky and cumbersome snowshoes, so we retreated. I called Fish and Game after the holiday to inquire, citing measurements for the footprints and the stride length. A warden explained that the bear was likely old or ill and left a den to die outside somewhere. Somehow this strikes me as both sad and noble. How about you?

These excursions illuminate my environment. From animal tracks, I discern (or interpret) evidence of joy, thirst, hunger, fear, confusion, illness, and dying. Human footprints surely yield such clues, too, to attentive doctors, policemen, and forensic analysts.

We just need to pay attention.

Disaster Preparations: several scenarios. Which ones for you?

I previously posted my article to www.survivalblog.com.  I highly recommend this website for people interested in practical, "how-to" articles for self-reliance.

 

Throughout the country, kind people volunteer their time and talents to help others harmed by natural or personal disasters.

Photo courtesy of vecteezy.com

We can only help others if we are first prepared to take care of ourselves and our families.

Below are real situations that have happened to us, or people that we or our friends and relatives know.


What would you do?  I hope that these real situations and questions can prompt useful and interesting discussions among family or other groups.

1.  In ice fog conditions, your car goes off the road and down into a ditch where people cannot see you.  You are injured.  What do you have within reach to call or attract attention for help, keep warm, and care for your injuries?

Considerations:  Cell service is spotty in large swaths of rural America, and often depends on line of sight to cell towers.  Take note of locations in your vicinity where cell service is unavailable.  Do you have any other means of communication in your car, such as whistles, flares, or ham radio?

2.  On a winter morning, you and your family members are away from home. Some are at work, school, supermarket, a doctor’s appointment, etc.  The power goes out in a broad region, including the buildings that each of you occupies at that moment.  What do you have on hand (in your purse, backpack, desk, or locker) that will help you get home or to your family’s predetermined rally site (if you have chosen one).  How will you keep warm where you are or where you are going?  How can you communicate with your loved ones to ensure that all are safe?  How far will you need to travel?  Do you have apparel appropriate for the season’s conditions?

Considerations:   Without electricity, your cell phones, elevators, electric keyed doors, ATMs, cash registers, traffic lights, heat, and water will not work.  If you work in a high-rise building, can you get to the stairs and leave the building safely? Do you know in advance if your car can get through the exit gate of the parking lot? Do you have ham radio to reach others in your family?  Even a two way walkie-talkie can communicate for line of sight within several miles.

3.  You awaken at home one winter morning to discover that the power went out during the night.  Your home is getting cool.  What can you do to preserve or produce food, water, and warmth?  Do you know how long your refrigerated and frozen food last if you do or do not open the appliance? (Often, the website can tell you… in advance) What food do you have on hand that can be cooked or prepared without electricity?  How much water do you have that does not require an electric pump?    

Photo courtesy of vecteezy.com

Considerations:  If your municipal or well water requires an electric pump, it will cease to run.  Do you have a hand pump for your well and have you attached it, primed it, used it? (Mine takes about 100 pumps to prime and get a few gallons from a 62 foot well.  It is tiring!).  Do you have jugs of stored water?  How old and tasty is the water? It goes stale!  If you have a generator, how many watts can it power?  Given the gas you have on hand, how many hours can it run? If you can power only a few appliances, what are your priorities and how much power do they need?  Note: for many appliances, the run rate wattage is much lower than the necessary START UP wattage.  So check this out. (A great source of information is www.generatorist.com.)   

Will your gas grill or stove ignite without electricity?  How many bags of briquettes do you have for a non-gas grill?  If exterior temperatures are below 45, you can store refrigerated food outside.  If it is below freezing, outdoor shelves can function as a freezer.   

4.  Your region is devastated by a natural disaster that physically isolates you from resources you need (perhaps roads are impassable because of a tornado, hurricane, flooding, landslides, earthquake or extreme snow storm).  You cannot get to the pharmacy, supermarket, or hospital.  However, your home is intact. With the supplies you have on hand, how long can you wait for access, how can you help or support nearby emergency service personnel, or how can you create your own access to resources you need?

Considerations: How many meals and how many gallons of water can your current supplies provide for how many people?  Do you have mechanical can openers  and sharpeners etc or only electric ones?  What are your greatest vulnerabilities? How do you handle neighbors and others who seek you out because your home is intact, for shelter and food?

5.  You are in a somewhat remote, off-road recreational situation with a friend in winter.  Perhaps you are snowmachining, dog mushing, cross country skiing, snowshoeing, hiking, biking, or camping.  Your friend gets injured or his/her transportation device is damaged and cannot travel as before.  What injuries or damage are feasible in your location? What do you have on hand to address likely injuries or damage?  Can you call for help?  If cell service is not available, what do you do?  If you need to leave your friend, what  can you do with supplies on hand to ensure both of your safety and comfort during your absence?

Considerations:  Each of these recreational activities involves a different carrying capacity for supplies and different transportation speed.  In the situation most likely for you, what can you carry to address potential problems?   Did you let someone know your departure time, route, and expected return time/date? Does your contact person know whom to contact after you do not return on time?  (Such as Alaska state troopers?) Do you have a personal EPIRB (electronic personal information beacon)?   Are you familiar with land to air emergency signals?  At the very least, you can carve out SOS and darken it against the snow, but other signals are faster, designate specific needs (like food or medical care) with less effort.

6.  You are commuting to San Francisco (or New York) or elsewhere and are stuck in the Berkeley (or New Jersey) Tunnels when traffic stops.  Air quality is terrible in the tunnel.  Your car radio does not at first report the issue.  (It turns out that two semi trucks jackknifed on the highway ahead, and it takes many hours to clear the accident so traffic can resume.)  What do you do for fresh air, information, and emptying your bladder?  What do you have in your car to help alleviate this situation?

7.  You and your family are evacuating by car with millions of other people in advance of a hurricane.  The traffic is so thick and slow that cars are running out of gas, which further slows everyone else if they do not move to the side.  Pretty soon, your car’s gas is dangerously low and you are not yet out of the predicted danger zone for the incoming storm.  What do you do?

8.  You discover an out of control fire at your home.  Pick a likely spot: the woodstove, fireplace, kitchen stove, bonfire, or burn barrel.  What do you have on hand to deal with it?  What can you do in advance to mitigate such danger?

Considerations:  Grease fires, electric fires, wood fires,  vs. other sources of ignition respond differently to mitigation efforts.  Research this.  Examples:  water vs. baking soda or sand.   Have you ever tested your fire extinguishers?  Have you checked the gauge to see how functional they are (they degrade over time). Consider "fire blankets" and other solutions. 

9.  You are on a late season float plane right before Freezeup at a remote lake.  The water is still liquid, but the air is below freezing temperature.  As the plane taxis through the water, it sprays water onto the tail where the water freezes on contact and weighs down the rear of the plane.  When the plane labors to ascend into the air, it fails, falls, and the rear sinks into the frigid water.  All passengers and pilot are able to escape the sinking plane and swim to shore, although some have to carry others who are hypothermic.  Now what?

Considerations:  The pilot wears a float coat with some precautionary items in its many pockets.  Passengers have whatever they were wearing and in their pockets.  Their bags and purses may be in hand, but are more likely, stowed in the rear.  Their clothes are sodden and starting to freeze on them.  The pilot is required to have a heavy bag of emergency supplies in the back of the plane, but it is now sunk in the lake.  The first need for all people is warmth.  How do you accomplish that?  What might you want to keep on your person for future flights?

10.  You are in a rogue (fake) taxi in a foreign country (or in the USA) that kidnaps people for their ATM cards or their cash and clothes.  You give up your money and any other valuables.  The driver and accomplice dump you in a slum with no money, no shoes, and no cell phone.  Now what?

11.   On your shopping trip to your usual supermarket, the power goes out.  You realize that since the machines will not work, the cashiers may kick out everyone, and that you do not have enough cash on hand to buy everything because you expected to pay by credit card.  Might they accept cash?  How much cash do you tend to carry and which items in your cart would you prioritize when the power goes out?  Or would you leave the check out line to look for other items?   Or would you leave the store to get home before traffic builds?

Considerations:  First mover advantage is well recognized in many situations, from sports to business.  But another well known point is “Never let a crisis go to waste.”  Somebody will take advantage of a power outage.  Given your size or age or children in tow, is it better for you to turn on your flash light to search for other items in the store or is it wiser to get out of the store with what you can buy at that moment?

12.   A storm has caused a tree to crash onto your home.  In your vicinity, this could have been a hurricane, tornado, ice storm, heavy rain or heavy snow. You now have a big hole in your roof or wall or window. If the storm was wide spread, there may be LOTS of people ahead of you to get the attention of repairmen.  What do you have on hand to patch the hole?  Can you repair it?

Considerations:  How much does a tarp cost, or a roll of 6 mm plastic? How would you attach it or weigh it down? How much does a roll of window screen cost?  How would you attach it? How do you preserve wood or walls that have been damaged by several days of rain water?  Can you put R factor insulation under a tarp over a hole in the roof? How do you address heat loss?

13.  If you are lucky enough for your home to escape a wildfire, you may still be close enough to suffer devastating smoke damage to every surface and fabric in your home.  How do you protect from that or clean it up?  How long does that take?  What is irredeemable? Is there anything you could have done before you evacuated from that dangerous situation?

Every one of these scenarios is based on real people I know or by relatives who know them. Considering realistic emergencies like these can enable one to plan ahead, possibly downgrading an emergency to an inconvenience.

I hope these scenarios will provide fodder for interesting winter discussions and planning.

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Readers may be interested in my book, Log Cabin Reflections by Laura Emerson, available through Amazon as a Kindle book.  With lots of photos, it describes the highs and lows of our learning curve to  live 40 miles from the nearest road in Alaska. 

Grief Assuaged by Nature

 

In August, my dad died.  I spent a few hours processing the news, but all I felt was an emotional maelstrom and a physical need to go outside and DO something.

So I harvested saskatoon berries. 

Berry picking has always been a calming and meditative activity for me.  It engenders feelings of gratitude at the reliable plenty of a summer’s harvest.  

 Today though, my mind was whirling with images of my dad and my siblings as I plucked the fruit.  In the process, the berries soothed my knot of grief.

I remembered when I planted these six, spindly little seedlings a decade ago. Every year, I worried when the springy boughs bowed below the snow, wondering how they would fare the following spring.  Some branches broke.  Of those, I taped and splinted a few.  Some benefited.  Others didn’t.  I pruned low branches girdled beneath our deep snow by hungry voles.  I mulched in the fall and fertilized in the spring.

Of the six trees, two are tall and prolific producers.  Three are middling, and one is the runt of the group.  

Since each tree has grown differently, I have lots of “woulda, coulda, shoulda thoughts” about my interventions. What if I had planted them elsewhere and farther apart?  Some trees hog the sun, grow taller and stronger and their boughs whip the narrower branches of an adjacent tree, which becomes stunted.  What if I had pruned them better, earlier?  Now such intervention on some major limbs might kill the tree.  What if I had watered them deeper?  What if?

All of us who are children, as well as parents, co-parents, step-parents, and siblings contemplate such what ifs.  It is hard to step out of a family or community and view it from outside.

As I gathered the berries, I reached for those of the darkest blue hue, heavy and round with juice.  Since the berries do not all ripen at the same time, I leave those that are purple or red that need additional time to mature more slowly in the sun. 

Some berries grow in ideal locations – plenty of sun, protected from the wind, with room to grow, well separated from others. 

Some are physically deformed by birds that pecked part of them.  A few look fine, but skinny larvae burrowed inside and rot the interior.  In thick clusters, a single berry in the middle is always desiccated and surrounded by a gray fluff of mold, which taints the berries surrounding it. It did not have room to grow so it died and infected those surrounding it.

Each tree, each berry, each season, teaches me a different lesson.      

That day, different from a decade of other harvesting days, my mind viewed this line of trees as a community, each tree as a family, and the berries as individual members of that family tree.

My dad has died.  The saskatoons consoled me because I observed among those trees and branches, life experiences that illuminate my own.  

 I can’t hug my dad.  But I can stroke these branches and think about his children and grandchildren and great grandchildren who will grow toward the sun, strong and resilient.  He was a strong tree with, like all of us, some weak branches.  He has many progeny, who will blow and bend with the winds of the future.

We have a bench along the lake shore with three stone cairns as memorials.  When I retrieve his ashes, we will build a fourth.