The Road to the Arctic | Driving The Dalton Highway in Alaska

[@bloqk16]

This is a well-produced and informative video about an aspect of Alaska. The editing and narrating segments melded well; had a personal flair to it without being schmaltzy. It's videos like this was the original intent from the creators of KZbin.

[@CarterChronicles]

Wow! Thank you.

[@lili4833]

just came back from Dalton highway and crossed the aristocracy circle; even touched permafrost. It was cold! very different experience

[@lili4833]

Arctic Circle not aristocratic circle though it is funny haha! Silly auto correct!

[@myytchannel6632]

Very beautiful video. Ver well documented, detailed and very informative. Thanks a lot for sharing. I plan to drive the whole length of the Dalton Highway (USA) and the Dempster Highway (Canada) this year in June 2023 with my 2020 Honda Accord Hybrid. I have all season tires and hope the road would be better in the Summer. I will blog about my road trip and share tons of pictures and I will try to make a video also. This will be a big road trip since I will be driving from Houston, TEXAS to Anchorage, ALASKA and back. I plan to tour Alaska and visit a lot of the other cities there and the National Parks. I will put a link to my blog here after my road trip in June 2023. I wanted to know exactly what mile posts are paved on the Dalton Highway. But no video provides that information. When I do my trip, I will try to make a video only about the paved sections on the Dalton Highway. My road trip will have me driving all of the Alaska Highway and all of the Dalton Highway. I will be driving from Fairbanks all the way to Deadhorse. I will be using my 2020 Honda Accord Hybrid. I will let you guys know how it goes. Wish me luck. I will blog about it during my trip and share it here.

[@CarterChronicles]

Sounds exciting. Best of luck with your trip!

[@debralynnbailey6527]

Heading that way Wednesday thanks for the info loved seeing you use the post marks 🇺🇸❤️

[@CarterChronicles]

Hope you have a great trip!

[@magooracing]

Nice well made video! We drove our Class C rv from Fairbanks to the Arctic Circle this summer. We asked some locals about the road before we went. We came thru Canada on the AlCan and thru the Destruction Bay bad part. Lots of frost heaves and gravel on the road, so we knew bad roads. So we thought. Going to the Dalton on the Elliott hwy we said what a rough frost heaved road. Well the Dalton is a whole another level of rough road. Coming back on the Elliot we thought it was a great road compared to what we experienced on the Dalton. The views are amazing, just miles and miles of forest. The Yukon river is wide. Gas was $7.49 a gallon at the Yukon river campground/gas store. The most we paid on our whole trip from Texas. Awesome bucket list trip!

[@CarterChronicles]

Sounds like an amazing trip! How long did your entire trip take?

[@Wyngs714]

Loved your video, wonderful photography. It is a shame that you couldnt rent the car a second day and spend the night in Deadhorse. It would have been worth the extra money. The true nature of the highway doesnt really come out until you reach Atigun, by far the most incredible scenery on the road. I rode to Deadhorse by motorcylce in 2014 from Ky. The Dalton was easily the most challenging, frankly sometimes dangerous riding of my life, and produced memories for a lifetime. Like your experience, it had snowed in the pass. The green contrasted with the fresh snow was surreal. Then the vast, empty expanse of the North Slope. So remote and desolate as to be a bit unnerving. A wonderful trip.

[@CarterChronicles]

It is a shame. I really wanted to go to Deadhorse, but time & money just didn’t allow it on this trip. We actually were going to drive on up to Atigun Pass, but decided the last minute not to. The next morning while eating breakfast at the truck stop in Coldfoot, we heard truckers talking about how it had snowed at Atigun overnight, and cars were wrecked and stranded… so for that trip, I’m so glad we didn’t go any further north! I can’t imagine driving the Dalton on a motorcycle! 😳 I’m sure you have some great stories from that adventure.😊

[@KP-hi1om]

That was incredible. When I retire I plan to take the first months to drive Uber from Key West, FL to Seatlle, WA. Then I'm going to drivr to Deadhorse, AK

[@CarterChronicles]

What an amazing road trip that will be! Think of all the places and things you’ll see along the way… wow!

[@garykos1308]

That Ritz plate looked delicious.

[@CarterChronicles]

Ha! We were getting pretty fancy with the Ritz peanut butter and jelly crackers!

[@ZacheryHook]

I wish I had a passport. For my 7th cross country adventure to Alaska. Washington 4 Oregon 2

[@mrmorganmusic]

This is super helpful. Did you feel the roads were in safe enough condition?

[@CarterChronicles]

Surprisingly, the roads were in better condition than we were expecting, with portions of the road paved. You have to be careful though. We started to drive faster on the “nice” sections of the road, but there would be random gigantic holes in the road that would catch us by surprise. Some we were able to avoid, others we couldn’t avoid and could have easily blew out a tire.

[@varnav5597]

Could you tell me what month did you drive to the Arctic circle?

[@andrbex]

Love your video. How was the car? Any chips due to the flying rocks off the road?

[@CarterChronicles]

The car was really muddy but other than that in good shape. We’ve heard and seen cars that weren’t as lucky.

[@dlpearson]

Is that a bear on the right at 1:19?

[@CarterChronicles]

That would have been awesome to see! Unfortunately, I think it was just a slightly rusted 55 gal drum. 😔

[@bloqk16]

A trivia bit about the Dalton Highway from an issue of the National Geographic Magazine from decades ago: That highway was built in six months. Other sources, online, claim that 390 miles of the highway was completed in five months. The fortunes at stake with the oil in the North Slope, along with changes in seasons, had road crews working 24/7. You won't find road construction of such a vigorous pace done in the 'Lower 48.'

[@CarterChronicles]

Very interesting. Thanks for sharing! On a side note, I inherited my grandparents collection of National Geographic magazines, and I think I may have the issue you are referencing (Nov 1976/Vol 150, No. 5). I had only skimmed over the pipeline story before, but now I’ll have to really read it. 😊

[@bloqk16]

@@CarterChronicles I erred with regards to the timespan of the road build, as I laboriously checked my Nat Geo archives for that issue, where I found on page 705 that the road took five months to build. WORD OF CAUTION about National Geographic on DVD-ROM: I dusted off my 12 year old DVD-ROM copy set that was designed for Windows XP, and it would not open with Windows 10. So, if you see an online seller of DVD-ROMs of Nat Geo from 1888 to 2009; it may not be compatible with your PC. I checked with several online sources to resolve the issue, with the general answer of 'too bad, the technology is outdated for use on a modern PC.' That is, until one fix-it website suggested manually turning back the calendar to 2017 in the PC, and change the compatibility mode to Windows 7. *It worked!* With that, I had access to the Nat Geo DVD-ROMs, where I checked out the Nov 1976 Nat Geo issue, skimmed over the entire article, and for the life of me, didn't see the 'six months' info stuck in my head. But, it did give a five month mention. So, if you think that going to Nat Geo DVD-ROMs is the way to go to eliminate the paper clutter, don't do it! Online sellers won't say that the DVD-ROMs are not compatible with Windows 10. According to one Nat Geo webpage, they don't sell DVD-ROM set of the archive issues anymore. Supposedly, an online subscription to Nat Geo can offer archives to past issues, but that info is vague.

[@paulitoivonen2131]

7:30 Having to correct you on that one. I think for example Finland has like 7 gas stations after N:67, northernmost in Finland being N:70 at Nuorgam, Finland. Russia and Norway might have even more northern ones! Insane, huh? :D

[@CarterChronicles]

There are gas stations further north… even at Deadhorse, but Coldfoot has the designation as the northernmost “TRUCK-STOP” in the world.

[@paulitoivonen2131]

@@CarterChronicles and that designation is very incorrect, unfortunately. Probably northernmost in North America. For example, St1 and Teboil in Ivalo is 1,5 degrees more north and most certainly is a truck-stop.

[@CarterChronicles]

I got the information off of their website, and information I gathered on our trip. If I’m wrong, I apologize.

[@CarterChronicles]

Google “northernmost most truckstop in the world” and let me know what it says…

[@redirish311976]

Did you all drive up to Alaska or did you fly into Alaska when you went up there? I would love to drive up there and take the Alaska highway up to Fairbanks and then to the Dalton highway but that’s going to probably be about 1-2 weeks just to get up there

[@CarterChronicles]

We flew into Anchorage for that trip. It is on our bucket list to drive all the way up. We need more PTO and more money to be able to do that. Let us know if you drive it!

[@blakebellamy82]

I’m doing this trip in the summer of 24. I live in Tennessee. Im going to fly into Montana and drive the Alaskan highway and the Dalton. However, the rental car price is scaring me away from doing the whole Dalton.

[@redirish311976]

I want to go up there one summer at the very beginning and drive up to coldfoot in Alaska and see the sun above the horizon in the middle of the night

[@laniergreenhaw3115]

My son and I drove from Alabama to Deadhorse this summer. I highly recommend it. We had beautiful weather on the Dalton but folks we met there had horrible weather and they turned back before Atigun. Hit or miss but what a trip!!!!!

[@CarterChronicles]

The car rental to drive up the Dalton is very pricey. That is why we only did one day of rental, but wish we had rented another day or 2 so we could have made it all the way. But Rob was being cheap 😀

[@AveGuy1]

Do they have the rental car police to catch you?

[@CarterChronicles]

😂 You could definitely take a regular rental car, but you would be paying for the damage on it and/or fees associated with breaking your contract.

[@michaelwelsh5870]

The rental vehicles have a tracker in them. You'll pay dearly if you trash the vehicle.

[@romeowhiskey1146]

BTDT...R1200GS!

[@CarterChronicles]

Not sure what your comment means, but we appreciate you visiting our channel. 😊