Father’s Day In Remote Alaska

I slept for ten hours last night. I had parked off the McCarthy Road at a rest stop that isn't heavily used. After the hiking, exploring, and photography of the previous day, the extra sleep was welcome. I made myself blueberry pancakes and a double espresso and slowly eased into the morning. I was dragging after a very long and wonderful day yesterday.

It was Father's Day, and it seemed like an appropriate day to reflect on family.

When I retired, I had a fairly clear picture of what these years would look like. Standing in Alaska today, I can say with confidence that almost none of it happened according to plan. What's surprising is that the unplanned version has been far more interesting than the one I imagined.

One thing I've discovered on this trip is that traveling alone creates a very different experience. There is nobody negotiating the schedule, suggesting the next stop, or wondering why I've spent forty-five minutes staring at a glacier trying to decide whether there is a photograph worth taking.

The freedom is wonderful. It has led to conversations, hikes, and experiences that probably would never have happened otherwise.

Still, there are moments when I wish I could simply point at a mountain, glacier, or old building and say, "Take a look at that." Not because I want a different life, but because some experiences are naturally meant to be shared.

Thanks to Starlink, I am rarely out of touch. Text messages arrive from friends. Family members call. Emails show up throughout the day. I write these blog posts and receive comments from people scattered across the United States and around the world. In some ways, I feel more connected than I expected when I first started this journey.

I spent much of the day going through photographs and writing yesterday's blog post about Kennecott, Root Glacier, and McCarthy. One of the things I enjoy most about blogging is that it forces me to slow down and revisit places after I've left them. During the visit itself, I am usually focused on photography, hiking, logistics, and trying to absorb as much information as possible. The writing comes later.

As I worked through the photographs, I found myself thinking about the people who lived and worked in Kennecott. It is easy to walk through the buildings and admire the engineering. The mill itself is an incredible structure, perched on the side of a mountain in a place that still feels remote today. More than a century ago it must have seemed impossibly isolated.

The workers who lived there weren't visiting for a few days of sightseeing. They spent years in that environment. They endured long winters, dangerous working conditions, and the constant demands of a mining operation that existed for one purpose: extracting copper ore as efficiently as possible. Looking at the photographs, I found myself imagining what daily life must have been like. The machinery, the noise, the dust, the relationships, and the routines that developed in a place most people today will only visit for a few hours.

Writing the blog allowed me to connect those pieces in a way that isn't always possible while standing in front of the buildings themselves.

Throughout the day I received Father's Day wishes from friends and family. A few texts arrived during breakfast, others later in the afternoon. It was nice hearing from people scattered across the country while sitting beside a remote road in Alaska.

I also spent some time reading and responding to a blog review from a friend in India who has been following my posts. The internet continues to amaze me. Here I am parked near McCarthy, Alaska, discussing blog posts with someone on the other side of the planet. Twenty years ago that would have seemed remarkable. Today it feels completely normal.

Part of the afternoon was devoted to housekeeping. Van life sounds adventurous until you realize somebody still has to clean, organize, sort gear, and put everything back where it belongs. None of it is exciting, but all of it makes life on the road easier.

For some reason there were no mosquitoes. That may have been the most surprising event of the day. I was able to sit at a nearby picnic table for quite a while without being disturbed. In Alaska, that feels noteworthy enough to record for posterity.

One interesting discovery was that there are no public garbage cans between Chitina and McCarthy. Numerous signs explain that garbage service is limited. "Limited" appears to mean nonexistent. I've been trying to use up food before moving on to the next section of the trip, which has left me with a growing collection of cardboard boxes and plastic containers. I've consolidated everything as much as possible, but for now the trash remains a passenger in the van.

Planning For Valdez

People occasionally ask how I create my itineraries. The process has evolved quite a bit over the years.

When I first started traveling extensively, I relied heavily on AAA TripTiks and guidebooks. Over time I began augmenting those plans with my own research, recommendations from other travelers, and lessons learned from previous trips. More recently, ChatGPT became part of the planning process. Today, I use Claude for much of the itinerary generation, but the final result is still very much my own.

Rather than planning an entire state in detail, I break large trips into blocks. Each block typically covers a region or destination area. For Alaska, examples include Skagway, Wrangell-St. Elias, Valdez, Seward, Denali, and other major areas. I maintain a detailed template that includes my travel style, photography interests, hiking preferences, driving limits, campground requirements, reservation needs, and a long list of things I've learned during previous trips. I feed that information into Claude and have it generate a detailed itinerary for the specific area (Block4 Valdez).

The initial output is only the starting point. I review every recommendation, verify operating hours, identify reservations that need to be made, add photography opportunities, look for local history, and adjust the schedule based on weather, road conditions, and my own interests. The goal isn't to create a rigid schedule. It is to create enough structure that I don't miss important opportunities while still leaving room for discoveries along the way.

I spent a few hours today building a more detailed plan for Block 4 of the Alaska trip in Valdez. Once the itinerary was complete, I worked through the reservations that needed to be made. Because this is Alaska, I also spent time reading through The Milepost, which remains one of the best resources for understanding what lies ahead on the road.

Tomorrow I leave one remarkable corner of Alaska and begin exploring another. If the last week has taught me anything, it is that the places I remember most are rarely the ones I expected when I first started planning the trip. The itinerary gets me to the destination. What happens after I arrive is usually the interesting part.