Coldfoot is a truck stop and a handful of buildings on the south side of the Brooks Range, at mile 175 of the Dalton Highway, and it is the last place with services for two hundred and forty miles. The name is said to come from the early prospectors of the gold rush in 1900, who arrived, saw the cold and got cold feet. Only a few dozen people live here year-round, and in summer the population includes truckers, pipeline workers and a few travellers.
The Dalton Highway runs 414 miles from the Elliott Highway north of Fairbanks to Deadhorse on the Arctic Ocean, built in 1974 to supply the Prudhoe Bay oil fields, and it runs alongside the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, which snakes across the landscape on its stilts. The road crosses the Arctic Circle about sixty miles south of Coldfoot, and north of here it climbs through the Brooks Range over Atigun Pass at 4,739 feet, a spectacular crossing. The little settlement of Wiseman, thirteen miles north, is a gold-rush village where a few people still live in old log cabins.
The riding is some of the toughest in North America. The road is mostly gravel, with long sections of dust, mud, potholes and loose stone, and huge trucks that throw stones and raise clouds of dust, so keep well back and give them room. The surface is sometimes treated with calcium chloride, which becomes slippery when wet. Weather can change quickly, with rain, wind and cold even in July, and the mosquitoes in summer are ferocious. The midnight sun lasts for weeks in June and July, and in late summer and autumn, the northern lights are visible.
The truck stop has a restaurant and a store, with basic food and supplies, and rooms are available but should be booked in season. Take spares, tools, tyre repair kit and plenty of water, because help is far away.
The Gates of the Arctic National Park lies to the west, a huge wilderness without roads, and the sense of space is overwhelming. Take a moment to look north at the mountains, and think about what is waiting.