Dalton Highway: Fairbanks to Coldfoot

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Fairbanks

   Fairbanks is the northernmost city of any size that most riders will ever reach by road, and it wears that with a certain pride. About thirty thousand people live here on the Chena River, in the middle of the Alaska interior, where summer days are close to endless and winter temperatures can drop to minus forty. It calls itself the Golden Heart City, a nod to the gold strike of 1902 that created the town, and the old gold-mining history is still part of the identity.

   Read the complete Fairbanks write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Fairbanks is where the day begins. Next is Yukon River Crossing.

2. 2. Yukon River Crossing

   Few bridges feel as lonely as the one over the Yukon River on the Dalton Highway. It is a long steel truss with a wooden deck, completed in the mid-1970s to carry the trucks that built the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, and the pipeline itself runs alongside, a silver snake sliding across the river on its own supports. Fairbanks lies a long day behind, and the Arctic lies ahead. At this point the highway has already left pavement and certainty well behind.

   Read the complete Yukon River Crossing write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Yukon River Crossing comes up about 218 km into the recorded legs. Next is Arctic Circle.

3. 3. Arctic Circle

   Mile 115 on the Dalton Highway is the Arctic Circle, and there is a wooden sign beside the road to prove it, with a small campground and picnic area run by the Bureau of Land Management. The line sits at about sixty-six and a half degrees north, and on the summer solstice the sun does not fully set for those who stand a little further north. It is a remote, windy, mosquito-ridden spot, and it is hugely satisfying to reach on a motorcycle.

   Read the complete Arctic Circle write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 314 km into the recorded legs you reach Arctic Circle. Next is Coldfoot.

4. 4. Coldfoot

   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.

   Read the complete Coldfoot write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Coldfoot closes the day.