Road trip: Canada-Alaska (First Blood)

Apologies if Cars4starters has been a bit light on over the past couple of weeks, but we’ve been trying to juggle content at the same time as preparing for a road trip.

It’s a big’un too, taking us to North America where we plan to drive a mighty 7000km from the United States, through Canada and on to Alaska, and back again over a period of seven weeks.

The plan is to fly into Seattle, Washington, on the far north of the west coast of the United States, where we will meet up with Mr and Mrs Sport, pickup a car and drive up through the Canadian Rocky Mountains as far as Fairbanks in Alaska.

There we plan to ditch the car and hop a plane into the Arctic Circle for a couple of nights, before boarding the iconic Denali Star train for the return journey back to Anchorage.

From there we head to the port of Seward where we will join a cruise ship and travel down the picturesque coast with its many whales and glaciers to Vancouver, before catching another train that will ultimately return us to Seattle.

That’s it in a nutshell and by way of explanation, we decided to kick off from Seattle because you can’t rent a car in Canada and return it in the US, but as Seattle is in the US and so is Fairbanks — it’s doable.

Ford Expedition

Our vehicle for the trip turned out to be a Ford Expedition from Go North, which offers one-way rentals and don’t mind you taking their vehicles over gravel roads.

Expedition is the SUV version of the F-150 pickup and described as an ideal choice for four adults and luggage.

It’s a ‘full-size’ seven or eight-seat SUV with oodles of room for four adults, expansive, leg room and armchair-size rear seating, plus tri-zone climate control air, with plenty of space left over for bags with the third row folded.

It’s powered by a 3.5-litre EcoBoost twin turbo petrol V6.

It’s the same engine that fires up the six-cylinder version of the Mustang and once upon a time, the Falcon.

Hooked up to a 10-speed auto, it’s nice and smooth, with 280kW of power on tap and 637Nm of torque (upmarket models produce a bit more).

It has a torque on demand all-wheel drive system, with auto engine stop-start and gets about 12.4L/100km using regular 87 RON petrol.

We would have preferred a diesel, but I’m not sure it would have produced significant savings . . .

Missing is satellite navigation which is offered on a subscription basis in this part of the world.

But the infotainment system supports CarPlay and Android Auto (and we also have an off-line navigation app).

So far we have travelled 2070km and I am writing this post in Canmore, a town in the Bow Valley about 80km west of Calgary, in the province of Alberta.

We’ve come across some odd things on the road.

We’ve stayed in a motel where the utensils were all Glad-wrapped, we’ve visited a town with a Rambo statue and discovered that cannabis is legal in both Washington and Canada generally, not to mention seeing Canada’s longest-running musical — Anne of Green Gables.

The first Rambo movie, the 1982 First Blood, was filmed in the Fraser Valley of British Columbia, including Hope and nearby Coquihalla Canyon Provincial Park.

The scenery is magnificent, although at this time of year many attractions are still closed.

There’s plenty of wildlife too, though not so many birds, which brings us to the issue of the bear spray.

It could mean the difference between life and death if we happen to be confronted by a bear in the forest.

If we don’t use it, we can return it with the car and get half of our $50 back.

The thing is, it is packaged in that tough plastic that usually takes a pair of scissors and plenty of determination to free.

Do we ask the bear for a timeout while we cut it open, or do we cut it open beforehand and in doing so lose $25 bucks — even if we don’t use it?

Decisions, decisions . . .

The Expedition by the way is getting about 12.1L/100km.