WE MADE IT!
The trip from Miami to Alaska was the journey of a lifetime, and we may need a lifetime to recover ;)
We’re overwhelmed with gratitude and utterly exhausted. We are finally sitting down to write this post a few weeks after arriving in Alaska. We reached the Last Frontier on July 29th after 30 days of non-stop driving and then immediately jumped on a plane to see the wild coastal brown bears feeding on sockeye salmon in Katmai National Park. It’s already been a whirlwind of sightseeing, wildlife, and experiences. We also all got sick with Covid, we believe, after mixing with our extended family that came from all different parts of the country. We are now finally getting our energies back and finding the time, often late at night or early in the morning, to collect our thoughts, process, and write.
We moved so much in the past months that it feels like our brains are on a treadmill. Thoughts and feelings race out of our minds before we can catch them. The first move was out of our house, and on that same day, we began a 6,007-mile journey from Miami, Florida, to Homer, Alaska. The distance is not actually the crazy part. The crazy part was doing it over 30 days with three energetic young kids, while sharing 180 square feet of living space, and one toilet!
We averaged more than 200 miles of driving per day, which meant that we were usually in the truck for over 4 hours a day. Our kids turned into road warriors, and remarkably, spent a fair chunk of the time not on screens. Even more remarkably, they didn’t complain once and were bursting with genuine excitement nearly every day. We stayed in national parks, state parks, RV parks, and once on the side of the road. We camped in 27 different places, only staying in two places twice. This means we were moving, packing, and unpacking most days. Miraculously, we managed to search for three threatened species along the way!
Our Tortuga (Airstream) has seen better days. She was forced to go at a hare’s pace instead of a turtle’s. Despite the warnings we received from fellow travelers, we completely underestimated how bad the road was in the harrowing last leg of the Alaska-Canada Highway, from Whitehorse, Yukon, to Tok, Alaska. We tried to go slow, but still got caught in some unexpected sections of bumps that felt like a roller coaster, producing those butterflies in the stomach sensations. When we opened the door of the trailer afterward, it looked like a 9.0 magnitude earthquake had hit our Airstream. Shelves were open and emptied everywhere. Underwear, jackets, and onions were strewn about the floor. The road was so bad, in fact, that both our kitchen cabinets flew off the hinges and broke, and the cast-iron grill range cover broke into many pieces. We had a spaghetti sauce spill on the floor, a brand new extra-large peanut butter jar crack open on a shelf, and when we got to Anchorage and filled up water to take a much-needed shower, we realized our freshwater tank's valve had cracked and was leaking. On top of all that, our daughter managed to short-circuit all our bedside reading lights after yanking on one of them. Thankfully, these are all minor issues and are mostly fixed now.
Most importantly, we all made it here in one piece.
Every night on the road in the Tortuga feels like a minor miracle when we see our kids finally fast asleep in their cozy bed, knowing that it will transform into our breakfast table in too few hours. When the last dish is done, the floor mopped, and it’s finally time for us to go to sleep, our heads hit the pillow, and it’s lights out. We were moving so fast that even our dreams could not catch up with us. Sleep is profound, deep, and dark when it finally comes. The lack of writing is due to sheer exhaustion, lack of power or internet, and mainly, lack of time. During so many consecutive long days on the road with kids, every second is accounted for.
As a result of the above, we didnt really pay attention to much news or social media. When we did, it made us understand how our news consumption during more stationary life affects our psyche. Sure enough, Israelis and Palestinians were still killing and fighting, Russia and Ukraine ditto, and now even Elmo is anti-semitic? Do we really need to monitor these stories so closely or is it saner to focus on bison herds, the weather, or literally anything else?
We were saddened to learn of these terrible tragedies in summer camps. First, there was that awful story of the flash flood at Camp Mystic. And then on the day we arrived in Alaska, we learned that 3 little girls lost their lives in a sailing accident at the same Miami sailing camp our kids went to last summer, and probably would have gone to this summer had we remained in town. One of the girls was our friend’s beloved 10 year old daughter, Ari. We were so heartbroken to learn this news. We still are. The perspective of a tragedy that hit close to home heightened our sense of gratitude for simply being lucky enought to have the job of parents to these three wonderful children.
As we allude to in our Pinworm Vision Quest post, a trip like this felt like a pressure cooker, or a kind of stress test for our family and for us as a couple. We had so many challenging moments where we had to maintain composure when everything was going sideways. We weren’t perfect. Not even close. We lost our cool plenty. But we got enough reps in to notice improvement. We saw each kid in a new light and became acutely aware of their individual challenges and abilities. We discovered new ways to channel their creative energies. The kids now understand that we are there for them in a way that may have been clear before, but now we hope feels cemented.
We have so much more to reflect on from this humbling journey, but for now, we are just thankful for our safety, health and for the community of friends who encouraged us to chase this dream. We are looking forward to the opportunity to be here in one place for a while. We are very ready to slow down and focus on learning about local plants and wildlife, after taking one big, long exhale. We don’t want to think about the fact that we will eventually have to drive back! We feel guilty that we didn’t write too much about Canada, especially Jaron, as an actual Canadian. On the return leg, we hope to spend a bit more time in the 51st state. Only kidding about that last jab, ey. We don’t need to worry about these silly politics for now. We’re here in Alaska. The Last Frontier. Together. A family of 5 alive in 2025. Full of gratitude. Curious minds. Open hearts. Let’s go 🐢
