Our Alaska Expenses

We are sharing a breakdown of all of our expenses during Season Four: Alaska Bound. Our hope is that the information will help you plan your own trip to Alaska. These are our actual expenses. There are so many variables that affect the cost, but we’ll try to give you enough details to assist you. Note that all prices are in US dollars and all distances are in miles.

To give you a little background, we were on the road for a total of 199 nights or 200 days, basically six and a half months. Most of the expenses we’ll break down into three segments of our trip. The first 43 nights of the season and the last 17 nights of the season were in the lower 48 states, so we lumped those expenses into the Lower 48 segment. The second segment is Canada. This includes 31 nights on the way to Skagway, plus six nights from Haines to Chicken, and then another 31 nights on the way back from Alaska. The third segment is Alaska itself. In addition to the 67 contiguous nights in Alaska, we also dipped down into Skagway and Haines for four nights on our way up through Canada.

So that gives us 60 nights in the Lower 48, 68 nights in Canada, and 71 nights in Alaska, a pretty rough split between the three. The miles covered in those segments are more variable. We travelled 7,718 miles in the Lower 48, 5,705 miles in Canada, and only 3,871 miles in Alaska.

One of the largest expenses for the trip was gas. Our Red Tail Lodge (our VanDOit camper van) uses regular gas, not diesel. So if your vehicle uses diesel and DEF, your expenses will be higher. Our average MPG was 12.7 miles per gallon. If your vehicle gets better or worse mileage than that, you’ll need to adjust the gas budget accordingly. We also were traveling when gas prices were pretty high, but they fluctuated quite a bit over the course of the six and a half months we were on the road. For example, the lowest price per gallon that we paid was $3.45 in Broomfield, Colorado at the end of the season. However, the price was $4.20 per gallon in Broomfield when we started the season. As you can see, the price was all over the place from $3.45 per gallon to as high as $8.15 per gallon. However, the average price was not as variable, with Canada being the most expensive at an average of $5.87 per gallon, followed by Alaska with an average of $5.28 with the Lower 48 being the cheapest at $3.94 per gallon. Because we drove more miles in the Lower 48 than in Canada, our gas totals in Canada were about the same as the Lower 48, $2,496.01 compared to $2,510.23. Our Alaska total gas was much less, $1,571.71 due to the lower number of miles driven in Alaska. Even though Alaska is a huge state, there is a very limited number of roads to drive on, with most destinations along a handful of highways.

The next largest expense for the season was lodging. Since we were traveling in our Red Tail Lodge, this means campground costs. We stayed in a variety of types of campgrounds. Most of the time, we did not have any hook ups. While in Canada, we stayed mostly in Provincial and National Parks. Although we rarely did disperse camping, we generally stayed away from private campgrounds, although we did stay in a few. A couple of nights we stayed for free, mooch docking on a relative’s driveway and the Copper River Campground run by the U.S. Department of Fish & Wildlife in Chitina, Alaska. The most expensive campgrounds we stayed in were private campgrounds, the KOA in Leavenworth, Washington, the Downtown RV Park in Watson Lake, Yukon Territory, and the KOA in Seward, Alaska. However, on average, due to all of the Provincial Parks we stayed in, Canada was the cheapest at $26.62 per night, followed by the Lower 48 with an average of $29.26, and Alaska was the most expensive with an average of $35.60 per night. If you like to camp with hook ups, you’ll need to budget in more. Likewise, if you like to boondock more, then you could probably save some expenses on lodging. For a complete list of the campgrounds on our itinerary, we put together a PDF for you: 2022 Alaska Trip Campground List.pdf.

The third largest expense for the season was excursions. We felt that excursions would help us truly experience Alaska, and this is one area we did not skimp on. You will have to decide for yourself which excursions, if any, you believe are worth the price. You can have a wonderful experience in Alaska without excursions, but some of our most memorable moments in Alaska were on excursions. But we also had memorable moments while we were not on excursions, as well.

We only did a handful of excursions in the lower 48, the art center in Lucas (Kansas Backroads - March 31st to April 1st, 2022), the Cosmosphere in Hutchinson (Hutchinson, Kansas - April 2nd, 2022), the Crazy Horse Memorial in South Dakota (South Dakota Black Hills - April 27th to 29th, 2022), and the Hjiemkomst Center just across the river from Fargo, North Dakota (Fargo, North Dakota - October 7th to 8th, 2022).

In Canada, there were a lot of gondola rides including the Peak to Peak Gondola in Whistler (Whistler, British Columbia - May 29th, 2022), the Sea to Sky (Squamish, British Columbia - May 27th to 28th, 2022), the Jasper Skycam (Jasper, Alberta - September 17th to 19th, 2022), and the Banff Gondola (Banff, Alberta - September 23rd to 25th, 2022). Also in Canada, we rode the Aquabus in Vancouver (Vancouver, British Columbia - May 12th to 15th, 2022), toured the SS Klondike paddle boat in Whitehorse (Alcan: Whitehorse, Yukon Territory - June 16th to 17th, 2022) and the Dredge #4 outside of Dawson City (Dawson City, Yukon Territory - June 20th to 21st, 2022), and took a shuttle bus to get to Lake Louise and again to Moraine Lake (Lake Louise, Alberta - September 21st to 22nd, 2022). The Northern Lights Centre in Watson Lake (Tā Ch’ilā Provincial Park, British Columbia - September 1st-4th, 2022) and the KSAN Museum in Hazelton (Hazelton, British Columbia - September 9th to 10th, 2022) rounded out our Canadian excursions.

But the majority and most expensive of our excursions were in Alaska. We started with riding the train on the White Pass Summit Excursion in Skagway (Skagway, Alaska - June 12th to 13th, 2022), followed by a guided glacier hike in Matanuska (Matanuska Glacier, Alaska - June 26th to 27th, 2022). In Anchorage, we took the trolly tour, visited the Alaska Native Heritage Center, and rented e-bikes for a day (Anchorage, Alaska - June 28th to July 4th, 2022). Our most expensive excursion, but our most memorable experience, was the Bald Mountain Air Tour, from Homer over to Brooks Falls in Katmai National Park to watch the grizzly bears fish for salmon (Katmai National Park, Alaska - July 11th, 2022). In Valdez, we rode on the Lu-Lu Belle Glacier Cruise where we saw a lot of sea life, including sea otters, puffins, and sea lions (Valdez, Alaska - July 20th to 25th, 2022). In Wrangell-St Elias National Park, we enjoyed the Kennecott History Walking Tour of the copper mill (McCarthy, Alaska - July 25th to 28th, 2022). Fairbanks was excursion packed with the Tanana Valley Fair (Pioneer Park, Fairbanks, Alaska - July 31st to August 1st, 2022), the Arctic Circle bus tour, the Fountainhead Antique Auto Museum, and the Riverboat Discovery (Fairbanks, Alaska - August 15th to 19th, 2022). In Denali National Park, we bought the Tek Pass (bus pass) since we were camping in the Teklanika Campground (Denali National Park: Teklanika River, Alaska - August 4th to 8th, 2022), took the Tundra Wilderness Tour (Denali National Park: Riley Creek, Alaska - August 2nd to 3rd, 2022), and paid for the Discovery Hike Bus to get to our ranger-guided off-trail hike (Denali National Park: Savage River, Alaska - August 9th to 12th, 2022). Just outside of Denali National Park, we hopped on board the Denali Peak Experience Flight which flew us back into the park over the glaciated mountains (Denali Peak Experience Flight - August 20th, 2022). We finished off our time in Alaska with the Musk Ox Farm and Alaska State Fair in Palmer (Palmer, Alaska - August 22nd to 25th, 2022).

For more details on all of these excursions, go to our blog posts on each of the areas. All of the posts have links at the bottom to the next and previous post, or search for a particular post. Or visit our Alaska playlist on our YouTube channel.

Here is the summary of all of the expenses. As you can see, the next biggest chunks were dining out and groceries. In fact, if you group those two items together, they are the largest expense, at a total of $10,317.06 for the season. Food is probably the most variable and flexible of the expenses. On average, we probably ate out one or two meals per week, but we also bought a lot of snacks and drinks, which we included in the Dining Out line item. And that includes a lot of chai lattes, cinnamon buns, and ice cream. The rest of the meals we prepared in our Red Tail Lodge. The Groceries line item includes supplies, such as paper towels and trash bags, as well as food items. If you like to eat out a lot, increase the food budget. Likewise, if you plan on preparing all of your own meals, you can reduce this amount. As a rule of thumb, you can expect eating out and groceries to be slightly more expensive than what you would find at home. Our food expenses (and supplies) worked out to be an overall average of $51.60 per day for the two of us. That average breaks down to $43.29 per day in the Lower 48, $50.03 per day for Canada, and $60.81 per day for Alaska.

The rest of the items on the expense list are smaller, but can add up if you’re not expecting them. The miscellaneous line item is the cash we spent that we did not keep track of what it was spent on. Our guess is that the cash was spent on things like laundry, snacks, tolls, and parking. We should have kept track of how much we spent on laundry, but we didn’t. Obviously, laundry was less than $1500. Our guess it that it was at least $500 in total for the season.

We took several ferries which included to and from Vancouver Island, from Skagway to Haines, and from Whittier to Valdez. The line item also includes the two days of train passes we bought for taking the commuter train into Vancouver.

We didn’t buy many souvenirs, mainly t-shirts and stickers. However, we included the cost of the binoculars we bought in Denali National Park, which was $95.

Parking, tolls, and park entrance fees includes the South Dakota State Park annual pass ($36) and the Canadian National Park annual pass ($115.02). Investigate for yourself whether an annual pass will save you money or not depending on your itinerary.

The remaining items we did not break down into the three trip segments, but just added to the season totals.

Vehicle maintenance included a windshield repair kit (we used the one we brought with us - Alcan: Tagish, Yukon Territory - June 10th to 11th, 2022), an oil change, wiper blades, and windshield washer fluid. While we were having our oil changed, the dealer in Anchorage noticed that our tires needed replacing due to wear. The roads in Canada and Alaska are hard on tires. We needed to replace all four, but they could only find two of the tires we needed so we just had the worst two replaced and waited until we got home to replace the other two. We didn’t feel safe making the trip back with all four tires being bad. So we included the two tires in this expense item. You may not need to replace your tires while you are on your trip, but odds are probably pretty good that you will need some kind of unexpected vehicle maintenance. We would recommend allocating a budget item for the possibility. Also included in the line item is money for a lock smith. We locked ourselves out of our Red Tail Lodge one morning in Anchorage and had to call a lock smith to get back in. Luckily we were in a city and not out in a remote area. Roadside assistance would have paid for the lock smith, but we didn’t think of that at the time. We were just thankful to get back into our vehicle and shelter.

Next on the list is our Garmin Inreach (paid link) subscription. We normally carry a Garmin Inreach when we travel which gives us satellite communication (text messages) and a way to send an emergency SOS. For Season Four, we upgraded our plan so that we had the ability to leave bread crumbs of our location, especially useful for remote hikes. We find the InReach gives us peace of mind. Even without a cell signal, we can text our kids with our GPS location to check in periodically. There was one stretch during Season Four when we didn’t have any cell signal whatsoever for five days. We would like to think that our kids would notice if we didn’t check in when expected and notify the authorities. The expense item also includes requesting local weather forecasts which cost extra, but are handy to have when you have no cell signal to look up the weather. You can decide whether a satellite communicator makes sense for you.

We also paid for YouTube Premium. This allowed us to download YouTube videos to our iPad (but not our laptop) for offline viewing. Again, this was for those times when we didn’t have a cell signal at our campground.

We included a line item for haircuts. This was three haircuts for Keith. Ann cuts her own hair. It is not a large expense for us, but six and a half months is a long time. This is an item to consider, depending on your hair cutting preferences.

We bought the TourSaver. This is a way to perhaps save some money on excursions, depending on which excursions you want to do. It is a risk, though. Most of the discounts are buy one, get one free, so it doesn’t make sense for someone traveling by themselves. Our advice to is look up to see exactly what the TourSaver covers and which excursions will fit in your itinerary. Even then, you may reserve something like a cruise or flight, only to have it cancelled due to weather. The tour company will refund what you paid for the excursion, but you don’t get a refund for buying the TourSaver, you spend that regardless. In our case, we used the TourSaver for the Alaska Native Heritage Center (saving $28.95), the Anchorage Trolly Tour (saving $25), the Miller’s Landing Tonsina Beach Guided Paddle in Seward (which would have saved us $116.94, but we had to cancel due to catching COVID - Seward, Alaska - July 13th to 18th, 2022), and the Riverboat Discovery Cruise in Fairbanks (saving $75.95). That’s a total savings of $129.90. After deducting the cost of the TourSaver, we saved only $39.91. At some places, it was not clear how to apply the discount. You can decide if it is worth the trouble.

The last item is the Milepost. This was our bible for the trip. It is invaluable. It has almost every detail you can imagine for the trip up through Canada and while you are in Alaska. We would not consider a road trip to Alaska without it. We should have doubled this line item because we actually bought two of them. The first one was a couple of years ago when we first starting planning our trip. An updated version of the Milepost comes out every April. So we bought a second one at the beginning of the season, so we would have all the updated information. When you buy one, you get access to a soft copy of the book. However, we mainly used the hardcopy.

These are the items we did not include in our expense summary, but you may want to consider them. We did not pay more for these items than we normally do, but that may not be the case for you.

Our health insurance plan covered us for emergencies while we were in Canada, although we would have to pay for any medical expenses up front and get reimbursed later.

Our vehicle insurance also covered us in Canada and we had our insurance agent provide us with a Canada Non-Resident inter-province Motor Vehicle Liability Insurance Card, just in case we needed it. However, we never needed to show it to anyone.

Our roadside assistance is through FMCA Roadside Rescue (Family Motor Coach Association) and covered us while in Canada. You’ll need to check with your plan to see if you are covered.

When exchanging currencies, banks and credit card companies often charge an international transaction fee. We did not include these fees as a line item because either they were included in the conversion from Canadian dollars to US dollars or the few remaining ones were less than $8 total. Be careful on this one as it could add up. When we checked with our different credit cards, only one of the three cards didn’t charge an international transaction fee, so we tried to make sure we exclusively used that one for purchases and reservations in Canada, although we goofed a couple of items.

The last item not included is our cell phone service. We have an AT&T plan on our cell phones along with a Verizon Jetpack hotspot. Our Verizon plan did not work at all in Canada. It detected when we crossed the border and did not work again, at all, until we crossed back into the United States. Our AT&T plan did work all across Canada, but, since it is not an AT&T network in Canada, we were deprioritized. At times, even though it looked like we had a strong cell signal, our throughput was rather poor. However, it was still usable, especially for phone calls and text messages. We mainly noticed the lack of throughput when streaming videos or trying to post one of our videos to YouTube.

So there you have it. A grand total of $32,651.95 for the whole season, which works out to an average of $5,023.38 per month and $163.26 per day. We hope this information helps you plan your epic road trip to Alaska.

Check out our related video: Our Alaska Expenses

(Ann)