Returning Home

We decided to go straight home from Williamsburg via I-95 instead of taking back roads. Traffic on I-95 was not too bad on Saturday and Sunday of Labor Day weekend. We split the trip into two days and stayed overnight in a hotel in Walterboro, SC.

Statistics

For those of you who are interested in the numbers, here are some statistics from the trip.

Statistic	Beth	Tim
Miles Ridden 1	14,001	13,268
Gallons of Gas Consumed	373	455
Miles/gal 2	37.1	29.7
Gasoline $/mile 3	0.13	0.15
Gasoline Average $/gal 4	$4.61	$4.01
Gasoline Highest $/gal	$6.68 Beaver Creek, YT	$6.45 Beaver Creek, YT
Gasoline Lowest $/gal	$3.44 Pembroke, ON	$3.10 Orangeburg, SC
Tires & Repairs $/mile	0.05	0.10

Trip Total Days	60
Nights Camping	41
Camping Avg Cost/ Night	$46
Nights in Hotel	13
Hotel Avg Cost/Night 5	$102

1. Beth rode farther because she rode on the Motor Maids weekend in Montana and Wyoming. ↩︎
2. The 6-cylinder Goldwing gets worse mileage to begin with. It pulled the trailer 99% of the time, so this wasn’t too bad. ↩︎
3. All monetary values are in US Dollars. ↩︎
4. The Harley uses premium gas, while the Goldwing uses regular gas. ↩︎
5. Beth shared a room 6 of the nights. If she hadn’t the average cost would have been about $145/night. ↩︎

Savings

I estimate we saved about $7500 by camping and preparing our meals.

• Camping vs Hotels = $4500
• Cooking vs Restaurants = $3000

Moments

• Most Favorite
  • Beth: Finding familiar places in Signpost Forest
    Liard Hot Springs
    Anticipating Tim Hortons for morning coffee
    Views of the Canadian Rockies, Banff & Jasper
    
  • Tim: Learning about the indigenous cultures
    
• Least Favorite
  • Beth: Breaking down on the way home just over the Ohio line with bad stator
    
  • Tim: Discovering oil leaking from the differential of the Goldwing trike
    
  Most Disappointing
  • Beth: Denali cloud cover
    
  • Tim: The guy in Kalsipel closing up shop and going home before we arrived.
    
• Most Remarkable
  • Beth: Visiting the museums showing indigenous culture and art
    Ice sculptures
    Chainsaw art in Chetwynd
    Discovering my childhood friend’s dad helped build the Alaska Highway
    
  • Tim: The sheer size of Alaska.
    
• Would Return To
  • Beth: Alaska to see southern coastal areas we missed
    
  • Tim: I would like to go to Dawson City, which I haven’t been to.
    
• Don’t Want To
  • Beth: … do so many days in a row setting up and taking down camp
    
  • Tim: Ride through the bad construction zones again.

Overall, this was a fantastic trip, one made better by travelling with our friends Lynne and Mike. The scenery was spectacular, from the multitude of Ontario’s lakes to the vast expanse of yellow canola fields to the soaring peaks of the Alaska Range and Rockies. Our experience is that it’s best done by motorcycle, where the views are all around you and not just through the windshield.