The First Road to Reach the Arctic. Edge of Nowhere, Tuktoyaktuk.

When I first got into adventure filmmaking, I had to really train myself to separate the business from the beauty and focus on the task at hand. But as time has gone by, it seems that I've become so focused that I often don't recognize the significance of what's in front of me until days or sometimes even weeks later. But this week, for the first time in a long time, I found myself lost in the landscape. Four years I've been waiting to put rubber down on this road. It's the one road that takes you to the very top of Canada, ending at the Arctic Ocean. It's a thousand kilometers of poorly maintained, unpaved shale and gravel. It's probably one of the main driving forces for building this particular rig, and it's actually the only section this season that is new to not just Destination Adventure, but me entirely. It is almost certainly going to be a dusty and muddy mess, but more than anything, it's going to be freaking awesome. I am incredibly excited to finally welcome you all to the Dempster Highway. I taped up the door to hopefully mitigate some of the dust inside the rig, but we've intentionally chosen this week to do the Dempster because it's calling for rain, and so far it's looking pretty good. A little bit pot-holey. I got 44 psi in the airbags, and I'm averaging about 70 kilometers an hour. If I can maintain this for the next thousand kilometers, that'd be just perfect. Just coming into the Tombstone Mountain Range, and from what I'm told, this is the nicest part of the whole drive. Surprisingly, the road is getting increasingly better the further we get, so we're making pretty good time. I haven't the slightest idea where we're going to be camping throughout this trip at all, but I think we're shooting for three days to do the whole highway. Today, I'm guessing we'll be camping probably somewhere on the other side of the tombstones. Everybody told me the tombstones are beautiful. They have far surpassed my expectations. I think we're about halfway through. We're stopping at a photo spot here. You guys gotta see it. Look at that. A little bit windy out here, but that's okay. Just beautiful in here. I'm thinking we're going to be gone by the time the fall colors start to set in, but just imagine this because these are all going to turn a beautiful red. Those have turned yellow. This whole valley is just going to be red and yellow. We'll see. Maybe when we get all the way up to the top, we'll run into something really cool that keeps us for a month, then we'll get to see the fall colors, but I have my doubts. Nevertheless, it's time to find somewhere to camp. Oh no. Busted the leaf hanger right off. So I've been traveling and filming like this for the better part of seven years now, and one unfortunate reality that comes with that is you do become desensitized to things, whether it be experience or views. I've got to tell you, tombstones is the first place this season to truly shock me. This place is spectacular, and that is an understatement. Unfortunately, I can't fly the drone right here in the park. I'll be putting it up as soon as we're out of here, and hopefully I can capture some views for you guys, but I'm definitely adding the tombstones to the destination adventure list of places you must visit in the north. Oh, horses. We're a little bit too far away to get a good shot, but there's a whole herd of horses over here. Not sure if they're wild or not because there was what looked like a ranch property back there, but they're right at the tail end of a rainbow. Quick little detour. I'm seeing something on the hillside over here. It looks like an old communications tower or something. There's a road going over to it, and it doesn't say private property, so we're going to check it out. I think it's definitely some kind of communications something. Yeah, now that's the problem, is how am I going to turn around with the trailer on? I think we're going to have to unhook the trailer. Well, there is a certain story that comes along with the sudden change in condition of my new shirt, of which I'm not going to get into, but it did involve almost losing the boat and trailer down the hill back there. Anyways, we got it figured. Back on the road. We've just left the park about three kilometers ago, so I'm allowed to fly the drone. Amazing timing. There's a herd of horses down here crossing in the river. That's crazy. Good eye. Good eye, mate. An unbelievable turn of events. We just leave the park, so we're allowed to camp, boondock anywhere. Emmy spied a glorious train of horses that I had to stop and film, and then coincidentally, there's like the world's best camp spot right here. I'm going to try and back down there, see if we can find a level spot. I've been thinking about spending the 70 bucks on leveling blocks, but when you're having fun like this, it's hard to justify it. This is hilarious, but would you take a look at that view? What an exceptional camp spot. The height of the truck right now is literally comical. Let me show you. Usually the generator just barely fits under the truck. Look at the outdoor kitchen. Going to need a step stool to cook tonight. This camp spot, I think it falls into the category of probably top five I've ever stayed in, and I think it comes down to this mountain and the river. The way the foliage is so sparse here, it reminds me of nothing I've ever seen in Canada before. I actually feel like I'm in the southern Alps in New Zealand or possibly Iceland. This is the Blackstone River in front of us, and for whatever reason, it flattens out to about 500 meters across right here, and it just breaks into all these different channels and fingers, and that mountain sitting in behind it gives you a view that's honestly kind of hard to comprehend and really difficult to translate on camera. But the highlight, of course, I think has been these horses. They're definitely not wild, but for whatever reason, they've chosen to stay right in front of our camp. They spent the whole night there, and every time we looked out the window, it was getting progressively nicer. There was rainbows going down the valley, then rainbows and horses, and we finished off the night with a beautiful golden hour. I think we could spend a week here pretty happily, but we still have actually more than 700 kilometers to cover, so time to hit the road. We have a destination today, the other side of Eagle Plains, which will bring us officially into the Arctic Circle, but I'll tell you, it's going to be a grind to get there. We just hit the road, and the views already are unbelievable. I've been told that the road improves a lot once you get into Northwest Territory. I'm not sure what to expect because it is pristine condition for a dirt road. We're doing almost 90 kilometers an hour right now, which is the same as what I do on the pavement. The views remain spectacular, but the road has taken a turn for the worse. I'm hoping it's just because we're climbing this big hill. Pretty washboardy, but there's a lot of large rock underneath the surface, so that probably contributes. Drop the airbags down to 30 psi. Unfortunately, the rig is too heavy for me to really play with the tire pressure a whole lot, but shouldn't last too long. The last 30 minutes have been pretty rough, so we're going to stop and just do a check over on the rig, make sure everything's looking good. It seems like everybody else has a similar idea. Well, everything's looking pretty good. Dad and I built these light covers this year. I kept breaking my lights off the trailer. Several hundred kilometers of dirt road, well probably over a thousand kilometers of dirt road now this season. I haven't broken a light yet. I was under the impression that Eagle Plains was the town right at the Arctic Circle crossing, but there's actually about 40 kilometers difference. Nevertheless, I did find a couple camp spots on satellite, so we're going to stick to the plan and hopefully find a nice spot by the river here and then push northbound tomorrow. I'm going to be totally honest with you guys. Yesterday was a bit of a grind for me. I mean, this is a purpose-built rig and the purpose is to access remote, hard-to-reach places like this, but hour after hour of abusing your rig is difficult after a while. But the road is supposed to get drastically better once we hit northwest territories, and that's only 87 kilometers ahead of us, so ready to hit the road. We're hitting the road today without too much of a plan for destination, because there's a couple factors that could really interfere with timeline. There's actually two ferry crossings on this section over the Peel River and Mackenzie River. I have no idea how long that'll take, but if we can get to Inuvik would be the ultimate plan today, but we're kind of just freestyling it. This section of highway, for whatever reason, runs right through airstrip. I'm thinking it's because there's just nothing else up here, so maybe this is a designated emergency landing strip for aircraft. I don't know, but we're whipping it right now. The biggest moment of the trip thus far is about to happen, but the way we travel, it's taken us four months to get this far because we make incremental progress. It doesn't even feel like that big of a moment, but the reality is we've gone a lot of miles and we are about to cross into the Arctic Circle. Well, we've been here for a bit, taking our photos, but I do have to leave a sticker. I actually don't want to leave it on the sign. Kind of a special sign, you know? So I'm gonna go and find my spot on the dumpster. Oh, the wind caught that one. Didn't even get to put it on there crooked. The wind blew it on there perfectly straight. In the grand scheme of things, it's just driving past another sign, but this one feels different. It also feels windy. I'm not much of a photo person, I think because I'm on camera every day anyways, but I really enjoy taking those photos. But our journey is far from over. We're in the Arctic Circle, but we still have to get all the way to the Arctic Ocean. Northwest Territories. 415 kilometers to go. Officially into the Northwest Territory. And there were some folks there putting up a brand new sign. They said there's actually some caribou just up here, so that would be nice. Everything about this drive has far surpassed my expectations, but the land of beautiful mountains and glorious camp spots I think is in the rear view. Just crested a hill, and as far as the eye can see is nothing but flatness. I think we are officially in tundra territory. Just rolling up to our first ferry crossing. I haven't the slightest idea how this works. How's it going? Up here in the north you see a lot of different travel rigs, a lot of European expedition trucks, and up in front of us here is your rich person expedition truck. Got an Earth Roamer. There goes a million dollar bill. I have a feeling we're not going to get to our destination tonight. Well, we'll get to a destination, but I don't think it's going to be Inuvik. As a matter of fact, I don't even think we're going to get across the Mackenzie River today. I picked out a couple backup camp spots just south of Inuvik yesterday in case we didn't make it that far, and this one turned out just perfect. We still want to try and make it to the very top today, so we're getting an early start. It's just after five in the morning, even though the sun is barely setting still. It's a beautiful morning, and it's hovering just above zero. Let's see how the old girl likes a cold start. Easy peasy. It's three degrees. Interesting experience. I've never had to wear my sunglasses at five in the morning before, but I'll tell you, this sunrise is spectacular. Coming up to our second ferry crossing over the Mackenzie River, and there may have been a miscalculation. We don't know what time the first ferry crossing is. Over the Peel River, it was 9 a.m. That ferry's looking so parked right now. 8.30. Two and a half hours early. Ready to keep whipping it, which was for many years the northernmost town in Canada you could drive to, and the end of the Dempster Highway. Going forwards from here, we're taking the Inuvik-Tuktoyaktuk Highway, which has been in conversation since the 60s, but construction started in 2014 at both ends, met in the middle in 2017, creating the first road in Canada to reach the Arctic Ocean, and bridging the 150 kilometers between Tukt and Inuvik, making Tuktoyaktuk officially the northernmost town in Canada that you can drive to. Being this far north, even though it's only 150 kilometers, constructing this highway was a massive undertaking because of all the permafrost, the muskeg, and a tremendous amount of water. If you look at it from satellite, it's hard to believe there's even a road going through that maze. It was somewhat of an engineering marvel, but for us today, it's the final leg of our Arctic Circle expedition. This last 100 kilometers was grueling, but it gives me tremendous pleasure to officially welcome you to Tuktoyaktuk and the Arctic Ocean. One more stop. Well, here we are at the top of Canada and our 2024 summer turnaround point, and the Dempster Highway has given me a lot of time to think and reflect, and what I've realized is this trip up here to the Arctic Circle, it's not really that big of an accomplishment. It's really all the years leading up to this that has made probably the greatest accomplishment of my life. For years, I thought that being a video producer for Princess Cruise Line was the greatest accomplishment of my life, but it really is this channel, Destination Adventure. This audience has watched me basically grow up from a young man with a lot of ambition and no direction, to achieving and ultimately losing my dream job with COVID, to starting this business and growing this into something that's showing a lot of potential for my future, and none of this has been possible without all of you. It's also allowed me the time to spend with my family. When I was on cruise ships, I was gone all the time. Now I'm able to be home for months at a time. My father spent most of my life working really hard, and he was home every night, but we didn't really get to spend that much time together, but through this truck build, his old truck, the truck that I grew up learning how to shift gears in, we've got to spend a lot of time together, working, fixing, problem solving. Now my relationship with my father and my whole family is stronger today than it's actually ever been before, and that's not something that I talk about really on the channel. In fact, I shy away from really getting too sappy on here very often because it makes me feel selfish to highlight the positives that have come from this business, knowing that many people don't get an opportunity like this with their life. But it's important to me to share what this means with all of you, because I've had the pleasure of meeting and conversing with many of the fans of Destination Adventure, and it always blows me away when somebody tells me that they're a big fan of what I do, because honestly, I am the world's biggest fan of all of you. Now we are in Tuktoyaktuk and our turnaround, but by no means is the adventure over. We'll be chasing stories here for a couple weeks, and then enjoying the glorious trip all the way back south. From the bottom of my heart, thank you all so much for joining me on this beautiful adventure of life. As always, take nothing but pictures, leave nothing but footprints, and I'll catch you on the next one. Tomorrow never come. Stars burn bright outside the city limits, where the canyons are empty. Lonely nights lit by lonely companions, in a sweetness and release. I thought I saw you hiding in the shadow. You were holding the answer. You always wait for the dust to settle, before you tell me you miss me.