31 days of Adventure - multi generational outings/trips

I am joining the Nester's 31 Days of Writing.  Check out my entire series - "31 Days of Adventure."

Perhaps the greatest multi generational trip I have ever undertaken was with extended family took Pappy,my husband's grandfather, on the Alcan Highway to celebrate his 90th birthday.  Pappy wanted to take this trip to see the part of the road he helped to build during WWII. If you need a good laugh, you MUST read Old People are Slippery and other Tales. It is a good summary of trip.

Here are a few tips I have gathered.

Manage Expectations- Let everyone know what you are going to do and see. 

Plan Ahead - Expect people are going to be tired, hungry, bored etc... Plan for that.  This is probably not a good time to fly by the seat of your pants.

Include as many participants in the planning as possible.

Do you have a good multi generational trip story - tell me about it in the comments?



Leavenworth, WA
Pappy's 92nd Birthday

Alcan Highway - Fort St John

This is part 2 of our trip up the Alcan Highway. Part One is here. Fort St John was our 2nd stop along the Alcan Highway. I highly recommend the Super 8 there as it has a water slide and Mr Mike's next to it. We visited the Museum in Fort St John. Above is my artistic oil derrick picture. I don't have much to say about this museum out of all of them we went to this was definitely the roughest and less polished of all of them.

Outside of Fort St John is Charlie's Lake. Charlie's lake is where during the War that 341st sent a makeshift pontoon boat across the lake and it sunk. There is a monument. The window you look through and can see approximately where the boat went down. Pappy was suppose to be on the boat but he was late. We tried to drive all the way around the lake but it wasn't possible. Below is a picture of Charlie and Charlie(Pappy) at Charlie Lake.

Alcan Highway (Dawson Creek)

*** This a 4 part series on our trip along the Alcan Highway. We took over 1,000 pictures. Hey, my Dad use to work at Kodak. It is all about the Kodak moments. All the observations are mine. Believe me, all the opinions are mine.

quote from the Alaska Highway House exhibit

What so special about the Alcan Highway? It was built in Canada by the United States military and civilians in response to bombing of Pearl Harbor.The Alaska-Canada Highway or Alcan Highway starts at Dawson Creek and officially ends at Fairbanks. It is 1,523 miles. There were 11,000 US troops used in the construction along with thousands of civilians. 133 bridges were constructed and over 8,000 culverts installed.The original highway was built in roughly in 8 months, 12 days. It is considered one of those civil engineering marvels. The conditions to build the road were less than desirable extreme heat and cold, mud, many rivers to cross, lack of equipment, mosquitoes etc.

On the 4th of July we were in Dawson Creek. The information center was serving Hot Dogs and cupcakes for the 4th of July. I thought that was cool. The information center is located in the train station along with a small museum and video on the Alcan Highway. It is definitely worth a stop. We also visited the art gallery. In the hallway at the gallery, there are some awesome pictures of the building of the highway. In addition we stopped at the Alaska Highway House in Dawson Creek and watched a great video on the Alcan Highway. Their exhibit on the construction of the highway is top notch. There were so many reason that the Alcan Highway was hard to build. Parts of the road went through muskeg which is essentially mud so the engineers built corduroy roads. There was an example of this at the Alaska Highway House and Pappy also had a picture of this too. Basically they had to build a wooden road across the mud. Pappy next to the corduroy road exhibit

Below is the terms of employment for civilians:

This is no picnic

Working and living conditions are as difficult as those encountered on any job done in the United States or foreign country. Men hired for this job will be required to live and work under the most extreme conditions imaginable. Temperatures will range from 90 above to 70 below. Men will have to fight swamps, rivers, ice and gnats will not only be annoying but will cause bodily harm. If you are not prepared to work under these conditions do not apply.

(found on the monument located at Fort Nelson, Fort Nelson Heritage Museum)


Throughout our journey we were constantly on the look out for the history of the Alcan history. There are some historic markers still left or re erected during the 25th and 50th anniversary of the highway along with panels describing the history of the Alcan Highway. Without a doubt the Alcan Highway has been improved over time so we actively tried to travel what was left of the old highway by taking detours. The road today is completely paved though maintenance is on-going. We went through several sections that had construction going on.



We especially liked going over Kiskatinaw Bridge. The Kiskatinaw bridge is the a timber bridge that curves nine degrees and is original to the Highway. The only original bridge that still exists. It is just outside Dawson Creek. At the Alaska Highway House, there is a model of the bridge.

Old People are Slippery and other tales

bumper sticker on a vehicle at the Fort Nelson Heritage Museum

Any trip with the two man wrecking crew would not be complete without a few adventures or tales. There were so many incredible moments during the trip and just darn wacky moments too. This post is about the wacky in case you were wondering.

At Fort St John, we stayed at Super 8. This Super 8 has a water slide. The Giant Man Child and #1 Son had been going down. I even went down and I am glad there is no photographic proof. Pappy somehow decided that he needed to go down too. I personally didn't think it was a great idea but who I am to tell 89 year old what he can or can not do. The Giant Man Child helped him up the stairs and showed him how to slow down by holding against the sides. They wanted me to catch him. Well he went really fast down the slide and flew by my outstretched hands and landed face down at the lower end of the pool. My first thought was this was going to end badly. He was fine once I helped him up. It just proves that old people are slippery. He decided against a repeat performance. I think we were a little bit relieved about that.


Upon arriving in Prince George, Pappy decided that we should go to Cariboo Restaurant. He was dying to have Cariboo. He was so disappointed to arrive and find that they can't serve wild game. He wanted some Cariboo. Darn it! He picked that restaurant because it had Cariboo in it's name so they must serve Cariboo.

There was the woman in Chetwynd that thought we stole her room It took us over 4o minutes to check in because this lady thought we stole her room with double beds. She didn't believe we had reservations. According to Nonna and the Giant Man Child, the desk clerk handled this well. The lady( I use that term very loosely) was offered another room free with a single bed so she would have 2 rooms. The motel was totally booked due to a refinery turn around. She was traveling with her husband and they evidently wanted to share room and not a bed. She just kept arguing endlessly. She was at the desk 30 minutes later as we were going to to dinner. We seriously thought she might slash our tires.


We decided we must be totally not understandable to the average Canadian. Almost every dinner we ordered at a restaurant arrived wrong. Usually it was Nonna that got the wrong meal. It started to get comical but we never starved. I am living proof of that.


I have to say we wouldn't be able to take our trip if our kids weren't great car travelers. Overall they were outstanding. BUT Chuckles can talk a blue streak especially when he gets tired. We started giving him Tootsie pops to shut him up but apparently he has some special skill that allows him to talk with one of those in his mouth. One time, that I am not proud of, I told him TO SHUT UP! We also told them to shut the sound off on the electronic devices so then Chuckles would proceed to hum the star wars theme song with the game - annoying especially since he was seated behind me. At some point, I preferred the electronic sound.


This trip couldn't be complete without a bathroom tale. In between Ft St John and Fort Nelson there is only one real rest area. I decided about 8 miles outside of Fort Nelson and about 200 miles from the nearest rest area. I couldn't wait another moment. It was an emergency so my hubby graciously (snort) pulled over. I went into the woods and several things crossed my mind: a. ) relief b.) I still know how to do this without ruining my pants c.) I hope I hid myself well enough as I have a loud blue shirt on. I don't think the passing motorists need any shock and awe if you know what I mean d.) I hear rustling in the woods. We had seen bear on a previous day right off the highway e.) I vow to never drink that much Pop again. f.) fat woman running out of the woods.

1,000 Reasons

There were 1,000 reason not to take this trip but one good reason to go - Pappy.

We have been on a 10 day vacation to travel the Alcan Highway in Canada. Pappy helped to build the Alcan Highway during WWII as part of the 341st Engineer Battalion. He operated mostly a DC-8 CAT that cleared the trees out of the way. In honor of Pappy's upcoming 90th birthday, we decided to travel the part he help build- Fort St John to Fort Nelson.

Pappy on a Cat 1942

This multi generation trip was a huge undertaking a 10 day trip with four adults and two children that would take us up through Britsh Columbia, Canada and through the towns of Prince George, Chetwynd, Dawson Creek, Fort St John, Fort Nelson, Liard Hot Springs and all the way back to Prince George by car. We figured we traveled roughly about 1/3 of the Alcan Highway.

Pappy 2010 beside a CAT that was similar to one he used in 1942 at Fort Nelson Heritage Museum

It was a genuine opportunity to get know history of this time period with someone who had been there. How cool was it for someone to tell us that he was there when a explosion leveled 1 city block minus 1 building in Dawson Creek. A rock rolled right by him. Or that he missed the makeshift boat that sank on Charlie Lake because he was late. I think we all are all thankful for that. Or how he buried his CAT but was able to escape in the nick of time. I learned so much about this time period and my kids really soaked it up too.