Stopping At The Eagle Plains Hotel

If you don't feel like driving straight through from Dawson City to Inuvik (or the reverse routing), you've got one option for where to stay. Welcome to Eagle Plains. There's a motel, a place for gas and auto repair, whatever you need to recharge and get you on your way along the Dempster highway. Looking for small town charm? Keep driving.

Down a hallway, strictly utilitarian from a time period decades ago.

The place isn't that big, but between exhaustion from a long drive and not knowing the area, one could feel a little lost, as if in a rat maze.

Two more disorienting looks.

Flinty patron in the lobby.

Driving The Dempster Highway With The 2015 Ford F-150, Part 1

If you live in Inuvik, NWT, Canada, and you need supplies, time to hitch up a trailer and head to Whitehorse or Fairbanks. Three days for a gallon of milk and some lumber? Ford decided to see what the drive is all about and sent its new pickup to have a look. James went along with a video crew to record the experience.

The F-150, cruising the Dempster highway.

In Canada, it seems that dogs not only ride in trucks, but also drive them.

Revealed: What's at the end of a rainbow.

The trusty camera department. You want a layer of mud? Drive a kilometer and you're all set.

The crew, watching the light, not the road.

Along The Dempster Highway In Canada

Way up within the Arctic Circle in the Northwest Territories of Canada sits the small government town of Inuvik. The lone road to other towns and supplies is the Dempster Highway, a forbidding traverse through beautiful scenery, but miles and miles of unsupported land. Drive the Dempster and prepare to fend for yourself.

A typical view.

A few rivers to cross, ferries provided. The main town at the south end of the road, Dawson City, where the Yukon and Klondike rivers merge.

More scenery.

Stuff out for decay and stuff flowering.

Crossing into the Arctic Circle.

Mama grizzly and her pup.

Shopping For Game

How best to get inspired at a sporting goods store in Fairbanks, Alaska? Just look up. The stuffed world is right in front of you, daring you to pick up a tent, stove, heavy coat and weapon of choice and head out hunting or fishing.

Looks like the whole zoo is there to greet you when you walk in.

Bison in the back, wolf wailing in an aisle.

Shy taxidermy.

By sea or by land, it's all on display, including old snow shoes and mean-looking bear traps.

Hollering hog. "Go hunt!"

Traveling From Fairbanks To Chicken

Yes, Chicken is a real town in Alaska. Just head out of Fairbanks due east, drive a few hours and stop to have lunch in lovely Chicken, Alaska.

While Fairbanks is in the middle of the state and seems to be the end of the road for travel, it still attracts tourists, mainly to go check out Denali National Park to the south. No mistaking the tour buses.

Sprucing up a newspaper box. What to do at the airport when it's slow? Throw together a couple of hockey goals and get playing.

A creative way to protect the watershed.

It's not hard to know when you've arrived in Chicken.

The town features a landlocked dredger and a thrown together stage.

Alaska Airport Animals

Just like in the Missoula Airport, the terminal in Fairbanks features the finest examples of local wildlife. They don't mess around in Alaska, no turkeys or innocent-looking deer. Go big game or go home.

Excuse me, sir, can I start you off with a grizzly bear?



Or thinking about going polar?



A wolf watching the departure counter.

Shooting At The Ranch In Montana

James got to play cowboy on a recent shoot for Ford's new 2015 F-150 in Montana. The challenge was to move hundreds of hay bails around the ranch in order to give the truck a real western workout. The Ford did well, no straw dog.

Our hero, grace under hay bail pressure.

Talking ranching and horsing around.

The crew, working in the fields.

Tools of the trade: stockyard for cattle, pastures for hay.

Making a phone call at the weigh station.

Perched on the hay rolls. The vista: a picnic table, John Deere tractor and beyond.

The next generation.

Enjoying Osprey Baseball In Missoula, Montana

Big Sky; small game. Welcome to Osprey baseball, played next to the mountains surrounding Missoula.

The men seem to be intently watching the game, whether lining up with some shade or in an all ages group.

And, don't forget the women.

Off field activities include a pitch speed challenge and some concessions flirting.

Real play and horseplay.