WHY IT’S SPECIAL

From Canada to Alaska, through some of the wildest landscapes in North America, this epic highway offers one of the greatest road trips in the world.

The 1,387-mile (2,232km) highway winds through the lonely forests of British Columbia, climbs the Rockies into the majestic wilderness of the Yukon – look out for bears – and continues north to Dawson Creek and past the Kluane mountains towards Fairbanks, Alaska. There are few places in North America built on this scale, and nowhere a highway threads through landscapes this varied, this awe-inspiring or this long: mountain, forest, lake, river – they just keep on coming, mile after majestic mile.

Completed in 1942, the road was built to forestall a possible Japanese invasion from the north. After the war, when it was opened to public traffic, its gruelling terrain saw it dubbed the “graveyard of the American automobile”. Things are easier today, but this is still a breathtaking journey.

YOU’LL NEVER FORGET…

The splendour of the scenery.

INSIDER TIP

No time to drive the entire highway? Dawson Creek to Whitehorse

(872 miles/1,404km) is a popular, shorter route. The old Klondike goldfields at Dawson City in the Yukon are worth the extra detour.

HOW TO DO IT

Frontier Canada (020 8776 8709; frontier-canada.co.uk) can organise a two-week trip from £2,650, with car hire, flights and accommodation; or fly to Calgary with WestJet (westjet. ca), BA (britishairways.com) or Air Canada (aircanada.com), pick up a car or camper and explore independently.

DRIVE TIME The Alaska Highway skirts the Yukon River near Whitehorse, in Canada