Alaska To Illinois

[mommyof6]

We are going to be driving from Alaska to Illinois at the end of April for a month. My 10 year old daughter has celiac and I would really like to know if someone can help me with places that may be along the way to get food. We will be driving through Canada and I'm not sure about what foods we can cross the border with. We have a lot of family in Illinois but they have no idea what our needs are. We are going to be in the De Kalb, Sandwich, LaSalle area (lots of family). We have never traveled outside of Alaska. (At least not for nine years! )

Our four youngest children have dairy allergies. So rice milk is a must. My husband and I have many food allergies too(just found out a year in a half ago). An all natural food store would be great.

I would like to be able to bring my mom out to eat for Mother's Day. Is there any places that are good with the celiac and allergy diets? I know up here Outback is great (too bad they are over 350 miles away from us but we get there when we can).

We just bought a camper so we can do this and have fun in Alaska . No more worrying about if we can get a hotel room that has a kitchenette and if they will take all 8 of us in one room because of the fire code.

I will appreciate any information you may have about traveling and places you may know of. Thanks!

[MaryJones2]

Hi mommyof6,

You shouldn't have any problems with packaged food crossing the border. Perishables like fruit, vegetables, meat, etc. can be an issue.

When we take long road trips I map out our route and try to find restaurants near our stopping points. If we are passing through a large city I will usually google it to see if there are any unique places to shop or eat.

Chicago has Trader Joe's so that might be worth a trip while you're there.

Also, here are a few restaurants in Illinois: Open Original Shared Link

[mamaw]

We traveled from Pa to Alaska by fifth wheel three summers ago. 12,755 miles total!We spent all summer traveling the Alaskan wilderness, BEAUTIFUL........Border crossings can take some time , we went back & forth many times between Alaska, B.C. & the Yukon. We never hard much of a problem until we entered the US coming back home....it took about 2 hours. I f you google Borederr Crossings it tells you what yoy can bring across the border. If you bring foods make sure thay have the labels on them. Every person is allowed so many kilos of meat per person. Fruits, & seeded vegetable, potatoes can be taken from you.I made gluten-free lasagne for the trip & a few other gluten-free dishes that I had frozen, I had 1 piece of lasagne left for mu supper the day we returned to the US--- it traveled three months with no problem but in the end I lost it & several pricey steaks that I marinated plus a couple of apples. Oddly enough they took three apples & left one! We joked about the border crossing guards just wanting supper. In our truck bed we hauled trees back from a friend's place. They were the burl trees. The ones that have the bumps on them to make a porch post. now we thought we would never get them across the border --- they were in plain site & they never said a word about them. Signs everywhere stating no wood products are permitted because of disease & insects.... to us it was a joke as far as security goes....

They also only went into our 36 foot fifth wheel on our last day . They would not permit one of us to stay while they searched around which I didn't like . We had nothing to hid but it un-nerved me that a stranger was going through our personal belongings. And they removed the food & then showed us what they took... I did show them my doctors dx's for special food but they still kept my gluten-free food...

And you are not permitted to have more than ten thousand dollars cash with you....

No weapons either....

Have a wonderful trip..... Also check out the border crossings & don't go to the ones where they are training border guards as they tear your camper apart trying to find something--- anything.. Going up we had someone tell us to use a different crossing because of this....so we drove a while longer to get to the next crossing that did not train border guards. That was one of the best tips we received......

Make sure you always have everyone's passport & info together so don't to take to much of their time or thet will just pull you over & make you wait, another good tip.

hth

mamaw