Week Seven ~ Alaska Trip May 30-June 4

Well, we had a great weekend dry camping in the overflow area of Hood Park. It was only $5. a night, so it was a good deal. We spent the weekend mostly watching everyone put up and take down tents! The group next to us had three tents, two canopies, one Durango and two vans. There were six adults, two teenage boys, one young girl, four preschoolers and two dogs! Several people slept in the vans. They played wiffle ball, badminton,  Frisbee, and hula hooped. They also swam in the lake a couple of times. A great time was had by all until we had a thunderstorm come through on Sunday evening, so they all packed up quickly and left. It was much too quiet after they were gone.

       On the road to Hood Park

Monday morning we headed out toward Spokane WA. Phil had noticed a leak and he is not sure if it is hydraulic fluid or diesel fuel. So we headed to a Cummins dealer. The dealer was very easy to find, right off the interstate and when we arrived we were pleased to find that they had water and 50 AMP hookups for customers. Of course, we would need to camp here for several years for the price of the repair to make up for campground fees! We checked out Google Maps and found a Chinese Food Buffet within 14 miles, so we went exploring and found it without much trouble. The food was very good.

The repair shop opened at 7AM and Phil was at the door at that time. They entered our information into the computer, we closed the slides and the RV was in the bay by 7:40 AM. Before noon they had diagnosed the problem and were sending for the part to do the repair. They took it into the bay on Wednesday around 11:30 AM and were finished by 3 PM. We had spend some time doing errands, getting prescriptions filled at Walmart, maps at AAA, and going out to lunch. We decided to stay the night and head out fresh on Thursday.

 

On Thursday we took Route 2 up to the Grand Couley Dam. It is quite a sight, larger even than the Hoover Dam. Up the road was also Chief Joshua Dam. The countryside went from rolling fields of wheat to sagebrush to mountains to apple orchards. It was hard to tell what would come around the next corner. We traveled north to Oroville and found an RV park with electricity and water for $8.00 per night. We have had our mail sent here, so hopefully it will come in tomorrow and we will cross the border into Canada.

OK, I am going to post this one on Friday morning. Hopefully if our mail is in today we will be crossing the border and we will not be using our air card until we are out of Canada. If we can pick up a wifi connection, we will be in touch. Otherwise, the next post  will be from Alaska.

We drove from Oroville WA to border crossing. No problems. just the routine questions and we were good to go. We traveled through some absolutely beautiful scenery. British Columbia is very mountainous with rich soil in the south. We were on the wine tasting tour road and there were a lot of grapevines, wineries, and tasting opportunities. Phil just kept driving…..

About midway we encountered some soil that was not as rich, but it grew a lot of sagebrush. We spent the night at a Costco, left early the next morning and drove up to Hixon. We are at a Passport America park. We will make it to Dawson Creek tomorrow and be at Mile One of the Alaska Highway. The lakes and mountains along the way are awesome.

The trip over hill and dale to Dawson Creek was memorable. Shortly after passing Prince George we went through Pine Pass.

We have seen some wildlife along the way. There are usually some deer, Phil spotted an eagle in Oroville and we have seen three black bears by the side of the road. We were traveling too fast to get a good picture of the first two and the third one I got his best side, as he was leaving!

I don’t think we have ever truly encountered a full MOUNTAIN RANGE before. The mountains just kept going on and on. The tree line was very obvious, almost like someone drew a line and told the trees to, “Stop here!” Later we encountered some construction on the High Mountain Road. Cracks us up that there is only one road and they have us follow a Pilot Car. Duh, where else are we going to go?

There are LOTS of RVs on the road traveling to Alaska also. It kind of makes one think of the covered wagons that went west all those years ago. Mode of transportation has changed, but not our desire to go see what is out there over the next hill or around the next bend in the road.

Just before we reached Dawson Creek, we encountered another slow down. This one did not make for a good day for someone!!

I think there was a real heavy storm that went through just before we got there, notice the wet road. Truck and trailer were on their side. NOT GOOD for someone. We don’t know if anyone was hurt, we pray not.

So, we are at Mile Zero. Did a few futile errands this morning. Will have lunch and then go play tourist this afternoon.