Alaska 2018 - Canadian Rockies

                                     

 

Thursday June 14 - 15

We camped at Wilcox Campground, one of several campgrounds along the Ice Field Parkway between Banff and Jasper, Alberta. The campground is actually on the southern edge of Jasper National Park, just north of Banff National Park. The Ice Field Parkway runs through both parks. Wilcox Campground had tiers of campsites on a mountain side, all facing the stupendous mountain view on the other side of the highway. It was mostly sunny, or at least sporadically sunny when we arrived at the campground about 4:15.  Most of the drive through the Canadian Rockies so far had been in the clouds, literally, as the Icefield Parkway passes through the mountains at near tree line. 

It had rained a good part of the morning, sprinkling as we drove around downtown Banff. We ogled the Alpine storefronts for North Face, Columbia, Smart Wool, and Hudson Bay Trading Co., along with souvenir vendors, candy stores and coffee shops. Upscale. Very. There’s a riding stable in town.

It was raining when we got to Lake Louise, so we didn’t take the free shuttle to the lake (hadn’t done our homework to know how long it would take plus the fact we felt a bit pressed to get more miles in for the day.) We may have missed Lake Louise but Bow Lake at Bow Lake Summit a little further north up the Parkway was spectacular. By then the sun was almost shining. The lake, close to the highway, was ringed by snow covered mountains. The turquoise water was perfectly still, and the sun cast perfect reflections of the mountains on the lake.

There were so many rented class C RVs on the road. Canadreams and Adventurers were the two most commonly seen. We figure Canadians take “package” vacations: rent an RV and do the Rockies in a week or a long weekend.

Friday morning first thing, we stopped at Athabasca Glacier. It’s just north of Wilcox Campground. It’s a huge ice mass between mountains.  Photo ops were limited by rain sprinkles and clouds hovering over the mountain peaks.

The Athabascan River that runs beside the Ice Field Parkway to Jasper is uniquely beautiful in color – a light milky turquoise blue, wide and shallow in places with sand bars, then narrower and faster- running at other times, but always that oh-so subtle shade of aqua. (We learned as we went along and observed many more similar rivers that the silvery blue color comes from the fine silt created by the glaciers. We also learned that a glacial river often becomes “braided” when it makes several shallow channels with sand or silt bars between.)

Bow Lake on Icefield Parkway

Alaska - Alberta

 

June 13^th, 2018

Cypress Hills Park came as a surprise on that straight road we were driving in Alberta as it ran through kilometers and kilometers of open grassy pastureland. We saw cows along the way, but very few houses.  Then suddenly, up over a hill and off to our left, was a long stretch of cypress forest-covered hills with a blue lake between the road and the hills. We turned onto the road leading through the lake’s shallow lands and slowed to let two Canada geese with their six babies waddle across the road. This was Cypress Hills Interprovincial Park. Interprovincial because the park land extends on either side of the Alberta/Saskatchewan border. The main campground is on the Alberta side, where we were.

With some exploring, we found six camping loops, with sites ranging in price from $21 to $50 (Canadian) depending on provided services and proximity to the lakeside. There was no one in the camp office or Visitor’s Center to help us because it was after five, and, I think, because the summer season hadn’t yet gotten underway in Alberta. There were lots of sites to choose from and no one to tell us otherwise. We chose the no-service (except for the clean vault toilet,) “last” (and cheapest) camping loop at the top of the hill, away from the lake, set under the cypress trees.

We couldn’t figure out how to pay since no credit cards were taken at the self-registration box, or US checks, and we hadn’t exchanged any US dollars for Canadian yet. (Don’t tell anyone, but we left Cypress Hills the next morning without paying.)

Magpies entertained us in the campground. They were prevalent like jays are in more southern locales, hanging around to pick up any left-behind crumbs or scraps.

The next day we drove to Dinosaur Provincial Park, 30 miles east of Calgary, a must-see stop we’d heard about from Canadian travelers in Texas last winter.  Badlands topography in the Red Deer River valley is the setting for the park and is the area where the greatest variety of dinosaur bones have been found for its size (sq. kilometers, I guess) in the world. Fifty-eight dinosaur species have been discovered at the park. Most of the collections of bones are in the Royal Museum in Drumhill, 1 ½ hours north of the park or in other museums worldwide. Stegoceras, Centrosaurus, Struthiomimus – a few of the species displayed in the Provincial Park Visitor’s Center and at fascinating exhibits along the drive on the public loop through the Park.

Magpie

The weather ! It was a beautifully (surprising) warm sunny mid-June afternoon in Alberta!

Badlands at Dinosaur Provincial Park

Alaska 2018 - Getting to Canada!

  June 11-12, 2018

On our way to Theodore Roosevelt National Park, we drove through Lemmon, South Dakota, a small town on the S. Dakota/N. Dakota state line.  The town is proud of its Petrified Wood Park built by Ole Quammen in 1930-32. He found a large quantity of petrified wood pieces in the prairie around Lemmon including bones of prehistoric animals. So, he hired a crew to collect the wood and with it, build an art exhibit of 100 cone-shaped pyramids or “trees,” along with a fairy house, a circular shaped museum and a large grotto. The project managed to give a few men a couple years of work at a time when there was little available.

We drove Highway 85 that runs north and south along the east side of the lengthy Theodore National Roosevelt Park. It connects the south part of the park to the park’s northern section. Hwy 85 is not a particularly pleasant drive. Oil field related truck traffic dominates the road making it impossible to enjoy scenery watching, even though the highway is designated “scenic.” Especially with the strong wind we were driving into, Nina, at my feet, was on pins and needles with every whoosh of a passing semi.

We arrived at Juniper Campground in Teddy Roosevelt around 5:00. Or was it 6:00? We were in the Mountain time zone for a while in western South Dakota, then we switched back to Central time in North Dakota. If we weren’t mixed up before, we really were then.

The next morning after breaking camp, we drove the 14-mile scenic Park drive to the Oxbow Bend in the Little Missouri River. The layered light-colored bluffs that reach the ground in “folds” reminded me of Escalante National Park in Utah, on a smaller scale. The Little Missouri River as it curves through the valley at the base of these bluffs is beautiful. Bison were lying in small groups in the lush meadow grass not too far from the road.

After leaving the Park we headed north on 85 to pick up Highway 2 at Williston, finishing up the semi-filled truck route on a blustery day. At one point a stone glanced off a passing truck and flew into our brand-new windshield. F**#!!!, was what our driver said. Fortunately, there was no cracking – yet! Just a chip.

Montana! We drove 250 miles west to Havre and then north to the Canadian border.

We entered Canada at Wildhorse, Alberta, at about 5:00 (Mountain Time) It’s a small, one-man, out-of-the-way crossing, and, driving north into Canada, after 25 minutes, we had met 2 motorcycles, 1 semi and 1 John Deere tractor. No phone service and no need for electricity either for that matter because there were no houses, no driveways and no cross roads on this very unpopulated stretch of highway.

                                              Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North

                                                     Wildhorse, Alberta, Canada

Alaska 2018 - Camping on the Missouri

 

June 10

First night – Camping on the Missouri

Monday evening about 5:00 we pulled into Indian Creek Rec Area on the Missouri River near Mobridge, S. Dakota. Here the widened river is good for fishing and the campground is adjacent to a marina and a bait store.

On our way, earlier in the day, we had stopped at the Corn Palace in Mitchell, S. Dakota. As a child, this was a fairly frequent stop for my family when we visited our Wolbrink relatives

in South Dakota every summer.

Our night’s stay at Indian Creek Rec Area will be remembered for the weather passing through. Our sleep in the Siesta was interrupted by a good old late spring midwestern thunderstorm. We had watched the dark clouds edge closer while we sat outside in the approaching dusk. The clouds were darkly ominous enough that we looked at the radar on weather.com before we went inside. It showed a bright red cel moving slowly toward us. Yep, an hour or so later, after we were in bed, the wind intensified enough to rock our boat and wake us up. The bright flashes of lightening, claps of thunder, and rain pounding on the roof of the RV kept us awake for a time, but all was well inside our little house. No leaks – not even from the skylight.

In the morning, after breaking camp, we drove through the town of Mobridge and across the Missouri River.  We turned off Hwy 12 to drive a couple of miles to the Sitting Bull Monument.  The Lakota chief was born near Mobridge and died there, too, so this monument marks his remains. It sits on a grassy knoll above the wide Missouri.  Nearby in the long prairie grass were 5 black chickens.  One of them cock-a-doodle-dooed.

This is beautiful country – these northwestern South Dakotan grasslands.  Especially this year.  More than ample rain has fallen in the past few weeks.  The grass-covered hills roll out from the Missouri River valley and are absolutely splendid in every shade of green, mottled with ever so subtle yellows and orange.

Alaska 2018 - 1st Stop Iowa!

  June 4 - 9, 2018

We arrived at my sister Janie’s “2^nd” home in Wellsburg, Iowa, Monday evening about 6:30. This is the house where our mom lived until she moved to a long-term care facility 4 years ago. She passed away in December. Janie was spending a month of her summer in this small burg amid corn and soybean fields.

It was a long day of driving for us, especially since we were slowed down by a flat tire. Early afternoon, I was driving while Michael was napping. As I approached the bridge over the Mississippi River near Rock Island, IL, there was a loud p-f-f-f-f-f-f-t sound. It was loud enough to wake up Michael. What was it? I pulled off on the first exit across the bridge.  Michael checked inside for possible causes, then outside. There he found the back-left wheel cover gone. Also gone was the tire stem on the inside left tire, and with it, the tire’s air.

Time to use that 2^nd spare Michael bought before we left. We saw a sign for Nahant Marsh Natural Area shortly after exiting and that’s where we found an empty parking area to stop and do a tire change. The grassy area alongside the parking lot was bordered by a thick stand of trees.  Redwing blackbirds scolded as I let Nina off-leash. We had a good game of fetch-the-ball while Michael cranked off the tire and replaced it with one of the spares, and 45 minutes or so later we were on our way again. I'm pretty sure Nina just thought we had stopped to play!

Janie, Martha & Nina

We stayed with Janie in Wellsburg two days, and on Thursday, drove northwest three hours to Estherville Iowa, where Michael’s mother lives. We spent two days there, visiting with Leona and Michael’s two brothers, Chet and Dean and sister-in-law, Linda.

Sunday morning, June 8^th, 8:45, we were on the road, heading west, for Alaska!! It felt good to begin what felt like the REAL part of out journey. A very strong wind developed by afternoon – 20-21 mph, according to weather.com. It was from the SE. How unusual to have a tailwind! A good omen perhaps?

Alaska 2018 - Leaving Home

                                                                 Saturday, June 2^nd, 2018

We were packed and ready to leave on our long-awaited, much anticipated trip to Alaska. Michael had set up his camera on the tripod in front of the Siesta, set the timer, hurried to get into the picture with Nina and me, and the shutter clicked, capturing our eagerness for departure.  One thing remained before buckling in: To retract the slide -out. Easy to do with a push of the Extend/Retract button in our Class C van-type 24 -feet long Four Winds RV. I pushed Retract. Nothing happened. I pushed it again, and again, and after several more attempts, still nothing. Now Michael began diagnosing the issue and just like that, we’re smack dab in the middle of our first mechanical problem – before we’re out of the driveway!

It took some doing, about an hour and a half’s worth of fiddling, of checking wires, checking fuses, disconnecting wires and reconnecting until Michael decided to disconnect the slide-out motor altogether. He then attached one end of a rope to the slide-out on the inside of the RV and the other end of the rope out the door to the John Deere riding lawn mower. It worked! By slowly driving forward across the yard, away from the RV, he was able to pull in the slide-out.

And we drove without another glitch to our first stop – 4 ½ hours south to our house in Ypsilanti, where we spent that evening and the next day with our daughter, Ellen, and grandchildren, Lillian and Bobby. (Son-in-law Bobby was attending a wedding out east, but arrived home Sunday evening in time to say good-bye.)

Michael found the problem with the slide-out while we were there. It was a wiring problem, a loose wire, something that probably happened a couple of days prior when he was working under the kitchen sink. Okay. Now we were ready to roll!

Monday morning, 9:00, we were out of our Ypsilanti driveway and getting onto I-94, heading west, as in west (and then north) to Alaska!