"What an Adventure" seems to be the theme!

When we first started out I thought the site of a gravel road would be our sign of an adventure. Little did I know that there would be a bigger sign....in the form of a flood! So, to make a long story short, the day we left Hillsboro, Canmore and Calgary were getting a ton of rain. In fact, they received a whole year's worth of rain in just 36 hours! Well, there are a lot of creeks and rivers that run through both towns and you can imagine what happened. The road south from Jasper to Calgary was closed (they've since opened it to Banff) and Canmore is completely shut down except for residents. Canmore is where we had plans to stay the longest (10 days) and do all of our day trips and the Calgary Stampede from.

We got into Jasper on Saturday and continued on with our regular plans only changing one reservation for the Jasper Tramway due to the weather. And, boy, are we glad we did! It was perfect weather and the views were spectacular! We decided to see if the campground had any sites available for a longer period of time but it turns out we could only get an extra night and we'll have to move sites. We are learning to be very flexible and enjoy every minute no matter the circumstances. We decided to see if Radium Hot Springs had any open sites since we had reservations there on July 7-9 and they did so we took them. They couldn't guarantee us full hookup though so we continued to look for campgrounds closer to Banff. The problem is that this coming weekend is their long weekend (Canada Day is Monday, July 1) so a lot of campgrounds are booked solid. Our final plans are staying at the Lake Louise Banff campground from June 28-July 4 (only electric hookup, no water!) and then move on to the Tunnel Mountain Trailer Campground in Banff from July 4-7 (full hookup) and then down to Radium Hot Springs as planned. They say that the Calgary Stampede is still on but we're just not sure how we're going to get there unless they open the road.

We are loving the scenery here in Alberta. There is nothing that compares! We took a wildlife tour and cruise of the Maligne (ma-leen) Valley on Sunday, including the Maligne Canyon and Maligne Lake (if you have a chance, look those up on the internet). They were beautiful! And then that night, we took the Jasper Tramway up to the heavens (at least that's what it felt like to me!).

OH! And I almost forgot one of the most important things we saw! The first night in Jasper, right in front of our trailer in a grassy area, an elk gave birth to her calf and we watched the whole thing! Truly amazing.

Yesterday we visited the Columbia Icefield and Athabascar Glacier. Another amazing trip. First, the scenery driving down the highway was breathtaking. And no one was on the road. It was as if we were all by ourselves. And the glacier itself was mind boggling. Too much to write here but I'll try to post pictures. On our way back to Jasper we stopped at Sunwapta Falls and Athabascar Falls. Again, too much to write here but look up on the internet if you have a chance.

Okay, I'll try to go post some more pictures now in another post! Miss you all but we're having a great time and loving Canada!

Wells Gray Provincial Park

This was a really fun day! Lots of hiking and mosquitos!

We stayed one night at the Clearwater Valley RV Park (KOA).

After our first hike and on to the second, Scott spotted these bears!

They were black bears which can come in many different colors, not just black!

We hiked into this farm and then did another hike to see the mineral spring. It was a very humid day with lots of flying bugs!

Ray Farm

Our second hike was to see Helmcken Falls. Beautiful!

Moon Shadows RV Park in Merritt, BC

The river next to our campground - Moon Shadows RV Park

Our site facing the river

Mosquitos and Squirrels and Bears, Oh My!

Today started out slow and relaxing. We woke up around 7am, made some coffee and watched more of the local news (see my comments to my previous post). By the way, the coffee was given to us by the owners of the Moon Shadows RV Park out of their own private supply because they didn't sell it in their little store. So nice! I will have to remember to mail them some Stumptown coffee when we get home.

We decided to head outside and look at the river that was so close to the campground and get some pictures. We also met a couple of women, one from Scotland and one from Vancouver, BC - friends who were traveling together and another man from Edson, AB who happened to be in Merritt because his son was graduating tonight.

We left Merritt around 10:45am. There were dry roads and it was about 58 degrees. We entered Kamloops at 11:45am and decided to stop at WalMart for a few grocery items. The temperature had risen to 72 degrees and the sun was shining. Kamloops is a very beautiful town.

We arrived in Clearwater at the Clearwater Valley RV Park (KOA) at 2:00pm and it was 81 degrees. We set up our site and fixed some tunafish sandwiches for lunch and then decided to get some gas and head out to Wells Gray Provincial Park for some hikes. Off for more adventures! The lady in the office of the campground had given us a list of areas that she recommended so we decided to start with one of the further ones away and work our way back.

We started at Ray Farm & Mineral Spring which was 55.7k from the campground. This farms dates back to the beginning of the century and the owners, John & Alice Ray are buried there. It was beautiful. We took a hike that led us to a small mineral spring. It was a pretty good hike, about 30 minutes each way. There were lots of mosquitos, huge flies and bees.

Our next stop was to be Helmcken Falls. As we traveled along the road, Scott noticed something black on the right side of the road ahead and it was moving! Two bears emerged and crossed the road while we slowed down and took pictures. So exciting! We continued on to Mush Bowl, Dawson Falls, and Spahats Falls.

We finally got back to the campground at 8:00pm and fixed chili dogs for dinner. We also took showers which felt so good after being covered in bug spray and sweat!

Note: As I was typing this last night, there was a huge thunder and lightening storm and the loud rain lasted well into the night. I am so thankful for the warm and sunny day we had so we could go and explore. And again this morning, as I am trying to load pictures, the rain is heavy and there is more thunder and lightening. Unfortunately, the pictures will have to come later as I think everyone in the park is on the internet right now.

Some pictures from the first day of travel

Leaving Portland

Entering Washington

Skagit River Bridge

Border Crossing in Lynden, WA

Border Crossing in Lynden, WA

Welcome to Canada!

Livin' on the Edge!

Ready to hit the road!

We left Hillsboro, OR at 8:30am this morning. It was 56 degrees and a littly drizzly with spots of sunshine which made it kind of humid. There was very little traffic (much different than leaving on a Friday night and taking 2 hours just to get to Vancouver, WA!). About an hour down the road we realized we had forgotten coffee! Oh well, we knew we could pick up some at our first overnight stop in Lynden, WA.

Our first stop of the day was the Toutle River Rest Area at mile post 54 (10:00am). Nothing exciting to report here. Business was done and we were on our way. It started to rain as we left.

At 1:00pm was our second stop of the day at the Smokey Point Rest Area. A little more exciting than the first stop with a thousand year old tree stump. The bummer part is that the picture of the tree stump is on Facebook and I wasn't able to download it to this blog. Don't hate. Just take my word for it....way more exciting than the first rest area.

At 1:15pm we came upon the infamous Skagit River Bridge. You know, the one that collapsed in the river about a month ago. So a temporary one has been built and my fear was that we would be the oversized vehicle to make it go down again. But, thankfully, all was well as we travelled across safely.

We arrived in Lynden, WA around 2:00pm and quickly decided that there was just way too much time left in the day for us to call it a night. So, we stopped at an ARCO for gas ($3.99 for diesel), cancelled our reservation at the RV park and continued on to the border crossing. We figured we could just find a campground somewhere and hope that we wouldn't be staying in a WalMart parking lot. We are so spontaneous and livin' on the edge!

It only took us 10 minutes to cross the border and they checked nothing! We were asked where we were going, what we were doing, where we were from, if we were leaving anything in Canada, if we had any firearms and that was it. They didn't ask us for a complete list of food or how much alcohol we had or if we had potatoes. Nothing! Apparently everything we read online was a scare tactic. But we weren't willing to risk it!

We made our way along Hwy 1A and soon came to Hwy 1 which would hopefully lead us to a nice RV park. The speed limit on the highway is between 100-110km/h which is about 60-65 miles/hr. But cars and semis were flying by us. It was still raining pretty hard but the scenery was beautiful. The hills were getting higher and higher and waterfalls were everywhere. They weren't trickling down the hills either. They were more raging waterfalls. We passed a few RV parks and decided to try Silver Lake Provincial Park. While we kept telling each other that we were on an adventure the road to the campground was screaming, "Turn around!" But we didn't listen. Even after it turned into a gravel road. Even after we passed a scary looking woman camped on the side of the road with her make shift camp. Even when we couldn't turn around because the road was too narrow and the raging river too high on both sides.

We finally decided enough was enough and found a small logging road that we thought might work to give us enough space to maneuver the McMansion around. I got out of the truck to help navigate and quickly sank my flip flops in the mud.  As Scott was twisting and turning the trailer, two park rangers came down the road and quickly passed us without stopping to help or even talk to us. At this point, I think Scott was so frustrated that he continued backing up not really caring that the trailer was taking out every bush in his way while I stood staring wondering how many branches would be sticking out of the back bumper of the McMansion while we continued on our "adventure." I really wish I would have taken a picture at this point. The mud covering the truck and trailer at this point was really impressive.

Down we went back to the highway and continued our way on Hwy 1 eventually to Hwy 5 towards Merritt and hopefully an RV park. Again, the scenery was beautiful as we traveled over the Coquihalla Pass with a summit of just over 1000 ft. It reminded me of traveling over the Santiam Pass in Oregon with its signs warning against passing snow plows. And again, semi trucks continued to fly by us on the downhill stretches while they chugged their way uphill on other stretches.

Finally, at 5:40pm we found a sign indicating a campground near Merritt and decided to continue living on the edge and give it a try. Another gravel road had us leery but we kept going and found Moon Shadows RV Park, a AAA park.

After setting up in our site which is right next to a very full river flowing swiftly, we made a delicious dinner of homemade pizza and turned on the local news. Uh oh........

It appears that there is flooding all over Alberta, especially in Canmore and Calgary, where we plan on being in just a week. There are evacuations happening. We're not sure if the campgrounds where we have reservations are being evacuated or not, or if they are flooded. We've checked the weather and it shows that rain should stop in the next couple of days. As I type this though, the rain continues to pound on the roof....

We'll continue "livin' on the edge" and won't let the weather ruin our vacation. We're looking forward to heading up to Clearwater, BC tomorrow especially since we shaved so much off of our travel time today. We're heading to the Columbia Icefield on Monday and are planning on driving down south afterwards to check out the highway that is supposedly closed now due to the flood and see how far we can get. Wish us luck!

P.S. I will post more pictures hopefully later. The wifi connection isn't that great and my computer keeps freezing up.

Do you know where I will be one week from today?

Dad and Me - March 2013

Every birthday my dad calls me and asks, "Do you know where I was 46 years ago today?" (or whatever age I am that year). On my 25th birthday, however, he didn't call. It's the only year he ever missed. The point is, my dad never forgets my birthday. Just as I'm not going to let you or anyone else forget that WE LEAVE FOR CANADA IN ONE WEEK!!

Perfect!

One week from today, the day before we leave for our vacation, we will know the gender of our first grandchild. Scott says it's a good thing that we leave the next day so I can't spend any money! But I've reminded him that I'm sure Canada has very cute baby clothes. Maybe a Mountie bib?

So cute!

Or maybe a stuffed moose?




Stayed tuned to find out what treasures I can find for Baby G!