Author: karenbpalmer

A last minute decision was made to move our storage units, we got about 10 feet and noticed a piece of barbed wire stuck in the side wall. Not a good omen for the start of our trip.

It must be our month to support tire shops. We had a leaky valve stem this time. Luckily we were able to get off the road to switch it out. We are getting the process down to a half hour start to finish, not exactly NASCAR standards.

Overnighted at Comlara Park near Hudson IL. Nice park, supposed to have electric and water, the water hook ups were a little sketchy, as we didn’t find any in the dark. The next day we found a hydrant between us and the next site, it was a weird setup.

Stayed at Bigfoot Adventure RV, Tracy City, IL. It was a little off road but a nice setup. They had zip lines, frisbee golf, outdoor event areas, and trails. The weekend after we left they were having a blues fest weekend.

We had planned on going to Ruby Falls, Chattanooga, TN but it was a three hour wait so we found Rock City, interesting place to walk around.

Rocktober Fest, fun find, German food, beers, and music.

Lovers Leap overlook at Rock City.

They say that you can see 7 states from here. We’ll take their word for it.

Sledding Tennessee style. Just grab a piece of cardboard, no winter required.

Took a stroll along the Chattanooga Riverwalk and stumbled across this. Waterfall down the stairways, open to run around in.

Outdoor rock climbing by the aquarium, we watched them scale the outside of the building while we ate our Ben and Jerry’s ice cream.

Great Falls Montana, above the falls, Ryan Dam. Lewis & Clark portage 18 miles around these falls and 4 others. Picture taken from Ryan’s Island, a nice park area that you access by crossing a suspension bridge.

The day started out pretty nice, the afternoon, heavy downpours and lots of wind. We had to go back to the hotel for awhile but we were able to go back out later.

In addition to the dams and waterfalls there is also Giant Springs. Over 150 million gallons of water flow daily from the spring into the Missouri River.

We went to Sip & Dip, no swimmers probably due to the weather. They do a mermaid show but we had missed it for today.

Hiked to the peak of Judith Mountain Range, just over 7 miles, 1500 elevation change, awesome views.

Fort Peck Dam, on the right side of the picture you drive on the dam. Built between 1933 and 1940 it’s interior was made mostly from mud, making it the world’s largest hydraulic filled dam. The dam was one of the places we fished by.

The sunrise over Fort Peck Lake. It was a beautiful start to the day even if it was a little earlier for us.

John reeled in a 19.2 pound king salmon, it fought pretty good on the way up. I was told that it was a fun fish to catch. We only got 1 in the boat, our guide said it’s been a slow year for them.

My little lake trout. We took a mid day break from salmon fishing to see if the lake trout were biting. We each landed 2 in a little over 1.5 hours then we headed back to the dam to try for the salmon.

We were surprised to find badlands in Montana. It was another beautiful drive along 24 and 200 between Fort Peck and Glendive.

Suburb of Calgary, the houses just go on and on. Very stretched out city, went on for miles, hill side after hill side. Hard to tell in the picture but the middle green area is on a steep hill side.

I can’t believe we’re doing this.

At the starting gate.

Off we goooooooooo……

49.33, fastest time of the day, so far. John would go again, I would be waiting at the finish line for him. It was a quite the experience to say the least.

Drumheller Alberta badlands, driving along, nothing, nothing, then bang the badlands.

There was a nice loop drive by Drumheller just had to wait for the Bleriot Ferry to cross the river to continue the loop. We’re petty sure this is the smallest ferry we have been on, glad we didn’t have the 5th wheel.

Little Church, their motto “seats 10,000 people, 6 at a time.”

You could crawl up into his mouth. Lots of dinosaurs around town, kids were busy finding them.

Suspension Bridge this was used by the miners to get across the river to the Star Coal Mine. The original bridge was only as wide as a 2×6. It was 23mph winds plus gusts, the bridge had a pretty good sway to her.

We drove the famous 11 bridges in a 6 kilometer stretch of road. This takes you to The Last Chance Saloon, there is supposed to be bullet holes in the walls yet. They were not open at 11am so we cannot confirm this. We did not look it up but they claim this road is in the Guinness Book of World Records as the most bridges to be found within the shortest distance.

Hoodoos on the outskirts of Drumheller Alberta. They are located just off the main road so it is a popular spot for people to stop.

Medalta Potteries you can do a self guided tour that is very interesting. They have some of the old equipment along many many examples of the various products they made at the plant.

Red Rock Coulees, out in the middle of nowhere is a field full of these rocks. One of those things in nature that leave you scratching your head in wonder.

Write-on-Stone Provincial Park. There are lots of hoo doos and some pictographs that you can view.

This is an information board that describes the largest pictograph you can see on the self guided tour. They had a 1 1/2 hour guided tour that takes you to others, we just didn’t time it right to do this.

Cactus in Alberta Canada, what?

The walk started with a good chance of rain, by the time we got to the turn around point the sun was pouring on the heat. Hot and dusty walk back.

Side note, sometimes it’s better to stay on course. Leaving the Write-On Park we decided to follow the Aden border crossing sign. Well, a few kilometers into it the road turned to gravel, expecting it to turn back to payment, it didn’t. 15 – 20 kilometers later we are at the border crossing, the road goes through the shed, with the agents ask us “what are we doing here”. They proceeded to tell us we had gravel for 15 more miles till we get to a highway. They were nice, maybe a little bored, we got asked a bunch of questions, least we didn’t have to wait in line to cross. Would not recommend this crossing, it was pretty dang bumpy and everything in the back of the truck got pretty dusty.

We did it, we drove the entire 1523 miles of the Alcan Highway, we started in Fairbanks ended where it begins in Dawson Creek BC, known for milepost 0.

A big beaver, somewhere in Canada.

This big guy greeted us to Jasper National Park, mama and a couple calves hanging out behind him.

One of our favorite views.

We have a long way to go. Our guide told us to walk like a cowboy when wearing our ice cleats.

Repelling down a crevasse on the Athabasca Glacier,

Windy and cold on top of the glacier, we both highly recommend repealing. We ended up with a couple scraps and bruises but lots of good memories to make those worthwhile.

Outside our Bungalow at Jaspers House Bungalows, we were warned that grizzlies and elk had been recent visitors, we didn’t see them.

A little cloudy today but the views are still awesome.

We got an early start one day and did a day hike in YoHo National Park. We hiked back to view Twin Falls. The hike mainly followed a stream and we saw a total of 4 waterfalls and lots of rapids. It was a good thing we got the early start since since it ended up being a 10 mile hike round trip with lots of elevation changes. The picture is of Twin Falls, we turned around at this point since we had such a long hike back. Even from this distance the noise made by the falls sounded like a jet plane was flying right over our heads.

Someone wants to go for a ride.

So we did. We saw 1 black bear, not common for this ski hill, and one deer. Grizzlies are more common here.

Here is a picture of the chubby black bear. He passed right under us on our ride down. My ride share guy didn’t have any problem leaning over to take pictures.

We went to the actual Lake Louise after dinner when it wasn’t as crowed. It was a pretty spot but not sure if it is worth fighting the crowds during the day. The parking lots are known to fill up by seven a.m. and then you have to take a bus from a remote parking lot, pay 10 per person and we were told to expect up to a two hour wait to get on the bus, going and returning. It is estimated that 15,000 people per day visit this shoreline in the summer.

We took a day trip down to Banff to check out the town. It was definitely a tourist town with blocks and blocks of shopping and restaurants. The crosswalks were very funky. Traffic would be stopped in all directions so everyone could cross at once, even do a diagonal crossing. The town is surrounded by the mountains with a stream running along it so there are great views each way you look.

We found John a sled for the Iditarod race, now he just needs the dogs.

Tok, there was a very nice lady to greet us to a bizarre collection of the areas history. This was the one main attraction in the town.

Suspension bridge Miles Canyon, Whitehorse YT. Lots of hiking paths around here, could spend a full day here.

The water here was clear and the scenery beautiful.

Floatplane base, it was fun seeing so many in one place. We drove about a mile down the road and there was another strip of them.

This is the longest wooden fish ladder. The salmon leave the Bearing Sea in early summer and travel over 2,000 miles up the Yukon River to get here. We could see some of the chinook salmon at the bottom of the ladder but none were going up when we were there.

Whitehorse, The plane, the plane, watch out John. Really it’s supposed to be the worlds biggest weathervane

Watson Lake Yukon, Canada, sign forest, we made our mark, can you find us? According to the tally in the visitor center there 88,186 signs as of September 2018.

Date night in the Yukon, we went out to see the educational film at the Northern Lights Center, titled The Aurora Borealis. Best views of them live, September to February, brrr, I think I liked the film just fine.

On our way to Fort Nelson we had to slow down for this heard as they were hanging out on the road.

Fort Nelson, not much to do, went on the Interpretive hike and found lots of different big, bigger than my hand (and little) mushrooms, like we said not much there. We also came across some really big hoof prints and bear scat along the trail.

We saw Denali a week ago in Talkeetna and now we’re finally here, toured Glitter Gulch and got our white water rafting trip booked.

Trying our luck panning for gold, I think we need more practice. John found 1 piece but lost it later.

On our tour of Denali we were supplied with warm drinks, got a kick out of the use of a tackle box.

In Denali we got to see grizzly bears with cubs, caribou, dall sheep, and moose. But we didn’t get to see the tip of Denali on this tour.

We found a couple of nuggets this time. Still need a lot of practice to perfect our technique.

We checked out the pipeline, there was a viewpoint not far from Fairbanks. There was some interesting information boards here about the building of the pipeline.

We found the North Pole. It was a cute gift shop. They will hold mail for you to be delivered later, wink wink.

We saw Santa’s reindeer not too far from the gift shop.

We drove up to Chena Hot Springs to relax for awhile. There were some very hot spots in the spring.

The Antler Arch in Fairbanks.

On the drive to Tok we took a break at the Knotty Shop. They also had a nice looking RV Park here.

Inside the Knotty Shop, I lost track on the number and variety of animals they had on display. This was just one area.

 

Fireweed galore here. Some people say the upcoming Winter’s snowfall total is determined by the Fireweeds height.

Red salmon jumping at Bear Creek Weir, pretty fun to watch.

Harbor seals hanging out on one of the small rock formations.

We were lucky and got to see the Aialik Glacier do some calving. It was amazing how loud it was and the size of wave it creates.

Seals hanging out on the icebergs.

Tasting to see if we want a cube for drinks later on.

The starting point of the Iditarod, I got John all signed up, anyone have some dogs and a sled he can borrow?

Salmon fishing just outside of Resurrection Bay, didn’t have much luck we caught one silver, ended up giving it to the other group on the boat with us. Total for the six of us was 4 silver 4 pinks, a lot of black cod, and jellyfish.

Very scenic drive, part on paved roads, part on gravel.

Vast views from Hatcher Pass.

There were plenty of switchbacks on the drive thru Hatcher Pass, the road barely allowed room for 2 cars to pass each other. No trailers or RV’s allowed.

You can pan for gold in this area, next time we’ll have to bring pans. Can you find Karen in this picture?

Talkeetna is a quirky little tourist town. It is also the starting point for many of the climbers that come to Denali. They issue up to 1400 permits per season to climbers. It usually takes about 2 weeks for them to reach the summit. This season a climber set a new record for the ascent by doing it in under 12 hours.

Jet boat up the class IV – V rapids on Susitna River. 18000 cubic feet water here, kayakers look for 12000.

Our salmon catch in Talkeetna, lots of fun fishing on the Talkeetna River. First it was drift fishing, the second was unbaited hook with a bead. Cross between fly fishing and jigging. Fun day, we would do this again in a heartbeat.

This is the spot where we did the jigging. There were lots of salmon heading up the smaller stream. The difference in the water is the smaller lake fed stream meeting up with the river which is partially glacier fed.

3 black bear cubs on the side of the road, mama too as she was not very far away.

Matanuska Glacier, a valley glacier, the largest accessible by car, is 27 miles long by 4 miles long, no significant change in 30 years.

Quick overnight at Abby’s B & B, we could of spent another day here to tour Hatchers Pass.

Way up in the sky you can see a helicopter with a water bag, dropping the water not far away on the forest fire along the Sterling Highway.

Russian Orthodox Church, built in 1849, a national historic landmark, overlooking the Cook Inlet.

Made it to Homer, Alaska, watch out halibut, here we come!

Tent camping on the Homer Spit. lots of smoke in the air so our views are hazy.

We chartered with Homer Ocean Charters, on the Seahawk, captain Nick. John bringing a halibut in.

Part of our catch, fun but exhausting day. Left the B & B at 6:00 am and didn’t get back until 8:30 pm. The big guy is about 40″ long, guessing it weighed around 30 pounds. We caught our 2 per person limit, one could be over 28″ and one had to be under 28″. Processors pick it up right at the docks for you.

Our hike down the Diamond Creek Trail led us to the Cook Inlet in the Kachemak Bay.

We came across this cubby star fish on the beach but it was still alive so we left it in a pool of water.

Rainy morning, the Grewingk Glacier that can be seen from our B & B.

 Stopped in at the Salty Dawg on the Homer Spit for a drink. Money and a variety of mementos everywhere, pretty dusty in there.

We’re all packed and ready to go, or we thought, we got a little ways down the road and realized we forgot our lodging information.

The view coming into Butte MT

A quick stop in Wallace ID, a snarky mayor claims it to be the center of the universe after a federal government fiasco.

Spokane Falls, Riverfront Park, nice walking area, in the process of a 4-5 year renovation.

Fountain in the park. Lots of panhandlers on the streets nearby.

When you can’t decide what to do next in Spokane they have a wheel for you to spin.

Snow in the mountains by Abbotsford BC. There was a 4.6 magnitude earthquake in Seattle today and aftershocks were felt in this area.

Columbia River, somewhere between Spokane and Seattle. Across the River is the Ginkgo Petrified Forest State Park, covering about 6,000 acres with 200 varieties of wood including the Ginkgo.

Some of us thinks this is a given, apparently others need to be told. Tunnel; remove sunglasses.

Beautiful country side, to bad it was cloudy most of the day. we’ve been driving through off and on rain showers everyday, other than the wicked thunderstorm in ND it hasn’t been too bad.

Net fishing, at the Moricetown Indian Reservation, we were told that this was the only reservation that was able to sell the salmon they netted. We got there just as they were taking a break, they’re catching sockeye, commented that it they were a couple weeks early.

Long drives, beautiful scenery. 450 miles takes about 10 hours on 2 lane highway, the roads have been nice lots of hills and curves, slow speed limit and had to wait for passing lanes.

The Butze Rapids trail, just outside of Prince Rupert, 3.8 miles, rolling hills, and through a rain forest.

We found this ugly banana slug on the side of the trail. We put a nickel beside it so you can see just how big it was.

We toured the North Pacific Cannery, very informative and interesting. Built in 1889 they still have equipment that is in working order. It was a mix of nationalities that worked here. Europeans managed it with Japanese, First Nation People providing the labor. The whole family would come and work during the fishing season.

Biggest whale statue in Canada, located in the Rotary Park, Prince George BC.

Moving into the staging area for the ferry. There was eight lanes but only six lanes on this ferry. They loaded you depending on how far you were traveling.

Boarded the ferry at 1:00 AM, walking the deck while we wait for the 2:00 AM departure. It still gets dark here but only from about 11:00 PM to 4:30 AM.

Playing Molkky at the annual Wollum fish fry.

Krist lightening off fireworks with the kids.

Everyone getting ready to watch fireworks.

While waiting we got to see Mother Nature show off her sunset display.

Getting setup for the big show.

Remember when you were learning how to sit on a bucket?