Still in British Columbia

May 6, 2007

We have driven through some very steep mountains. The scenery is great and it is interesting how dry it is. I just never thought of BC as having so much desert.


Did not drive long today, the road is very winedy and narrow so we don’t go very fast. Stopped at McKleese Lake. The pics will show how nice it is. The gas and RV parks are astronomically more expensive than the states. I am trying to ignore this!!! I have been sporadically able to get through to my children on the cell, so have used our calling card. Just realized how expensive that is. We had 675 min and I made a call to Nicholas on his birthday and spoke for about 10 min, when I called Chip tonight I had about 58 min left!!!! Gas is about $5.60 per gal.!! As Chip keeps telling me we should not worry about it, we have looked forward to this for too long!!!

We will try to get to Prince George tomorrow, trying to get through CA as quickly as possible!!!

We are really enjoying our time together. The lack of commitment is wonderful!!! However, I also miss my friends and family.

Will post this and hope to get on line again soon. Please email me when you can.

May 7, 2007

Trying to decide which way to proceed. There are only two routes to Alaska and we were thinking of going route 37 which is further east than the Alaskan Hwy. We talked with the park owner and he said we should take 97 (Alaska Hwy) this time if year and when we come back the other route as it always needs repair and will be better later in the season. Glad we spoke with him!!!!

Slightly overcast but temp in the low 50’s. We enjoyed sitting at the lake last night. Had our first experience with pay showers. I try to use the showers at the campground when possible as this one is rather small!! When I looked in the shower I saw the coin box and it said “loonies only”!!! I wasn’t sure if that meant I had to be crazy or some type of coin!!!!!

We are going to try to make it to McLeod Lake, which is north of Prince George. Have looked at all the tourist info on Prince George as we hear so much about it, but haven’t found anything that excites either of us. Will look around and keep going if it is not interesting. Doug is still stressing a little about getting to Anchorage by June 5th. He will relax a lot more when we are up there and then when we return will take our time.

The weather has deteriorated, drizzled about all day. The area reminds us both of upstate New York. Passed lots of lakes still partially frozen and snow piles over 10 feet high along the road!!

Stopped at a campground about 70 miles east of Dawson Creek. We were confused about the time.. The map told us we were back in Mountain time zone. When we stopped the owner told us they did not change to daylight savings time so we were still the same time, which meant 3:25!!! As it turned out it was not bad. This is a small individually owned camp. The owner told us if we wanted to take a walk there was a path down through the ‘junk yard’ to a bridge. As any of you that know Doug can imagine his ears perked up when he heard ‘junk yard’!!! We stopped and spoke to a couple of men working and found out they were the ones that built the bridge. We really enjoyed talking with them. The attached pictures show the “wonderful” bridge that was built!! They call it the 11th wonder of the world. It was built to get their live stock to pasture!!! Bill Martin loves the story about Doug burying a car in our back yard. Well, if Doug had this much property he would not have to bury the car!!! The guys we talked to said they thought when we got back from our walk, Doug would have his checkbook out to buy the place!!! If it were not for me he probably would!!! This was a really neat stop and one Doug will enjoy repeating many times over!!

During our walk we saw a lot of evidence of moose, but didn’t actually see any of them. Guess I am glad of that as the evidence indicated they were rather large!!!


May 8, 2007

Got a REAL early start today, 7:30am!!! Trying to make it to Fort Nelson tonight. Have been asked if I do any of the driving. No, Doug made sure before we left that I could drive this thing just in case of an emergency, but he loves to drive and that is fine with me. I enjoy the scenery!!!

I am glad everyone is enjoying this blog so much. It has been good for me, makes me keep a journal. In the past I usually do it for the first couple of days and then stop. I know we will enjoy reading this in the future.
Weather is clear and cool again, but see clouds in the direction we are headed.

We made it to Dawson Creek, only 1600 more miles to Anchorage!!!! Enjoyed a little museum here and a movie on the building of the Alaskan Hwy. It will certainly give us a renewed appreciation of this road as we travel it. I cannot imagine what the builders went through during construction!!

Continued on to Fort Nelson. Met a really neat gal from Fairbanks. They just picked up an RV they purchased over eBay in Dallas. We hope to hook up with them again tomorrow.

We have decided that the scenery on the Alaskan hwy is much like the panhandle of Florida - very boring after the first hour! Went through a couple of areas that were worth photographing, but that was all. Went through a couple of very heavy snow showers, that made it a little exciting!!