Robert, Tuesday, May 27
We drove into Prince Rupert Today. It is clearly not a tourist town. I would describe it as "gritty." There are saw mills just on the other side of town. Although it is on the water I didn’t see fishing boats so I don’t know if there is a fishing industry here or not. We did eat dinner in town tonight. It was good but not great. We went to the ferry terminal to check it out before we show up Thursday morning with the trailer attached. The schedule we got when we made reservation said the ferry left at 9:00 am. Turns out that the time is 8:30 am. The schedule we got said we needed to be at the terminal 2 hours before departure. At the terminal they said it was 3 hours prior. That means we need to pull out of the campground at 5:20 am! I guess we will be hooked up and ready to roll Wednesday night. We will need to check that we have an alarm clock that works for Thursday!
We got fuel and paid the most ever–$5.44 per gallon! Takes your breath away, doesn’t it? I did compute milage and fuel consumption so far on this trip. We have driven just a little over 2,500 miles since we left home. Of that, 2,315 miles were towing and 190 miles not towing. We are getting 9.25 miles per gallon. We normally get about 10.5 miles per gallon when towing and 18 mpg when not towing but that is when we are on fairly level ground. So far we have towed quite a bit in the mountains and over mountain passes and that reduces the mpg a lot.
Prince Rupert is the first town we have stayed in with absolutely no cell phone service. Just before we entered Canada we added Canada to our calling plan. If we had not it would have cost a bundle to make calls in Canada. We have had pretty good cell phone service while along the major highways and in the cities here. The cell phone coverage has been spotty along the less than major highways and in the mountains. I do know that there is cell phone coverage in Prince Rupert as the manager of the campground has and uses his cell phone. I guess that Verizon just hasn’t signed an agreement with whoever is the cell phone provider here. We expect to have cell phone coverage when we get to Ketchikan.
Just before we left on this trip, we drove back east to see Leslie’s parents and to try to time it so that we could see newest grandchild. Unfortunately, grandson Henry was born while we were in Kansas driving back home. We left Cody and Molly with Leslie’s parents while we when to see friends in the Washington, DC area and to see John and Emily who were on the verge of Henry being born. While Cody and Molly were staying with Leslie’s parents, Ann, Leslie’s mother, taught Cody to try to catch the end of his leash while she swung it back and forth. Cody really liked the game and he would howl for Ann (or anyone else for that matter) to play the game with him. Well, he now has a new game and he has forgotten (almost) the leash game. I brought along a laser point that I had had for a long time to use when giving presentations. Now Cody howls to have someone shine the pointer on the ground while he chases it. Even Molly, who normally sleeps a lot, will get up and chase the red dot on the floor. As the space in the trailer is nowhere as large as the three story house they can and do run in when they are home, we use it to help them get some exercise.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Made It to Prince Rupert
Leslie Monday, May 26, 2008
We’ve made it to Prince Rupert, BC. We’re really quite far north. This morning I looked out at 4:15 am and the sun was already up. I was looking to see if any of those mythical moose were grazing on the golf course. They weren’t!
Today was more driving westward, mostly along the river. The mountains were on our right, the river on the left.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117085_S67rD-M.jpg
There were some beautiful waterfalls coming out of the mountains.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117147_iDB6B-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117186_QCKFo-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117255_fwYNC-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117287_Ekn5Y-M.jpg
About 30 miles east of Prince Rupert we could see mud flats in the river, likely a result of tidal movement. We assumed that we would not be crossing another mountain pass since it was likely that the road would follow the river. At 20 miles out of Prince Rupert we started climbing. Although we only climbed to 500 ft of elevation, it was a steep hill to haul.
By the time we had reached Prince George we were too far north to pick up the satellite radio so we won’t have CNN any longer. We’ve put the XM radio away until September.
We’re staying at the Park Avenue RV park just up the hill from the ferry dock. Considering that most areas around a working waterfront are a bit seedy, we weren’t expecting much. Actually this park is very nice. The rows are on a hillside and there are only 10 rigs here although the park would hold over 300 during busy season. And finally, we seem to have reliable WIFI service.
There are some funny sites here. Okay gentlemen: what year is this?
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117038_vCokn-M.jpg
The occupant is one man in a cowboy hat.
And then there is another neighbor who appears to be waiting for his rig to show up. He’s been sitting here since 4:00 pm and it’s now almost 9:00 pm and he doesn’t appear to have a place to sleep. Mmm? Who knows?
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117119_FYsxe-M.jpg
(We seeemed to lose our internet connection last night as I was trying to post this so I can update you a bit. Sometime around mid-night many rigs showed up. I'm guessing that they came off a ferry. I think the man who was rig-less was joined by a rig later. Most of the late arriving rigs left early this morning.)
We were outside about an hour after we got set up and noticed that water was flowing from the front of the rig. That’s not good. Further investigation revealed that we have a leak in our water system. Robert ended up drenched as he investigated. The weather here is beautiful (sunny and mid-60s) so that wasn’t too much of a problem (for me:-) ). His diagnosis of the water problem is that a brass fitting in the water control center had broken. I didn’t know that something made of brass would "break". The temporary solution is that we have to use water from our 100 gallon fresh water holding tank and not from the city water connection. This isn’t a huge deal because we can fill the fresh water holding tank and then pull from the tank with our new water pump. (I sure am glad the water pump is now working...) We’ll talk with the factory tomorrow about shipping the fitting to us in Ketchikan.
When we left Colorado the freezer unit of our 10 cubic foot refrigerator was completely packed. Because the rules on how much and what types of meat you are permitted to bring into the US are complex and constantly changing, we’ve been trying to eat our way through the freezer. I’m happy to report that we have only 2 packages of stew beef yet to consume. I’ll likely make one batch for lunch/dinner tomorrow so that at most we’ll have one beef item to carry back into the US. (When we board the ferry on Thursday, we’re headed for Ketchikan, AK.) The last time we went to Alaska I promised myself that I would eat only fish for the entire trip. Really suffering, huh? I don’t know that I can pull that off this trip but I might give it a good try.
More later,
Leslie
We’ve made it to Prince Rupert, BC. We’re really quite far north. This morning I looked out at 4:15 am and the sun was already up. I was looking to see if any of those mythical moose were grazing on the golf course. They weren’t!
Today was more driving westward, mostly along the river. The mountains were on our right, the river on the left.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117085_S67rD-M.jpg
There were some beautiful waterfalls coming out of the mountains.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117147_iDB6B-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117186_QCKFo-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117255_fwYNC-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117287_Ekn5Y-M.jpg
About 30 miles east of Prince Rupert we could see mud flats in the river, likely a result of tidal movement. We assumed that we would not be crossing another mountain pass since it was likely that the road would follow the river. At 20 miles out of Prince Rupert we started climbing. Although we only climbed to 500 ft of elevation, it was a steep hill to haul.
By the time we had reached Prince George we were too far north to pick up the satellite radio so we won’t have CNN any longer. We’ve put the XM radio away until September.
We’re staying at the Park Avenue RV park just up the hill from the ferry dock. Considering that most areas around a working waterfront are a bit seedy, we weren’t expecting much. Actually this park is very nice. The rows are on a hillside and there are only 10 rigs here although the park would hold over 300 during busy season. And finally, we seem to have reliable WIFI service.
There are some funny sites here. Okay gentlemen: what year is this?
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117038_vCokn-M.jpg
The occupant is one man in a cowboy hat.
And then there is another neighbor who appears to be waiting for his rig to show up. He’s been sitting here since 4:00 pm and it’s now almost 9:00 pm and he doesn’t appear to have a place to sleep. Mmm? Who knows?
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/302117119_FYsxe-M.jpg
(We seeemed to lose our internet connection last night as I was trying to post this so I can update you a bit. Sometime around mid-night many rigs showed up. I'm guessing that they came off a ferry. I think the man who was rig-less was joined by a rig later. Most of the late arriving rigs left early this morning.)
We were outside about an hour after we got set up and noticed that water was flowing from the front of the rig. That’s not good. Further investigation revealed that we have a leak in our water system. Robert ended up drenched as he investigated. The weather here is beautiful (sunny and mid-60s) so that wasn’t too much of a problem (for me:-) ). His diagnosis of the water problem is that a brass fitting in the water control center had broken. I didn’t know that something made of brass would "break". The temporary solution is that we have to use water from our 100 gallon fresh water holding tank and not from the city water connection. This isn’t a huge deal because we can fill the fresh water holding tank and then pull from the tank with our new water pump. (I sure am glad the water pump is now working...) We’ll talk with the factory tomorrow about shipping the fitting to us in Ketchikan.
When we left Colorado the freezer unit of our 10 cubic foot refrigerator was completely packed. Because the rules on how much and what types of meat you are permitted to bring into the US are complex and constantly changing, we’ve been trying to eat our way through the freezer. I’m happy to report that we have only 2 packages of stew beef yet to consume. I’ll likely make one batch for lunch/dinner tomorrow so that at most we’ll have one beef item to carry back into the US. (When we board the ferry on Thursday, we’re headed for Ketchikan, AK.) The last time we went to Alaska I promised myself that I would eat only fish for the entire trip. Really suffering, huh? I don’t know that I can pull that off this trip but I might give it a good try.
More later,
Leslie
Monday, May 26, 2008
Finished First Part of Adventure
Robert, Monday, May 26
Happy Memorial Day! Of course this is just another Monday in Canada. We finished the first part of our adventure today; we drove from Smithers to Prince George. This is where we get on the ferry and start up the southeast coast of Alaska. We don’t get on the ferry until Thursday morning so we have two days to explore Prince George. That’s a good thing as we need to get the metal value stems installed on the truck. We also discovered that we have a water leak. We went back to the office where we registered for our campsite to find out how to get on the internet. When we returned to the trailer Leslie pointed to water dripping from the front corner of the trailer. It turns out that there is a brass fitting that is used to switch the incoming water to either the fresh water tank or directly into the trailer water lines. Somehow it appears to have cracked and was leaking water. I tried to tighten it and got a shower. It does work when sending water into the fresh water tank so we put water in the tank and we can use the water pump (the one we just got replaced!) to supply water. I’ll call the factory tomorrow and have them send a replacement part to campground where we are staying in Ketchikan. It doesn’t look like it is too hard of a job to replace it–just a little cramped in the space where the fitting is located.
The drive today was an easy one–only about 222 miles. We left the Smithers at 10:00 am and I drove half-way until our lunch stop and Leslie drove the rest of the way. We stopped for lunch at a roadside rest area and fixed sandwiches. This is our normal routine as long as we have bread and some kind of lunch meat. The route took us through some beautiful mountains. The weather was sunny and warm and we got some views of waterfalls coming down from the snow fields. We expected rainy and cold along the coast so the weather is a welcome surprise. The southeast coast of Alaska is known for its rain. We decided to take the ferry north bound as the weather gets rainier later in the summer. Also going this way we hope the road repairs are completed by the time we start the drive back south in September.
Molly is getting better. The lymph node that was swollen is much smaller. Through this all she hasn’t shown any signs of feeling any worse for wear. She and Cody still howl every time we put them in the truck to hit the road. Some days they howl for an hour; other days they don’t let up. The second they get back in the trailer they settle down.
We’ll see how the mosquitoes are in this campground. They were horrible at the last campground. We do have a lot of insect repellent with us but I hate to put it on unless it is absolutely necessary. We also have mosquito nets that fit over our heads and come down to our shoulders. They look goofy but when they mosquitoes are as large and numerous as they can be in Alaska, I’ll take goofy over a million mosquito bites.
Prince Rupert looks like a real town. Tomorrow we will go exploring. To get to the campground meant we drove right through the downtown. There were a lot of shops and restaurants; in others words our kind of town. The campground is about a half mile from the ferry terminal so it should be easy on Thursday morning. The scheduled time for the ferry is 9:00 am and we have to be in line two hours early. This means an early start on Thursday.
Happy Memorial Day! Of course this is just another Monday in Canada. We finished the first part of our adventure today; we drove from Smithers to Prince George. This is where we get on the ferry and start up the southeast coast of Alaska. We don’t get on the ferry until Thursday morning so we have two days to explore Prince George. That’s a good thing as we need to get the metal value stems installed on the truck. We also discovered that we have a water leak. We went back to the office where we registered for our campsite to find out how to get on the internet. When we returned to the trailer Leslie pointed to water dripping from the front corner of the trailer. It turns out that there is a brass fitting that is used to switch the incoming water to either the fresh water tank or directly into the trailer water lines. Somehow it appears to have cracked and was leaking water. I tried to tighten it and got a shower. It does work when sending water into the fresh water tank so we put water in the tank and we can use the water pump (the one we just got replaced!) to supply water. I’ll call the factory tomorrow and have them send a replacement part to campground where we are staying in Ketchikan. It doesn’t look like it is too hard of a job to replace it–just a little cramped in the space where the fitting is located.
The drive today was an easy one–only about 222 miles. We left the Smithers at 10:00 am and I drove half-way until our lunch stop and Leslie drove the rest of the way. We stopped for lunch at a roadside rest area and fixed sandwiches. This is our normal routine as long as we have bread and some kind of lunch meat. The route took us through some beautiful mountains. The weather was sunny and warm and we got some views of waterfalls coming down from the snow fields. We expected rainy and cold along the coast so the weather is a welcome surprise. The southeast coast of Alaska is known for its rain. We decided to take the ferry north bound as the weather gets rainier later in the summer. Also going this way we hope the road repairs are completed by the time we start the drive back south in September.
Molly is getting better. The lymph node that was swollen is much smaller. Through this all she hasn’t shown any signs of feeling any worse for wear. She and Cody still howl every time we put them in the truck to hit the road. Some days they howl for an hour; other days they don’t let up. The second they get back in the trailer they settle down.
We’ll see how the mosquitoes are in this campground. They were horrible at the last campground. We do have a lot of insect repellent with us but I hate to put it on unless it is absolutely necessary. We also have mosquito nets that fit over our heads and come down to our shoulders. They look goofy but when they mosquitoes are as large and numerous as they can be in Alaska, I’ll take goofy over a million mosquito bites.
Prince Rupert looks like a real town. Tomorrow we will go exploring. To get to the campground meant we drove right through the downtown. There were a lot of shops and restaurants; in others words our kind of town. The campground is about a half mile from the ferry terminal so it should be easy on Thursday morning. The scheduled time for the ferry is 9:00 am and we have to be in line two hours early. This means an early start on Thursday.
Sunday, May 25, 2008
On the Yellowhead Highway
Robert, Sunday, May 25
Drove from Prince George to Smithers today. Total distance of about 232 miles. Canadians give their major highways names. We were driving on the Yellowhead Highway. We keep thinking of it as Highway 16. We saw countless signs to watch out for moose. I decided that moose stands for "Mythical Object Observed Scarcely Ever." We saw absolute none. We did see a coyote and several deer but no moose. It’s probably something dreamed up by the Chamber of Commerce to keep the tourists coming back. Along the way there were beautiful lakes that were along the highway for miles. They looked to be a mile wide but as much as 10-15 miles long. The drive went from mountains to hills with farmland. Then as we approached Smithers we started seeing mountains again–mountains with a lot of snow on them. I am guessing that they are the start of the coastal mountains as we are about 220 road miles from Prince Rupert which is on the coast. Tomorrow we will drive to Prince Rupert and spend 3 nights before getting on the ferry. As I am sitting at a picnic table fighting off the mosquitos, this will be short. It is hard to type and swat mosquitos at the same time.
Drove from Prince George to Smithers today. Total distance of about 232 miles. Canadians give their major highways names. We were driving on the Yellowhead Highway. We keep thinking of it as Highway 16. We saw countless signs to watch out for moose. I decided that moose stands for "Mythical Object Observed Scarcely Ever." We saw absolute none. We did see a coyote and several deer but no moose. It’s probably something dreamed up by the Chamber of Commerce to keep the tourists coming back. Along the way there were beautiful lakes that were along the highway for miles. They looked to be a mile wide but as much as 10-15 miles long. The drive went from mountains to hills with farmland. Then as we approached Smithers we started seeing mountains again–mountains with a lot of snow on them. I am guessing that they are the start of the coastal mountains as we are about 220 road miles from Prince Rupert which is on the coast. Tomorrow we will drive to Prince Rupert and spend 3 nights before getting on the ferry. As I am sitting at a picnic table fighting off the mosquitos, this will be short. It is hard to type and swat mosquitos at the same time.
Bulwinkle?
Leslie Sunday, May 25, 2008
We’ve had such poor internet connections that I haven’t been able to write much of the interesting or funny things we’ve seen or to educate those of you unfamiliar with RVing on some of the facets of this lifestyle.
I always like to visit grocery stores when I travel. It seems to give a good impression of real life in the locale. Throughout Canada we’ve noticed that bulk food sections of grocery stores are really large. I’m guessing it is part of the "go green" movement. Yesterday in Prince George we saw what was the largest and most varied bulk food section I’ve ever seen. They had an entire row of spices. They had jams and fruit preserves and lemon, Boston cream, and cherry pie fillings in tubs. There was more candy than you can imagine, especially fruit slices (such as spearmint leaves, peach circles, and more), many types of rice, pastas, grains, soup mixes, baking ingredients, etc.
Today we drove Route 16 from Prince George to Smithers, BC. We had several more long hills with 8% grades both up and down. There were signs after signs warning to beware of moose. And we saw:
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340612_P32ed-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340627_oenAH-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340657_QSKjN-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340677_emhrp-M.jpg
signs after signs to beware of moose, but not one moose did we see.
As we dropped out of the mountains, it appeared that the major industry is logging.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340601_aGdD9-M.jpg
We traveled along the Frazer River which is famous for fishing. There are cabins, RV sites, and fishing lodges along the lakes but mostly it is pretty desolate.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340577_TK9go-M.jpg
A bit further we cam across fields and fields of dandelions. One would think that they were farming dandelions but alas it appeared as the dandelions just grew wherever — (and wouldn’t you think that if you were a moose you’d enjoy munching on all those dandelions?) No such luck!
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340556_tjF6V-M.jpg
About an hour out of Smithers we first saw the coastal mountains come in to view.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340718_tYTuM-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340736_qJ79k-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340750_f6SSW-M.jpg
And of course, more signs to beware of moose. Yeah, Bullwinkle where are you?
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340702_yBXfp-M.jpg
We’re staying at the Riverside Golf and RV Park in Smithers, BC. Our view out the front is the golf course and the coastal mountains, out the picture window we see an empty site along the river.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340769_kjW7k-M.jpg
The sites are mostly side-by-side which means that our patio would face the patio of another unit (or another way of looking at it is that two units share one space) . That is less desirable because you have less privacy if you choose to sit out. We’re pretty certain that another unit will not be placed next to us because the remaining space is less than 5 feet wide. It’s very early in the season and the campground is not very busy so this shouldn’t be a problem. The sites are pretty and this would be a nice place if they laid it out with half as many sites.
Tomorrow we’re on to Prince Rupert. Although we don’t like to travel two days in a row, we want to have two full days in Prince Rupert to have some needed work done on the truck tires. (Tires and brakes are important; they take precedence over our comfort wishes.)
Oh, and as I try to post this, I'm sitting at a picnic table with hords of mosquitoes attaching me! OUCH! OUCH!!! These are terrible mossies!!!!
More later,
Leslie
We’ve had such poor internet connections that I haven’t been able to write much of the interesting or funny things we’ve seen or to educate those of you unfamiliar with RVing on some of the facets of this lifestyle.
I always like to visit grocery stores when I travel. It seems to give a good impression of real life in the locale. Throughout Canada we’ve noticed that bulk food sections of grocery stores are really large. I’m guessing it is part of the "go green" movement. Yesterday in Prince George we saw what was the largest and most varied bulk food section I’ve ever seen. They had an entire row of spices. They had jams and fruit preserves and lemon, Boston cream, and cherry pie fillings in tubs. There was more candy than you can imagine, especially fruit slices (such as spearmint leaves, peach circles, and more), many types of rice, pastas, grains, soup mixes, baking ingredients, etc.
Today we drove Route 16 from Prince George to Smithers, BC. We had several more long hills with 8% grades both up and down. There were signs after signs warning to beware of moose. And we saw:
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340612_P32ed-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340627_oenAH-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340657_QSKjN-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340677_emhrp-M.jpg
signs after signs to beware of moose, but not one moose did we see.
As we dropped out of the mountains, it appeared that the major industry is logging.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340601_aGdD9-M.jpg
We traveled along the Frazer River which is famous for fishing. There are cabins, RV sites, and fishing lodges along the lakes but mostly it is pretty desolate.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340577_TK9go-M.jpg
A bit further we cam across fields and fields of dandelions. One would think that they were farming dandelions but alas it appeared as the dandelions just grew wherever — (and wouldn’t you think that if you were a moose you’d enjoy munching on all those dandelions?) No such luck!
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340556_tjF6V-M.jpg
About an hour out of Smithers we first saw the coastal mountains come in to view.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340718_tYTuM-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340736_qJ79k-M.jpg
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340750_f6SSW-M.jpg
And of course, more signs to beware of moose. Yeah, Bullwinkle where are you?
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340702_yBXfp-M.jpg
We’re staying at the Riverside Golf and RV Park in Smithers, BC. Our view out the front is the golf course and the coastal mountains, out the picture window we see an empty site along the river.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/301340769_kjW7k-M.jpg
The sites are mostly side-by-side which means that our patio would face the patio of another unit (or another way of looking at it is that two units share one space) . That is less desirable because you have less privacy if you choose to sit out. We’re pretty certain that another unit will not be placed next to us because the remaining space is less than 5 feet wide. It’s very early in the season and the campground is not very busy so this shouldn’t be a problem. The sites are pretty and this would be a nice place if they laid it out with half as many sites.
Tomorrow we’re on to Prince Rupert. Although we don’t like to travel two days in a row, we want to have two full days in Prince Rupert to have some needed work done on the truck tires. (Tires and brakes are important; they take precedence over our comfort wishes.)
Oh, and as I try to post this, I'm sitting at a picnic table with hords of mosquitoes attaching me! OUCH! OUCH!!! These are terrible mossies!!!!
More later,
Leslie
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Last Provisions
Leslie Saturday, May 24, 2008
We took the RV to the repair facility this morning. Molly & Cody had to wait in the truck. Although they were annoyed, the weather was a beautiful, sunny day with temps in the upper 50's. I used the opportunity to finish some client work on my laptop.
Today was the first sunny day since last Sunday. We were happy for the opportunity to do some outside things. Prince George is the last town of any size we’re likely to see until early July when we’ll get to Anchorage. We replenished our provisions. Our one funny was that we saw and visited a COSTCO -- yeah! The organization of COSTCO was exactly the same as Fairfax, VA or Arvada, CO. After we had unloaded our cart and I had begun to write the check suddenly Robert remembered that a check would be in US dollars (not good). A quick look at our Canadian cash told us that we couldn't pay cash so we resorted to the COSTCO AmEX card. Not a big problem but we laughed at our forgetting what kind of dollars we're transacting. (Right now the US dollar and the Canadian dollar are at about par so it doesn't make much difference.)
Here is the welcome to Prince George.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/300826337_LgW2S-M.jpg
Because we're relying on campground WIFI we're having significant trouble getting emails out. While we sit here in the campground laundry room (longest time I've spent in a luandry room in many a year) we seem to be able to receive emails and we can post to the blog but we can't send any direct emails. Sorry about that.....
perhaps connections will be better tomorrow as we head west on Hwy 16 toward Smithers, BC.
more later,
Leslie
We took the RV to the repair facility this morning. Molly & Cody had to wait in the truck. Although they were annoyed, the weather was a beautiful, sunny day with temps in the upper 50's. I used the opportunity to finish some client work on my laptop.
Today was the first sunny day since last Sunday. We were happy for the opportunity to do some outside things. Prince George is the last town of any size we’re likely to see until early July when we’ll get to Anchorage. We replenished our provisions. Our one funny was that we saw and visited a COSTCO -- yeah! The organization of COSTCO was exactly the same as Fairfax, VA or Arvada, CO. After we had unloaded our cart and I had begun to write the check suddenly Robert remembered that a check would be in US dollars (not good). A quick look at our Canadian cash told us that we couldn't pay cash so we resorted to the COSTCO AmEX card. Not a big problem but we laughed at our forgetting what kind of dollars we're transacting. (Right now the US dollar and the Canadian dollar are at about par so it doesn't make much difference.)
Here is the welcome to Prince George.
http://CarpediemAdventures.smugmug.com/photos/300826337_LgW2S-M.jpg
Because we're relying on campground WIFI we're having significant trouble getting emails out. While we sit here in the campground laundry room (longest time I've spent in a luandry room in many a year) we seem to be able to receive emails and we can post to the blog but we can't send any direct emails. Sorry about that.....
perhaps connections will be better tomorrow as we head west on Hwy 16 toward Smithers, BC.
more later,
Leslie
Old Water Pump is History
Robert, Saturday, May 24
Got the water pump replaced today. When it quit working I called the factory and they said to get it replaced, send them the old pump, and they would send me a check for the cost. I’ll wait until we get to Alaska to send it as the cost to send it from Canada would be out of sight. It cost us $1.01 Canadian to send a letter to the US so I imagine the cost to send the pump from here would be prohibitive. The reason we picked the campground we are staying in is that it is literally across the road from the dealership that replaced the pump. After we got the pump replaced, we hauled the trailer back to the campground, set-up, and had lunch. Then we went into town to get a few things. We read on the web that there is a $20 vacuum cleaner that is small and works well so we wanted to get one. The vacuum we have been using is almost useless. The new one really does work far better than the old one. I have been trying to get the valve stems replaced on the truck tires. The ones that came with the truck are rubber and I want to replace them with metal. I bought the metal stems at a NAPA store and had one replaced a week ago. At the time I could only find one stem. We have pressure sensors installed on all of the tires on the truck and the trailer. The sensors are about the size of a marshmallow. The replace the regular valve caps. With rubber valve stems, they cause the valve stems to flex leading to early failure. Unfortunately, every place I checked said they couldn’t do the work until tomorrow. We plan on two or three days in Prince Rupert before we get on the ferry so maybe I can get them replaced there.
Got the water pump replaced today. When it quit working I called the factory and they said to get it replaced, send them the old pump, and they would send me a check for the cost. I’ll wait until we get to Alaska to send it as the cost to send it from Canada would be out of sight. It cost us $1.01 Canadian to send a letter to the US so I imagine the cost to send the pump from here would be prohibitive. The reason we picked the campground we are staying in is that it is literally across the road from the dealership that replaced the pump. After we got the pump replaced, we hauled the trailer back to the campground, set-up, and had lunch. Then we went into town to get a few things. We read on the web that there is a $20 vacuum cleaner that is small and works well so we wanted to get one. The vacuum we have been using is almost useless. The new one really does work far better than the old one. I have been trying to get the valve stems replaced on the truck tires. The ones that came with the truck are rubber and I want to replace them with metal. I bought the metal stems at a NAPA store and had one replaced a week ago. At the time I could only find one stem. We have pressure sensors installed on all of the tires on the truck and the trailer. The sensors are about the size of a marshmallow. The replace the regular valve caps. With rubber valve stems, they cause the valve stems to flex leading to early failure. Unfortunately, every place I checked said they couldn’t do the work until tomorrow. We plan on two or three days in Prince Rupert before we get on the ferry so maybe I can get them replaced there.
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