Category Archives: Retirement

Doh!

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We are in Homer AK for a week.

The last post had us about to get to milepost 0, we did (on June 14):

Milepost 0

We didn’t stop there as the nights continually were getting longer. We made it to the Walmart parking lot in Ft. St. John, BC:

Our next major destination was Liard River Hot Springs. We stopped in Ft. Nelson on the way. I remember bits of the Liard Hot Springs from the 1964 trip. The mosquitos bothered everyone else but didn’t bother me at all. Maybe that is why my dad called me ‘stinky’? I forgot to take a pic of the hot springs but I got one of our site. (PS. This time the mosquitos DID bother me):

We left Liard a day early and gifted our site to the next camper that occupied it. We had a long day ahead. Normally the stops were nicely spaced, 200 miles or so. This stretch was not so. It was beautiful, with lots of wildlife but also very sparse:

On the way we stopped at the Signpost Forest in Watson Lake, YT to leave a ‘sign’ of our own. Let’s know if you ever see it in the future:

We made it to our camp after almost 300 miles. And the rig was so dirty! We also heard a whooshing noise under the trailer when I hooked up shore water. Our winterizing valve was hit by some rocks and it got knocked open. I closed it and all was good, for now.

The dirtiness of the rig reminded me of some pictures of the dirty rig from 1964:

The next sustained stop was Whitehorse YT. Whitehorse is a very decent sized town where you can stock up before you trek into Alaska. We visited the canyon nearby and the paddle boat:

From Whitehorse, we took a day trip down to Skagway without the trailer. Skagway is in Alaska but I don’t feel it was officially Alaska yet. Even though we had to deal with those surly Canadian border patrols when we came back.

Back at Whitehorse, I had a minor repair to do. From the rock roads I noticed that the propane line on the A-frame was no longer gray. The rocks had chipped off the paint to let the copper color show through. I covered them up with pipe insulation:

Next stop was Alaska but a bit too far for one day. We stopped overnight at a nice Provincial Park that was thick with mosquitos:

Then, on June 24, …

We spent two nights in Tok, the furthest north camping we have done, got our guns, and then headed south to Glennallen. We took a day trip from Glennallen to go to Valdez. At least there were no Canadian borders to cross. A glacier on the road to/from Valdez:

Our next stop was Palmer for multiple nights. We were timing it to get to the 4th of July get together on time. While in Palmer, the valve that got knocked with the rocks was now leaking. It probably was happening earlier but this was the first I noticed. I removed the valve and went to an RV repair shop. He told me that it was simple and if I could get the trailer there by 4pm, he can fix it:

Not a problem it was there by 3pm. He crawled under the trailer and 30 minutes later it was fixed. He put a new, tougher valve on it. $30 for all that. Wow!

We made it to our 4th of July celebration and met a lot of new people. One guy told me he lived in a small little town called Mountain Gate in California. I told him that I went to Central Valley High School. He said he did too! He was 5 years after me but it shows how truly small the world has become. Me (’78) and Mike Adams (’83):

After the 4th, we decided to try to avoid the heat and fires in the Anchorage area and we ended up in Homer.

Now you are updated, we have the next 3 weeks planned and after the first week of August we are heading back to the lower 48. We will keep you posted!

Halfway to Anchorage

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Well, actually, over halfway. The approximate distance from Austin to Anchorage is 4200 miles (the way we are going). We are currently staying at the St Albert Kinsman RV park just north of Edmonton. From here we have just under 2000 miles to go. Here is our spot, overlooking the river, taken around 10:15!

All this started about 3 weeks ago when we left Austin. This was our cute little spot there:

Our next stop was the North Texas Airstream Commmunity in Hillsboro TX. It was an odd feeling to be somewhere else after spending over 3 months in the Austin area. But we had to get moving toward Alaska. The plan is to head basically due north to Minot ND and enter into Saskatchewan.

Keeping with our normal 200 miles a day (sometimes more, sometimes less), we ended up the next night in Lawton OK at the Comanche Nation Casino. They have about 4 sites that have 30amp electric for free overnighting, you just need to register with security. Here was our spot:

Next state was Kansas but on the way we had to dodge some inclimate weather, like tornadoes and flooding!

We were watching the weather apps, radar maps and ended up at the Pratt County Veterans Memorial Campground:

Still heading northish, next state Nebraska and still being weather wary, we continue on. However there is one detour I just HAVE to make.

The Geographical Center of the Conterminous United States:

If you remember from a previous post, we had already been to the Geographical Center of California, so this was a natural. That night we stayed at a city RV park (Cozad MUNY) in Cozad, NE.

The next stop was also in Nebraska in Valentine at the Wacky West RV park:

This is where a slight direction change was in order. I determined that we should not go through Minot but head west to Montana and through Alberta to Canada. This made our next stop in Sturgis, SD. Where we were treated to a 30 minute hailstorm:

We survived that without any visible damage and continued on to Billings MT to stay at the first KOA in the KOA system. We stayed a few nights here as opposed to the single night hopping since leaving Hillsboro TX. That means we disconnected for the first time in that period. Roxie found some friends there:

We also purchased a new bed for the trailer. It is a normal queen so we have to squeeze by the ends. I will have to cut 5″ off of it one of these days:

The next stop was Great Falls MT to do some more prep for crossing over the border. I also had to repair a drawer slide that failed:

Roxie recommended a detour on the way, Glacier National Park. We found a spot for 2 nights:

On into Alberta. We had a bit of an ‘issue’ with the agent in Canada but more on that after we get back to the states, stay tuned. We ended up staying the night just Northwest of Calgary at a combination RV camp/golf course. We had a bit of weather here also:

Now we start the last portion. Almost to Mile 0 of the AlCan.