changinglanes2015dotcom

Here is where it gets interesting because we faced our first night without electricity, water or sewer (kind of like staying in a Wal-Mart parking lot in the middle of the woods).  With a short stop between at Toad River Lodge with it’s collection of more than 10,00 hats (caps).  Cary contributed a hat and received a card stating it was the 10,039th hat contributed to the collection.  We finally arrived at Liard Hot Springs Provincial Park, and here is where Cary was in his element.  Fear not, because he finally got to use his new generator and we had prepared for this with meals, water for showers and making GiGi comfortable in the rig with A/C.  The worst was not having a signal for phone and Wi Fi.

Next morning all our tour group left for the next town, Watson Lake, with a short delay caused by a herd of buffalo.  They had established a rest stop in the middle of the highway and here in this territory the animals have the right-of-way.  Luckily most of the animals including bears, caribou, elk….. do not pay attention to the vehicles but when you come upon them, your camera time is limited because of vehicles behind and ahead.  It’s a major traffic jam where there is an animal sighting.  We have posted some of our animal sightings but we have not seen a moose yet.  They are gigantic and we have been told that when they get aggravated their ears will go back and they will charge.  We don’t plan on getting close enough to see what his ears are doing !  We also spotted a fox but couldn’t get a picture fast enough.  Hope to get many more pictures before this trip is over.

We continued on up the Alaskan Highway to Fort Nelson, BC, where we stayed only 1 night.  Fort Nelson Heritage Museum was within walking distance from our campground and we are so glad we visited.  It was so unique with vintage farm equipment, antique cars, collections of every kind – including hand saws, old radios, telephones, you name it and they had it.  They even had an old log cabin on the property furnished with skins and furs, pots, utensils.  Also included was the kindest old gentleman who could tell you a story or demonstrate anything you needed to know about anything in the museum.  It was unreal !

We then left for Dawson Creek BC, which is where the Alaskan Highway began.  We all took plenty of pictures of the sign, marking mile O of the highway and also met up for a group picture.  (Haven’t received it yet).  The surveyor, made completely of scrap metal points Northwest to a mud path which finally became the Alaskan Highway.  We visited the Alaska Highway House Museum and were fascinated with the fact that 10,000 army soldiers and civilians completed this highway in only 8 months, facing extreme temps of 70 below O, insects, swamps, rivers, ice, mountains with only 7,000 pieces of equipment that took a beating, most abandoned because of breakdowns and no parts to repair them.  This all occurred to build the highway because we had to protect North America from the Japanese after Pearl Harbor.  Can you imagine what these men did in 8 months when nowadays it takes 8 months or more to have a pothole repaired in the middle of a big city.

We have to catch up now since we have a signal for the time being.

We stopped in Jasper AB, a quaint small town with specialty shops, coffee shops and beautiful flowers galore.  Most popular in these towns along the way are pastry shops too, where they seem to have a competition with their cinnamon buns.  We just had to sample one of course but had to split it because they are huge.  It was here in Jasper that we spotted our first elk lying down behind the camper and another with her baby.

The morning of the 14th we left for Jasper, Alberta, in the same cloudy weather and a tour was scheduled enroute to the next RV park.  We all met at the Columbia Icefield.  This tour was much better than awesome.  We all got on a regular tour bus (where it was snowing at the time), and rode up to the beginning of the ice fields where we boarded an Ice Explorer Bus with giant tires which took us up to the Athabasca Glacier.  There was one point where we were riding straight up and another where we felt like we were going to drop off at the top.  We reached the glacier and exited the ice bus for 15 minutes to walk and take pictures.  We learned that we were standing on the largest mass of glacial ice in the Canadian Rockies.  What a beautiful view!  We then were driven back down on the ice bus and tour bus and on to continue our trip.  We were back on the road again and headed for the next stop when we almost went into shock when we spotted 2 bears on the side of the road ahead.  I keep my  small camera in my lap with my trigger finger on the On/Off button so I can snap at any time and I caught one picture of the bear but not quick enough for the other.  All traffic on the highways here stop when there is an animal sighting so you better have your camera ready because they move fast.We then stopped at the Athabasca Falls with that  same beautiful color water that is from the glacial flour.  How many times can you say “Gorgeous.” That made our day complete.  Hope you enjoy our posts but up here WiFi is scarce and phone signals are few and far between so BEAR with us if we do not post as often as we would like. (One bit of trivia – there are only 23 Ice Explorer  Busses in the world and all 23 are at the Columbia Ice Fields)

Before leaving Banff, we went on the Gondola ride up to the top of Sulphur Mountain.  The weather was still not on our side.  At the bottom the sun was shining and the temp was mild.  After an 8 minute ride to the top we exited, walked out to see the view and the wind got up, the snow came down and we got soaked.  It was so bad that the Gondola company handed out blankets and ponchos to all the people on top.  After about 30 minutes of waiting in line to go back down, the sun came out and all was beautiful again.  We caught a few pictures of the view and some mountain goats that were on top of the mountain, but honestly after waiting in line in the storm we looked worse than the wet goats.

Spent the day on the tour bus to Banff National Park and more.  First stop was the Spiral Tunnels, the steepest and most scenic railway lines in North America and we were lucky enough to actually see the train running.  The next stop was Emerald Lake in Yoho National Park, BC which is frozen from November to June and the color is a beautiful turquoise which is caused by powdered limestone.  Then we traveled to Moraine Lake which took us back to Alberta and is called the “Valley of the Ten Peaks.”  The water was an unbelievable blue green color that is created from glacial silt.  Then on to lunch at Lake Louise Ski Resort and on to Lake Louise which was much more than we expected.  The water was more beautiful than all we had seen yet. The emerald color is caused by melted water from the glaciers called glacier flour, and this was our first view of a glacier, the upper and lower Victoria Glaciers.  How about a $ 1,000.00 a night stay at the Lake Louise Chateau overlooking the lake and glaciers ?  Other stops included the Natural Bridge and Johnston Canyon where we hiked to the waterfall which was more than worth it.

We included a picture of our first bear sighting from the window of the bus.  Can you see that black spot in the picture.  You have to move fast to catch a picture of the animals.  Just so glad we were on the bus.  One more interesting fact – the overpasses are covered by grass and trees so that the animals can safely cross the highways.

The weather did not cooperate with us today but we still were determined to visit the hot springs and “WOW” are we glad we did.  It was awesome – about 101 degrees and even though it was lightly raining, it was so soothing that we stayed in for about 30 minutes.  Quite a few of our tour group did the same.  With the mountains above us and the hot “healing waters” it was just about perfect.  Sorry we didn’t include a picture but our hands were wet, along with everything else.  We talked with one of the local ladies in the store and she said you can appreciate the waters more in the winter when your hair freezes.  No thank you !  We included some pictures along the way to Banff, AB  and as you can see it was too cloudy and wet to really appreciate them but the mountains were still beautiful because you could see them rising above the clouds.

We had a great visit to beautiful Coeur D’Alene Idaho as we pictured the Resort in the previous post.  The Marina and beachfront park in the downtown area were especially impressive and we couldn’t believe some of the expensive boats which seemed to outnumber the amount of people, but many of them were from Canada and other parts of the country.    We walked the boardwalk, downtown area and made several trips to Cabela’s for extra supplies (also a great place to visit).  After a great orientation and fantastic meal with the Fantasy Tour group, we left Coeur D’Alene for our first destination.  We passed through the Canadian border without any problems.  We had heard all the stories about how they could easily search your vehicle and RV for everything from eggs to chicken, potatoes and any and everything.  We presented our passports and they asked some general questions about weapons, our pet and if we had any fresh fruits.  That was it and we were on our way.  It was a beautiful trip and we arrived at our first destination today in Radium Hot Springs, British Columbia.  We hope the weather will hold out for us tomorrow as we heard it may rain.  We were really hoping to visit the Hot Springs tomorrow where the temperature is 101 degrees.  Our RV resort also has a pool, hot tub and inside pool so we do have an alternative but it would be nice to go to the springs.