Today we played tourist and went to see a glacier. There is one just about 5 miles from Seward with an easy walking path to the ice field itself. It was a National Park so we got in free with our Golden Age Passport. Larry walked all the way in and checked out the ice but Diane turned back a couple hundred yards earlier when the path crossed a stream on slippery rocks. It was a beautiful clear day and the blue ice was highlighted by the sun.

                                                                 Exit Glacier near Seward, Alaska

A few short miles away in Seward it was heavy overcast but no rain. The weather near the coast with all the mountains can change from mile to mile. We had a most excellent lunch of fresh halibut at a seaside restaurant. It was so good we went by a local fish market and bought another halibut steak for dinner that evening.

After seeing all of Seward we wanted to we hit the road back toward Anchorage but we didn’t want to get back to Diane’s cousin’s place until the next day so took a side road to Hope. There we found a great National Park and campground. It was in the forest with all paved roads and paved camping pads -- the first ones we have seen in Alaska, most are gravel or dirt. Because of our Golden Age Passport, we got the space for half price -- $5. Of course there were no hookups so we dry camped. Dinner that evening was fresh halibut steak with salad and wild rice.

                                                                      Campground at Hope, Alaska

After a late start we drove the 100 miles or so into Anchorage. From there we headed out to Fort Richardson looking for a Laundromat and a place to dump and take on fresh water. We found the fort’s campgrounds and took care of the latter but no Laundromat. They had washers and dryers for free use of the campground customers but no coin operated ones. We thought about checking in but figured we could find a Laundromat cheaper than the $15 campground fee (a bargain with full hookups). However, we were staying at Diane’s cousin that evening. So over to Elmendorf AFB to check out their campground. Sure enough they had coin operated machines, and at $1 each, a bargain.

Went out to dinner with Al and Bev to a nice place downtown. We had, what else, halibut and it was most excellent. We kidded them saying we felt privileged to know someone who had been on the evening TV news three nights in a row (and Anchorage Daily News newspaper as well). They took it well but said they were throwing in the towel, retiring, and moving out of Alaska. They decided to check out Las Vegas as a candidate for a new hometown.

We dry camped in their driveway with plans to hit the road early the next day.

After saying good-bye to the relatives, we hit the road toward home -- or at least the lower 48. At the last minute we decided to take the long way back and go through Denali and Fairbanks. It is a couple hundred miles out of the way but, no doubt, this will be the last time we make a road trip to Alaska.

The roads were pretty decent  and this excursion  missed a lot of bad roads and construction we hit between Tok and Anchorage. Our destination was Cantwell, Alaska, a few miles south of the Denali National Park. I wanted to see the town that shares our name. It wasn’t much but I got my picture in front of the RR sign announcing the town (it is on the Alaska RR route from Anchorage to Fairbanks).

                                                             Larry Cantwell at Cantwell, Alaska

We spent the night at, where else, the Cantwell RV park. The campground clerk did a double take when she saw the name on my Good Sam card but it didn’t get me any extra discounts. At $14 with electric & water for good level sites it was not bad.

Another big bait of king crab legs for dinner. Best way I know of to keep Diane happy on this trip.

Longest day of the year and we will see it near the Arctic Circle. Probably won’t notice much difference as it stays light all night anyway. We spent the night in Cantwell at the Cantwell RV Park. Not bad but no modem hookups so couldn’t get e-mail in or out. The next morning we headed up the road to Denali. This has to be the, and I mean THE, tourist attraction of all Alaska. There were many, many motorhomes and campers in the parking lot and bunches of cars as well. We went into the visitor’s center where they arrange tours and rides on the shuttle buses that take people deep into the park. One must make arrangements and appointments in advance for these services (which we didn’t) so we drove back into the park as far as we could by private auto -- about 12 miles. The only critter we saw was a red fox trotting down the middle of the pavement. We were somewhat disappointed that we never did see Mt. McKinley as it was covered in clouds even though skies were clear elsewhere.

The roads were good as we headed up to Fairbanks. Never did see the city as the highway skirts around the town. There we ‘turned the corner’ and began the long journey homeward. With the long days and good highways we pushed on and finally spent the night at Tok where we used a free camping spot provided by a service station with a fill of gas.  Diane stayed up most of the night to see the longest day of the year.  The sun briefly dipped below the horizon and after an hour of twilight it popped back into the sky.

This is the day of bad roads. Most of the construction lies between Whitehorse and the US (Alaska) border. We crossed the border without incident ( but had to renew our firearms permit) and hit bad roads immediately. But we took our time and made the drive without any problems. It started raining on one construction zone where they had already watered down the roadbed and made it a sloppy mess. The Rialta was covered in mud and road grime. It makes it easy to tell which direction motorhomes are traveling, those going north are clean and the south bound are covered with mud. It was a long day but we made it to Whitehorse where we stopped at the same campground we used on the trip north.

Tired after a long day on rough roads so we slept in. We also lost an hour as we crossed the time zone from Alaska to Pacific time. We took this opportunity to catch up on e-mail as the campground had a good modem hookup. After a breakfast of freshly baked biscuits (from a can of course), peanut butter and jelly, we finally hit the road again.

The bad roads were behind us and we enjoyed smooth sailing most of the day. We stopped about mid afternoon at Mukluk Annie’s for an excellent lunch of grilled salmon (over a wood fire), baked beans, salad bar, iced tea, and brownie for dessert -- all for about $10 each US. They even threw in a free RV wash, which we sorely needed. A couple in a big house-on-wheels motorhome was ahead of us at the wash scrubbing the thing down like it was going into surgery. They were heading north. Suckers! A couple hours they would be covered in mud and grime.

Still an hour or more out of Watson Lake we ran into rain. Just as it started raining we came to Ranchera Falls recreation area. It has a large parking lot, trash bins, and pit toilets so we pulled in to let the rain go by. There was no one there and the rain didn’t let up so we just about decided to spend the night when another couple pulled in driving a pop-top van camper. They said they would like to spend the night as well but didn’t want to be there by themselves. We felt the same way so with mutual support we found level spots and settled in for a cozy rainy night in the wilderness.

                      Walkway to Ranchera Falls                                                           Ranchera Falls

More campers joined us at Ranchera Falls during the night and we had a regular little RV park before morning. It was clear to start the day but we soon ran into the rain again. Must have been the front that went through during the night and we caught up with it. Mostly drizzle or light rain throughout the morning. We went through more construction areas and the good news was there was no dust. Bad news, lots of mud and we were covered before we got through. After lunch it started to rain in earnest and came down the rest of the day. The good news, it washed off all the mud we had collected earlier. As the day wore on and we went up in altitude we could see fresh snow collecting a few hundred feet above us. Then we started seeing slush in the rain and it soon turned to snow -- not sticking but the air was full. The temperature dropped to the 30’s so we figured we would need some heat before the night was over. We stopped at a commercial campground on Muncho Lake so we could plug in our little electric space heater and save our LP. We got the last space available -- this was at 4:00 -- so looks like a lot of other people were also packing it in up early.

                                                                     Muncho Lake

Most traffic was heading north as we were getting into the main part of the Alaska Highway tourist season. We were seeing tons of campers and motorhomes coming up the road. In fact, a good ninety percent of the vehicles we meet were campers or motorhomes.

L&D heading south

We awakened to cold rain, a sharp wind blowing off the lake, and snow at higher elevations. Now this is more like it, the weather I was expecting from the northland. The little space heater got a workout during the night but saved our propane for another day. We overloaded the circuits at one time with the hot water heater, space heater, and microwave all going at the same time. Popped a circuit breaker and the campground manager had to go reset it (theirs not ours).

We were in and out of snow all day; snow at higher elevations and rain at lower. Some areas had two inches or more but none of it was sticking to the highway. The fir and pine trees were covered with snow and looked like thousands of acres of flocked Christmas trees. Quite a striking scene for the third day of summer.

                                                              Snow near Muncho Lake

With most of the bad roads behind us we put in a long day driving. Stopped for dinner at a rest stop where the chief cook and bottle washer whipped up a meal of fried chicken, baked potatoes, gravy and salad. After dinner we pushed on to Fort St. John, just 35 miles from the southern end of the ALCAN at Dawson Creek. I remembered seeing some campers in the Safeway parking lot on the way up and that’s where we landed for the night. The cold rain continued to come down throughout the night but we were snug in our little home on wheels.

Someone in the camper had the ‘wide-a-wakes’ at 0430 AM in the morning. Someone got up and was plundering around then Someone Else needed to go outside and pee so Someone took Someone Else out and slammed the door. The Third Someone decided he couldn’t sleep through all this racket so gave up and got up. After a cup of coffee we hit the road early, and I do mean EARLY.

We stopped in Dawson Creek at a campground where we stayed on the way up and knew they had an Internet modem hookup. Did a quick e-mail dump, a sewer dump, and got on the road again.

We parted company with the ALCAN and headed west toward Edmonton, Alberta. The country and highway changed dramatically. Gone were the mountains and forest-covered hills to be replaced by farms and fields of a flat prairie. The highway improved considerably with smooth pavement and even four lanes in some areas. There were even side roads leading off to other towns -- haven’t seen that for a while. The traffic has changed as well, about 1 in 10 was a RV as opposed to 9 out of 10 on the ALCAN. But for the third day in a row we are driving in rain. I think we will follow this cold front all the way to Iowa.

We stopped in Beaver Lodge just outside of Grande Prairie to cook breakfast at a town owned RV park. There were nice showers and a dump station and no one around. Why not? So we took showers and ‘reloaded’ the camper. We're good for another night of dry camping. This sure cuts down the expense of traveling.

Speaking of expense, gas prices had dropped in this part of Canada since we came through, about 3-4 cents a liter. In fact we bought the cheapest Canadian gas ever that day, $.759 per liter -- about $1.80 per gal US funds.

Hit the Great Northwest Casino in Grande Prairie and won about $15 bucks (Canadian) but it was enough to scratch the casino itch. By the way, it was the Third Someone who was the winner covering Someone’s losses. Passed a Wal-Mart store on the way to the casino so decided to stop and see if they would change our oil since it has been 7000 miles since the last one. I knew they wouldn’t have an oil filter but thought we could at least get the oil changed. Not only would they do the oil change but they called an auto parts supplier and got us a filter as well. Even though it took a couple hours out of the day I was most pleased to get this chore taken care of. Volkswagen recommends oil changes every 10,000 miles but I feel that is too long, especially considering the severe conditions we have been driving in for the past month. Even bigger surprise, it only cost $20 (Canadian) which is less than we pay for the oil filter alone.

26 June

Spent last night in an IGA grocery store parking lot, very handy to buy stuff for supper (and some fresh baked cinnamon rolls too). We drove into Edmonton where Diane wanted to look for a purse our Canadian friends showed her earlier on the trip. We didn’t find a store that sold them but did find a wonderful restaurant -- Tomato Factory or something like that. We had whole roast chicken for two with grilled veggies, garlic-mashed potatoes, and the best gravy we have ever smeared on anything. It had sun dried tomatoes among other spices and goodies. We saved half of the chicken for later and got two meals out of the deal ($25 Canadian).

Lots of traffic on the four-lane highway between Edmonton and Calgary. We stopped at place after place looking for a modem hookup for e-mail but to no avail. So we gave up and went to a RV park to spend the night. What a rip off! It was $22C for electricity and a dump station. When I went to take a shower, they were coin operated and cost another $2. I passed and took a bath in the van. But we did get e-mail downloaded, all 373 messages, many repeats. It was cold and rainy that night so we broke out the little electric heater once again.

27 June

Problems with our e-mail. The server in Leavenworth is not deleting our messages after we download them to the laptop and they keep building up. Downloaded 476 messages this morning and took over 10 minutes -- can’t afford that every day.

Drove into Calgary and did a repeat of the previous day’s search for the purse. Again no luck but again found an excellent restaurant, The Bellagio (same spelling as the one in Las Vegas). We both had veal Marcella and it was out of this world. We thought about hanging around for another day just to have another go at that excellent meal -- price $10 each plus tip.

We scraped up all our Canadian money and went to a gas station and bought that exact amount of gas, to the penny. Got rid of that stuff.

Another small town farther down the road had a dump station so we decided to take advantage of that but first Diane wanted to take a shower to have something to dump. The engine heats the water while driving and there was plenty. While she showered in the far corner of a large grocery store parking lot (inside the camper, of course), I went in to do some shopping. When the clerk rang up my haul, $22 worth, I handed her a credit card like we have done for the past 6 weeks on the road. She said they didn’t take credit cards. Huh? Now what? I told her I didn’t have any Canadian currency and she said they took American so I pulled out a $20 bill. She did a lot of calculations and finally arrived at $13.64 for the groceries and gave me change in Canadian. Bummer. More to get rid of. But Diane thought of an excellent way to get rid of it, she sent me back to the store to buy some English cucumbers. They were 98 cents each so I bought 5, she was most pleased. Then back to the dump station to empty the holding tanks and take on fresh water. They were asking for a donation for use of the facilities so I put the rest of the Canadian money in the donation box.

We hit the border mid afternoon and went through without incident. It is nice crossing the border at small roads, no waiting, no hassle and the personnel are usually friendly. We made it to Cut Bank, Montana, where we holed up for the night in a parking lot. It was pretty noisy and a rip-roaring thunder storm came through dumping rain with high wind. So we didn’t sleep to well and was up and on the road early.

On the road by 0630 and that was really early for us considering we lost another hour going east. We stopped and had breakfast in at a grain elevator parking lot and I took a shower since there was plenty of hot water. We later found a city owned dump station and got rid of the waste water but no fresh water. About noon we stopped at a small town in Montana to see if we could get on the internet at their library and straighten up our e-mail situation. But we spotted a nice city park on the way in and stopped there. They had a campground with water connections so we pulled in and took on fresh water. Diane decided she would take a shower and since that was the only water in the tank, we just let it dribble out on the ground.

We found the library just as they were closing up for lunch but decided we didn’t want to hang around for another hour regardless how nice the town was and hit the road. We stopped a couple hours later at another town and did make connection with their library and got on the internet. Deleted 500 old e-mail messages and sent a note to the tech support about the problem.

We made excellent time. The roads, although 2 lane, were smooth, mostly level, straight, and we had a strong tail wind. We cruised around 70 mph most of the time and still got 19 mpg. We hit the day’s destination early so decided to push on to the Four Bears Resort and Casino. We got there about 7:00 but lost another hour when we crossed the ND state line so was actually 8:00 local time. The rate was $12 per night for full hookup so decided to stay two nights. We need a day of down time to do laundry and house cleaning.

                      The Four Bears Casino and camp grounds along the Missouri River, ND

Ran the A/C all night as it was warm and humid in North Dakota. But then it started raining sometime during the night and cooled off. We slept in and started the day’s chores about 10:00. The campground had a laundry but they were in the men’s and women’s rest rooms -- some in each. No problem with the washers but only one of the dryers worked and it was in the men’s area. So it took a hour and a half to get all the clothes dried and we draped some wet items on the van.

When we finally made it up to the casino, they were in the middle of the new hotel grand opening. Lots of speeches, Miss North Dakota, Indian chiefs, and other dignitaries I didn’t recognize. They had also booked Loretta Lynn for an evening concert. Wait a minute! She was at an Indian casino back in Morton, Minnesota, when we first started this trip. Deja Vu! Anyway we hung around and participated in the eating part of the festivities and got a pretty decent free meal out of the deal.

It was about 4:00 when we caught their shuttle back to the campground. Good thing we left the A/C on for the dog or he would have been roasted by now, it turned hot again. Yes, it can get hot in ND. Spent the rest of the evening in the Rialta getting out of the heat and turned in early.

30 June

We packed up and drove up to the resort for breakfast. The breakfast buffet was $6.95, a dollar higher than their dinner buffet -- go figure. Anyway after looking it over we decided it wasn’t worth it and ordered off the menu. It took forever to get our food, at least 45 minutes. They knocked off 20% for the bad service. We then visited the casino for a couple hours and proceeded to get scalped.

More prairie driving, more wind, but otherwise an uneventful day. We ended up at a Flying J truck stop for another night of dry camping. The cook was getting tired of fixing meals so we hit the local cafe for a pretty decent buffet -- belly fill but OK. The best feature was a modem hookup at the table so we had dinner and read e-mail.

It was a little noisy as the parking lot was full of trucks and most didn’t shut off their engines all night. But, hay, it was free. We didn’t even fill up with gas.

Off to Forest City. Iowa the Mecca of Winnebagos. But first we had to stop at the Indian casino in Morton, MN, where we stopped on the way out. Again they were kind to us and we walked away with our pockets full of their cash. Sort of made up for the scalping by the ND Indians.

We arrived in Forest City about 8:00 PM and all the free hookups were already taken. We went by the WIT campgrounds for a dump and fresh water. The showers were open and had hot water so we took advantage of that perk as well. With no place else to park we pulled up in front of the service center door along with about a half dozen big rigs and sacked out for the night.

Diane was up early as she wanted to be first in line for walk-in service. Too late, she was number 4. While she was standing at the front door waiting to get in along with several other folks, an obnoxious butthead came up and was raising hell about how badly he was being treated. They were supposed to have his rig fixed last week but didn’t so he had to stay over the weekend. If they didn’t get it fixed today he was going to contact the Attorney General’s office and make them take the rig back and “stick it up their ass under the lemon law”.

The service center has three parking areas, one right in front of the door (where we were parked), one a few feet away to the right that have electrical hookups, and one to the left for employee cars. Butthead was parked in the spaces to the right. Another 40 footer came in and parked crosswise to our rear leaving enough space to drive through. After Butthead checked in, he decided to move his 40 footer to the front lot, a distance of about 25 or 30 feet. So he fired it up and came in from behind us to swing into a parking place between another 40 footer and us. Well, there was hardly enough room for a full size sedan to make that maneuver but this idiot tried it anyway. As he turned into the parking space, his rear end swung around and slammed into the front of the rig that had pulled in and parked crosswise. Did quite a bit of damage to his rig but didn’t hurt the other one too much. Then a parking lot fight ensued between Butthead and Mrs. Butthead. Of course it wasn’t his fault, it was Winnebago’s. He shouldn’t even be here and if they had fixed his rig when they were supposed to he would be on his way and this wouldn’t have happened. All the spectators found it very amusing and secretly said to themselves it couldn’t have happened to better guy. Of course we all felt sorry for the couple whose rig got hit but it looked like minor damage that could be repaired fairly easily.

The experience with Winnebago was not so positive this time. We were told to check back at 8:30 for a status of our chances of getting service. At 8:30 we were told to check back after lunch. I could see where this was going so asked to speak to someone who could tell me if they would even do the work. I had my doubts about them retrofitting the new style door lock connectors to an older rig, especially this time of year when they were so busy. A supervisor came out after repeatedly being paged and we talked over the situation. He was not very encouraging, kept saying they had a better conduit for the wires now. We were not interested, wanted the Magnum Shooter or nothing. He said he would go back and talk to the electrician and see what he had to say and would come back and let us know. Of course he never came back. In their defense, they were overloaded with customers and had 8 or 10 walk-ins besides all the appointments. We gave up and left. But first I had to promise Diane to do the job my self.

On the way out of town we stopped at the Winne surplus store. Lots of good stuff there if one needed any of it. I made off with 4 new hubcaps with the VW logo for $5 each and a bag of mixed screws, bolts and nuts for $1 per pound. One of the employees was charging stuff to payroll deduction, a TV and some other junk. Wonder if they would let an employee charge a Rialta?

Made our way to my Mom’s place in south Iowa where we will spend the next couple days. Just 150 more miles to home camp.

Alaska journey, final report.

It was July 4th, Independence Day, as we complete the final leg of a 10,500 mile, 7 week adventure. Independence. To me that is what the Rialta represents. It is more than just metal, plastic, and fabric; it is freedom and independence. And now that we are free from the shackles of the work place, the Rialta gives us the freedom to go where we want, when we want. We are free from seedy motels, free from greasy spoon restaurants, free from cramped airlines and frantic rushes through airport terminals. It is a great feeling and the Rialta makes it possible economically and reliably.

The little home on wheels has performed flawlessly, both the coach and the VW chassis. I didn’t keep total accurate records of gas mileage but many samples came in over 18 mpg. The only problem was a leaky sewer valve and a Winnebago dealer in Anchorage satisfactorily took care of it under warranty.

Will we make the trip again? Probably not, there are too many other places to go and sights to see, but I’m glad we went this time. For us, it will be a one-time affair. It is a loooong way from Kansas and we drove almost every day -- too much driving. The scenery was eye-popping drop-dead gorgeous, the weather was mostly bluebird, the exception was a few days of rain on the return trip. King crab legs, salmon, and halibut were out of this world.

Someone asked if there was something we should have taken but didn’t. No, but there were several items we took that we should have left home. We only used the foldout camping chairs twice and they took up a lot of space in the trunk, I never used the waders I packed, could have gotten along very well without all the rain gear -- it never did rain hard, a waterproof windbreaker would have been enough. We took 12 movies on tape and watched one. We got the most mileage out of the dozen or so paperbacks, preferring to read than watch TV. After all it was light enough to read until midnight. I took a large aluminum pot for some unknown reason. It was so much in the way in the trunk I just left it beside a dumpster one day (it was old and beat up anyway). I took a basic set of tools including an electric impact wrench, tow rope, air compressor, can of flat fixit, etc, hoping I never had the opportunity to use any of it and didn’t. A snapshot 35-mm camera didn’t get much use either as I used a digital camera and Diane carried the camcorder. The laptop we purchased in Oregon at the beginning of the trip did get a workout and will continue to travel with us in the future but loaded up with some more entertainment software. Finally, we didn’t need the shotgun but it gave Diane a sense of security so guess it was worth the expense and hassle of taking it along.

All in all a great trip, a grand adventure but its nice to be home and sleep in a king-size bed, have a hot shower for as long as we want, and not be bumping my head 40 times a day.

Larry & Diane home at last

Filthy 2000FD.

**************************************

From Diane’s Diary

Day 1 (crossing the border into Canada)

I count this as my first day to Alaska. Seeing family and friends in the lower 48 does not count.

I felt like a pioneer woman crossing into the unknown, unexplored, uncharted territories, in a Rialta, not a covered wagon. Kept thinking about Sacagawea and her tiny infant she had strapped on her back while leading Lewis and Clark. Her baby was two months old, a boy named Pomp, named by Clark and the baby’s father was with them. He name was Jean Batiste' Chardonneaux. Wondered why she was the guide and not the father of her baby? Must read more about her when we return. Enough about history.

The ride to the Canadian border was desolate and I wondered what we were getting into. The border crossing was painless, even with checking our firearm. They did not even ask to see my passport or I.D....I was crushed.....it was such a good picture as I was much younger. Larry had to go into the office to do the firearm paper work. He and two customs guys came out to the van. I held our 'killer' dog back when they entered. The customs guy came inside, they had to check the serial number on the weapon, commented this was a nice rig and a very nice shotgun. I politely thanked him and he mentioned it two more times while looking around. Guess this was the first Rialta to pass this border.

From then on it felt like civilization with small towns clustered along the highway. It seemed like we were in England. We have been there several times and the road signs etc., looked the same. We stopped early in the day at a nice campground with a river so Baron was able to swim. Did not have any food so went to a Greek restaurant where I had the best Calamari I have ever eaten.....and I have had Calamari all over the country.

Have not done too much cooking yet but discovered the sink spigot could be longer. Very difficult to get a skillet rinsed under the spout. [We changed the spigot after the trip]. This had to have been designed by a man. I just brought two pans...Calphalon non-stick, one large and a small skillet with straight up sides, and they are so easy to clean up and stash. I clean them out with a paper towel before sudsing and rinsing them.

Have used the campground showers so far. This morning there was a woman in the bathroom with a large container of make-up and two different size curling irons blow drying her hair. Wonder if she will still be doing that after traveling several thousand miles. I told my stylist to give me a three month hair cut. It is very short and what I call wash and wear, perma-press. You have to keep things very simple in this style of living.

Only traveled 1/2" into Canada today---according to my map 589- more inches to go

Day 2

This is a day I will never forget and wish it never happened. I relieved Larry from driving about one hour into the day. We normally split driving 50-50 but he has done most of the driving this trip. Found myself going up a very steep grade on the side of a mountain. To make a long story short, I was climbing a mountain that had a summit of 12,000 feet. We were right on the cliff with concrete barriers on most places but I knew the drop off was just a few feet away. I am terrified of heights and found myself hugging the center lane of the four-lane highway. There was no place to change drivers so I was stuck with this mess. After going down the mountain I was a basket case. Felt like falling apart but controlled myself. Never do I want to go through this again. I believe the Rockies here are much worse than in Colorado. At least the driving part.

Larry left the big thick red line, on the map, and decided to take a short cut somewhere so took a wee tiny skinny blue highway. Well, this was almost worse than when I was driving. Sat in the passenger seat gripping the armrest with my eyes tightly closed. This was a very narrow blacktop country road on the side of a mountain without concrete barriers. Finally got back on the red line highway and I was able to get myself composed.

We are now 2" into Canada.

Day 3

Wakened to snow, cold and very much wanted to head back south instead of north. After the day started I felt better about continuing our trip. Larry kind of left it up to me whether we wanted to continue this trip. Only after he promised to not take any more tiny blue line highways did I agree.

Went grocery shopping and then it really felt like England. I found some English cucumbers and salt / vinegar potato chips. Saw the first moose today along the side of the road.

I have never seen so many forests and trees in my life -- thousands of acres. When you approach a pulp mill you learn very quickly to hit the recirculate button ….. it smells like sewage!

There are acres and acres of dandelions. It looks like someone spread a yellow blanket over the ground, they are so thick. I finally decided what they do with the dandelions. When they turn to seed they are harvested, picked up by helicopter and dumped over our home in Leavenworth.

The lilacs up here are just starting to bloom. Could not get any because they were all in yards. It seems like we have been in spring since Feb. when we were down in the Gulf Coast.

Did not check inch marks today.

RUG STORY

Baron really is getting our carpet dirty so decided we had to get throw rugs that I could launder frequently. I am Mrs. Clean and cannot stand the spotted dirty carpet. Found some plush bathroom rugs in a charcoal colour (note spelling, we are in BC now). I knew we would need 6 but also knew Larry would raise a fit buying this many because they were a bit pricey. So bought two at a Target store. As we drove to Oregon I kept telling him we needed another for another spot. So after stopping at Target stores enroute to Oregon he caught on to my plan. We are buying them on the installment plan so he would not know I was getting so many. Yeah -- he was right.

GAS MILEAGE STORY

All through the lower 48 Larry had to figure the gas mileage on EVERY fill-up. This got rather old as I could predict what the mileage would be by wind, speed etc. But...it still had to be done. When we got into Canada we started buying in liters in Canadian dollars. After a couple fill ups the gas mileage taking has ceased. This guy has a degree in Math but cannot do arithmetic. His little hand held calculator (from a Cracker Jack box) has some lights burned out on one 8 figure....it looks like a 3. This has caused some concern and many harsh words said when he thought he was getting 13 MPG instead of the 18 it was suppose to be.

Day 4 ( or whatever...I have lost track)

Finally made it to Dawson Creek. Larry's dream was to have his picture taken at milepost "Zero", which is the start of the ALCAN highway. After searching for a time in the town we finally found it in the dead center of an intersection, yes, in the middle of town. We parked, Larry got his camera out and this is the conversation that followed.

Me.....you are not going out in the middle of the street to have your picture taken

Him....yes I am.

Me...your kidding.

Him....NO I am not kidding.

Me....whose going to take it?

Him…..You are (as he thrust the camera in my face)

So I hid by the side of the van and quickly snapped his picture...he signaled me for another which I took, and then "slunk" quickly back into the van. The residents of Dawson Creek must have a law they cannot enter the intersection while some idiot tourist is standing with a silly ass grin on his face because at least three cars pulled up and stayed until Larry cleared the intersection.

                                                           Milepost Zero; start of the ALCAN

Did laundry at the campgrounds (you have to mortgage your house to do laundry, eight quarters for one washer load) and there were two other women there. They made me an honorary member of the "We Don't Want to Go To Alaska but our Husbands Do" club. They have taken a poll and have not found one woman who wanted to go.

I wish they would make a template to cover the speedometer in large numbers for metric. It is difficult to see 100km 80km 60km and not think that is the speed in miles. They are so tiny on the dash it is impossible to read and I can't remember them all.

It is bedtime and the sun is still shining but will pull the shades and try to sleep. Sun doesn't set until 10:00.

Did not measure but think we are 5" into Canada now.

5 June

IT HAPPENED....IT HAPPENED......IT HAPPENED

I was not too keen on this trip to Alaska but it has always been a dream of Larry‘s. I had this fear of getting stranded on the ALCAN, running out of food and water never to see a human again. We would be found about 10 years from now with just skeleton remains.

We drove just a few hours from Ft. Nelson and came to a road closed sign. It seems that with very hot weather and heavy rains that a culvert and a bridge washed out 100 miles away from here. There is not an RV Park, province (state) park that has a parking place left; we heard that people are parking along the highway. Rumor has it that it could be 3 days or longer.

We backtracked a few miles to a spot along the river where we saw three very large RVs when we passed. Found a nice spot and some nice neighbours (still in BC). Now remember, we are in a very small RV, we dumped and filled with water this morning so should be good for 2 days if we conserve. I always make sure we have food for two days but ran out of milk today. Have tried to find the milk that is on the shelf, in the states, and after opening you fridge it. But....they do not have that in Canada.

Now the pioneer survival is coming out in us. We have taken water from the river to use in washing up bodies and dishes. Our neighbour and Larry will dig a hole to dump the black tank if necessary. There are several "full timers" with big Motor Homes around us that said we would not starve if this runs into several days. They have room to carry lots of food .... we don't.

It never did get dark last night. The sunset was just lingering in the sky when I went to sleep at 12:30 A.M. Wakened at 2:30 and it was the same. Very difficult to go to sleep when the sun is still in the sky.

But......all I can think about now is survival........I hope to be able to send you all another message but who knows what is in store for us......we do not have a cell signal....there are no modem jacks on the phones that are not here..............you may never hear from us again.

Inch marks are not important now. I just want to get out of here alive!!

7 June

We made it out alive! I made Larry drive across this new bridge (they built it in 2 days and 3 1/2 hours exactly), in fact, we had mountain curvy roads today so he did 100% of the driving. I did all the cooking....we ate lunch and dinner out today. Was tired of canned food and dog food we have been forced to eat whilst (BC) stranded. ;-)

We stopped at a flea bag gas station, the pump was from the 1940's, and bought a few liters. It cost 96.9 cents a liter. $98.95 a gallon in translation, my calculations. My calculator is from Texas Instruments, not cracker jacks, so I know it is correct. It made me so mad I decided to use their bathroom instead of ours. Wanted to keep the tanks empty in case we had to dry camp another night. Saw the shower that looked very nice. After kitchen sink baths (did not want to put water in the black tank), with river water for two days, I had this wonderful vision of gallons and gallons of water falling down on my head. I ran out into the van, collected my shower stuff and Larry said I had better not take the shower. That did it...... I was out the door in a flash and it was the best shower ever!! Did not get 'caught' and got them back for the liquid gold we put in our tank. I certainly felt better both inside, outside and Larry thought I smelled better also.

As I am sitting here another Rialta just pulled into this R.V park. Will probably go talk to them in the morning. It's the third one we have seen on the ALCAN. We are in a decent place tonight and guess what......I took another shower......in this life on this route you never know when you will get your next one. Oh, how I wish our shower drain was going into the gray tank....then we could dump on the ground when dry camping. [Installed valves to divert shower water to gray tank].

Just looked at my watch and it is 10:30. The sun is still high in the sky. From now on it will never get dark.

7" into Canada.

8 June Day 498

It was a boring day in the Yukon. The only exciting thing that happened to me was driving across the longest bridge on the ALCAN. I managed to get across by driving down the center, there were no other cars coming, closed one eye and held my breath. It worked!! I made it.

There is a problem with the front passenger seat with the fabric. As soon as you sit down it emits toxic fumes that immediately put you to sleep. Only when your vital organs start to shut down and the chin hits the chest does it arouse you to stay alive. This is only in the Rialta's with the fabric seat, if you have a leather seat I doubt if that would happen.

We are in Whitehorse, Yukon tonight.

Diane

20 June

Today is the Summer Solstice, longest day of the year. We find ourselves at Fairbanks only 150 miles or so from the Arctic Circle. Wouldn't it be great to be up there tonight and never see the sun go down. But it is a gravel road and we don't want to put our precious Rialta through the rough roads. Still thinking about the rough roads up coming up here and kind of dreading the return trip.

Tonight I plan to stay up all night just to see the sun never set.

Diane

21 June

I tried to stay awake until very late but not to be. At 11:00 the sun was still quite high, fell asleep....at 1:30 it seemed to be just a bit lower. A couple hours later it was still light and saw just a bit of the sun. Never did get twilight.

Larry is wondering why I am falling asleep in the passenger seat today.........

Now we are working our way south where the sun will set and we will be able to sleep at night.

Diane

Explanation needed here. Bev is my cousin whom I have not seen since we were 6 years old in 1945. Our fathers were both Mennonite so we were reared on the straight and narrow. Rumor has it in our family that her husband runs brothels in Alaska. Of course, we did not believe the rumors.

Story as follows.......

*******************************************************************

We are finally camped at a place where we are hooked up to electricity and I can type this long letter without the battery running down on this laptop.

We made it to Anchorage and arrived at their house on Monday night. Bev had king crab legs, my favorite vegetable. On Tuesday they both went to work and we did laundry all day. That night they took us out to dinner in Anchorage. At 10:00 P.M. Al left the house saying he was going downtown. We just said goodnight and bye because were leaving the next morning. Al was going up to Fairbanks on Wed morning to attend to a business he just bought. ?????

Note….we slept in our motor home which was parked in the street in front of their house.

We got up Wednesday morning and at 7:00 I went into the house to take a shower. Al had gone to Fairbanks that morning, (early) . Went out to the van and Larry went in the house. We had to take our van back to the Winnebago place because the repair they made the day before was still not correct. So Larry called A&M RV after he got out of the shower and got a recording that they were not open until 8:00 A.M. He came back out into the van. Just before 8:00 he went back into the house in Bev's office to call the place. He waited until his watch said 8:00 before dialing. I left the van with the laptop under my arm so we could download e-mail right after he got off the phone.

As I walked up to the front door this green pickup came flying into the drive way, screeched on it's brakes......I thought it was the lawn mowers and wondered why they were in such a hurry. I just quickly glanced sideways at the truck. Immediately a red SUV flew right beside the green truck and just as I put my hand on the doorknob all kinds of bodies came flying out of the two vehicles and said, “STOP...DON'T TOUCH THAT DOOR.” Then I was aware of police cars screeching to a halt all around. Afterwards, we counted three of them with one of them blocking the driveway. Two Anchorage police cars were on the street.

They ask me if Al was in the house and I said "no". They ask me if I knew where he was and I told them he went to Fairbanks early that morning. They knew I was not Bev because they then said they had a search warrant to enter the house and search for records. They said at that time that Bev was not involved.

I was detained outside the house and told them I was her cousin, had not seen her since 1945 etc. They ask my name and birth date. That's all. Then they had me go inside the house. Went into living room where Larry was sitting on the couch. They had to have a guard stand by us and we had the friendliest conversation with this guy.

Larry had just picked up the phone to call the RV place when they walked in on him, told him to step out and escorted him into the living room. I finally ask the guy what this was all about and he said Bev was not involved but they were looking for records of Al's.

The night before when we went out to dinner we took Bev's car because Al's was full of papers and stuff from his business. We believe he carried all his records in his car.

Bev finally came out under guard and she started crying saying she had no idea what was going on. She was really embarrassed. They had guys all over the house in every room. Guess it took them about 3 hours to go through the house.

They started taking pictures of the inside of the house from every angle. We were sitting on the couch when I saw the camera pointed at me and I just naturally smiled. They all had a chuckle over that and said we did not have to be in the picture. Larry thinks they took a picture of us but I don't think so. They never did ask Larry his name. (In retrospect we believe they had spotted our Rialta in front of the house before the raid, perhaps a day or so before, and probably knew all about us. Since Larry worked for the government, Dept of Defense, I’m sure they found out we were ‘clean’ and had nothing to do with Al’s business).

After the picture taking started they said we could leave if we wanted....we wanted.....I went into Bev's office, under guard, where she was sitting and gave her a hug and told her we would call. We were heading out that day anyway.

Larry said they were the IRS, CID and several local policemen. I guess Al's several other businesses (massage parlors) were being raided all at the same time exactly 8:00. I'm sure this investigation has been ongoing for a long time because on T.V. shows the raid on the house is always the end.

Bev called our cell phone while we were in the RV place after they had left. She then told me about Al's businesses....he indeed did have several parlors and had just bought another one in Fairbanks. As you might guess…they are illegal.

We are in southern Alaska now and will probably stop and see them on the way out of the state.

Diane

[We did see them again and teased them about being on the evening TV news.  After we left and on the way to Fairbanks, we saw the remainder of a bonfire beside the road.  We said that must have been all that was left of Al's records.  ;-) ]