July 4 2008 Kananaskis

Barb and Gordon got in about 9 PM last night. They set up next to us in a site that was connected to ours in the living area. The sites at Lower Lake campground are carved out of the pine and spruce forest, so you have quite a bit of privacy but occasionally they made adjacent sites that connect, so people traveling together can set up like we did, side by side.

We went for a good forest walk over to the Inter Lakes campground where most of the sites had been taken, but it looked good for another time as some of the sites are beach front on the lake. After the walk we returned for lunch and the weather turned intermittently rainy so we went for a drive to the southern parts of the park.

July 2 2008 Red Deer

We left Jasper around 8 AM and started down the Icefield Highway, one of Canada's most beautiful drives. Most of the road travels beside the Athabasca River and other very busy streams and rivers. At this time of year the rivers are all swollen and white with glacier flour from snow and ice melting in the highlands. A bit of a surprise was the Athabasca Falls where the entire Athabasca River goes through a gorge about 4 metres wide and falls about 10 metres. This has carved a beautiful little canyon and is an amazing site.

We left the Icefield highway at Saskatchewan Crossing and headed east to Red Deer on highway 11. This travels through the mountains slowly converting into the foothills and then you reach Rocky Mountain House. From there it is mostly farm land into Red Deer.

The video might take a while to download.

July 1 2008 Jasper

After spending a couple of pleasant days visiting Lee's brother Rick and niece Katie in Prince George our next journey was to Jasper in Alberta. We decided to drive this on the 1^st so that we would be easily in position to have our RV at the repair shop in Red Deer on the 3^rd. The traffic was light until after McBride and then became moderate but OK. We saw beautiful Mt. Robson, mostly in the clear.

At Jasper we turned south and stopped at Wabasso campground where we shoehorned our RV into a big site with a small opening. A nice long walk along the river capped off the day.

June 28 Prince George

Coming off the ferry we had to go through Canadian customs and then we were off in rain and mist up the hill to P.G. The trip had one exciting moment when a black bear practiced his 100 m sprint straight across the road in front of us. We missed him, but I'd say we gave him a pretty good scare. He may not wait so long before moving away next time he hears a car coming!

The weather fined up by Houston and we had a good run through to PG with the exception that diesel fuel became hard to find at the part of our journey where we needed to find it. Really needed it. Tensions eased once we found a little store at Topley!

We got a spot at the Blue Spruce RV park which is a very nice park with spacious sites and trees!

June 26-28 Alaskan Ferry

As usual we arrived at the ferry terminal way before most people and were at the front of the line. Boarding went smoothly and we quickly had our room sorted out ( a triple berth with a window on the port side) and found ourselves a place in the observation lounge to sit and watch the scenery. We departed on time at 2:15 PM 26^th of June. The vessel had two people from the park on board, a husband and wife team, to tell us all about the journey and wildlife and to help in wildlife spotting. They were very good, but he in particular looked like a very rabid greeny so I did not mention my mining background.

Our ship was the Matanuska. According to “the Milepost” it began service in 1963 carries 499 passengers, 88 vehicles, has 108 cabins, a cafeteria, gift shop, cocktail lounge, a recliner lounge and an observation lounge where we spent most of our time.

The weather that first afternoon was cloudy but fine, and too cold to be out in the wind on the deck. A clear bright sunny day would have been better for the scenery, but it was not to be. It was our most prolific wildlife section for mammals, seeing humpback whales and Dall porpoise, sea lions and seals.

We woke the next morning to even more cloud and occasional rain. It was mostly fine for the Wrangle Narrows which is a narrow passage that our ferry was just small enough to go through, but only at high tide. The big cruise ships have to go 150 miles more using a different route because they are too big. This area has a large concentration of bald eagles and we would have seen about 200 or so. The tide had turned and was falling as we went through. It was interesting to see a spot where it was running north and shortly after, running south. We'd hit the apex.

There is a surprising number of people live in the islands that make up the Inside Passage considering there are no roads from the outside, only local roads. We stopped at Juneau, the state capital, Petersburg, Wrangell, Ketchikan and finally Prince Rupert, arriving at 5:15 AM June 28th.