Day 28

Last day of the trip, and the day we arrive back home! We got up early and tore down our soaking wet tent. No amount of towelling off would get it dry, so we had to pack it up wet. We showered using our last tokens, and it was Brett with the company this time. Brett waited for the shower to open up, and found that, like him, there's always somebody forgetting their shampoo and such. Rhonda was the first woman in the showers, she even had to turn in the lights. A first.

Brett grabbed a cup of coffee from the general store. As soon as Rhonda was out, we hopped in the truck and hit the road (on our way out, the sun began to shine and there was a rainbow in the mountains. It figures, nice weather when we are leaving. But with only 2 days of rain in 28 we can't complain all that much). Brett's big concern was the inevitable lineup at the border crossing, which was only 20 minutes away. And the possibility of a search...

We arrived at the border crossing, and didn't see any duty free shops. ? However, the customs checkpoint was deserted! Hooray! And once again, as soon as the magic words "we're schoolteachers" passed our lips, we were on our way!

We had started the trip with a McDonald's breakfast, and we thought it would be cool to end the trip the same way. However, the nearest McDonald's was in High River, an hour and a half away. We filled up in Cardston around 9:30 AM, and made breakfast at the McDonald's in High River at about 10:45. Thank goodness it was a Saturday!

We drove through Calgary, and made our way to Red Deer. We filled the truck again for the last leg of our journey, taking the secondary highways back to Evansburg. Our GPS had different plans, as it wanted to lead us all the way up to Edmonton, take the Devon Bypass route, and use Hwy 16. According to our GPS, the route we ended up using took the same amount of time anyways.

Brett decided to trust the GPS when it was going to lead us along even more secondary highways to completely bypass Drayton Valley. It lead us to the Hwy 22/Tomahawk turnout, and we were back in familiar territory.

We arrived back in Evansburg at about 3:00 PM, having put about 700 km's on the truck that day, our longest since the beginning of the trip. And we were finally out of the truck and back home, safe and sound!

Total km's driven on the trip? 8,900 km's. Total pictures taken? Around 1200. Total gas expenses? We'll see... Total expenses overall? We'll see...

Was it worth it??? YES!!!!!! It was the trip of a lifetime.

Day 27

We got up to some pretty wet surroundings this morning. Our chairs were soaked, so we had to spread out a tablecloth on the picnic table seat for somewhere to sit down. We brewed up some coffee and tea, and made ourselves some breakfast sandwiches to start the day. We then packed up and hit the showers using our new tokens from the campground general store. Behind the general store were the public showers, and thankfully they were empty on the men's side. However, Rhonda once again had company in the shower. But she was a nice woman who let me have the shower as soon as I got into the room.

After we were cleaned up and feeling human again, we set off on the Going To The Sun highway (Without the sun part. Maybe we thought if we followed this road we would find it. But no luck. It was just a highway.). It's a highway that goes right up into the mountains, and over them. There were several stops on the highway, but they were all on the opposite side of the highway. We were driving back along the same highway, so we planned on seeing those sights on the way back.

Our first stop was at Logan's Pass, the highest point on the highway. It's located right at the top of the treeline, and offers some spectacular views of the lush, green valley that drops off from that point. That was, until the cloud rolled in and completely obscured the view of everything. When you're that high up, any clouds are at the same height as the road, so it ended up looking like a pea soup thick fog. It had been raining ever since we got to the Pass, and the fog didn't help any. After seeing the sights and perusing the gift shop, we hopped back into the truck and drove down to the other side of the Park. Driving in the fog along the extremely narrow mountain road was pretty treacherous, and we were simply coasting along at 10 mph at times. We also had to stop for road construction a couple times, too. Funnily, they had some pretty upbeat and happy road workers, though. All the while, the fog was blocking the view of all the deep valleys and mountain peaks that make the highway so beautiful to drive. And the road crews had set up their gear in all of the prime spots to see the sights. How convenient.

We eventually got out of the cloud/fog, and were back down to a normal altitude. We stopped at some small waterfalls for pictures, then went into Apgar Village, located on the far west side of the Park. Rain was still coming down, so we ducked from one gift shop to another, picking up some last minute souvenirs. Basically avoiding the great outdoors.

The shortest way back to our campground was back up the Going To The Sun highway, and our luck in terms of the fog was much better. We could now see the amazing vistas previously hidden by the thick fog and cloud cover. At one viewpoint, we even saw some mountain goats grazing on the valley floor, far below us. And yes we took a picture. But we didn't block traffic.

Some of the more interesting viewpoint were blocked off by construction equipment and emergency cones, but Rhonda did a good job of taking pictures from inside the truck on the go. It was a trial and error kind of experience. Rain was still coming down. After Logan's Pass, we stopped at most of the more interesting viewpoints for photos. By this time, the rain had let up some, and had completely stopped by the time we got back to the campsite. After realizing that we didn't have much to do at the campsite and no groceries for the night, we headed in St Mary again for some dinner supplies. Yes, we were actually planning to cook tonight.

After arriving back at the campsite again, we were both a little tired, so we bedded down for a nap. Meanwhile, the rain stated to pelt the tent and tarp again. We weren't feeling up to the task of cooking in the rain, so we decided to visit the great restaurant again.

Tonight, Brett dined on steak with blue cheese and chorizo cornbread, while Rhonda opted for the Prairie Chicken, a swiss and mushroom chicken burger. Brett went for another beer, this one called "Trout Slayer" from the same brewing company as the beer from last night. This one was a light amber ale, not quite as good as the one from last night, but still decent. Rhonda finally ordered something that got her a frosty glass, a Huckleberry Soda (she had been coveting Brett's frosty glasses all throughout the trip). To keep out of the rain, we opted for dessert as well, some chocolate cake. Rhonda had some tea which came in a cool pyramid shape. Other diners actually came to the table to look at it. That's how cool it was.

We staved off the inevitable and browsed the same gift shops again, and saw that tonight's forecast called for more rain and the possibility of SNOW! So, what to do for the evening?

We went back to the campsite, and hid in the tent. Brett bundled up in his hoodie and rain jacket, and enjoyed a large can of beer, while Rhonda snuggled in her blankets. We chatted, read to each other and basically passed the time until a reasonable hour for bed.

About 200 km's put on the truck today, and we're all still here. Cold and wet, but here.

Day 26

Our site in Lincoln RV Park was about 40 or 50 yards from where we set up our tent. There wasn't much point hauling the stove and everything else over just to brew some coffee (which Rhonda won't drink because she is scared that it might stunt her growth), so Brett hopped in the truck and grabbed some coffee from the local gas station, a 2 minute drive from the RV Park. It was a good thing that he had some cash, as all of the card machines were down. After sitting around, the sky started to rain a little, so we decided to tear down the tent. We packed the gear and got ready for the shower. There was only one shower available, so we were going to have to take turns. Brett checked his e-mail while Rhonda showered, and we switched off. While Brett showered, Rhonda found the campsite availability online for Glacier National Park, our home for the next couple nights. We decided to stay at the campsite with showers, and we were on our way. Showering has become noticebly important to us on this trip. I guess it is the close quarters in which we exist.

As made our way into the open valleys of eastern Montana, it started to rain on us. We stopped for fuel and a quick brunch at a gas station on the way. Needless to say, lunch at a gas station was not spectacular (understatement). We hit the road, and were in Browning, Montana within an hour. It's the southern edge of the Blackfeet Indian Reservation. Now, our only other experience driving through a reservatioin was in Arizona, and this was no different. It still looked like a third world country. Only this time with much less sand and sun.

We exited the reservation at St Mary, a small town right on the edge of Glacier National Park. We got in the park, stopped at the Visitor Centre, and found our intended campsite, which was only 5 miles up the road. On eof the exciting parts of this leg of the journey is the fact that our National Park Pass has save us a lot of cash, so it was a worthwhile investment after all.

We then arrived at our campground, and drove around for a while, looking for a good spot. We decided on a spot nestled amongst some old growth trees with no undergrowth to get in our way. Staying here would cost us $20 a night, and we intended to stay for 2 nights. However, we only had $38 in bills. This campground was one of those honor system campgrounds where you pay your fee at the entrance sign using an envelope. To make a total of $40, we had to use quarters from our change box. Which was ok, because it was pretty full, and we had to buy tokens for the showers here.

We set up the site, and then sat and relaxed for a bit. It wasn`t raining anymore, so we were able to enjoy the outdoors for a while. It was soon time for dinner. Neither of us wanted to cook, so we decided to try the restaurant beside our campsite. We headed over to check the prices and browse the gift shops, too. After, we headed back to St Mary to get some supplies for the evening. One of these would be instrumental in our relative comfort over the next 2 nights: a tarp for the tent.

Back to the restaurant we went to try some fine dining in the mountains. Brett tried the Ultimate Cheeseburger, while Rhonda went with the Sweet Chili Chicken. Both were very delicious, but I would say that the highlight of the meal was probably Brett`s beer, called Moose Drool. The best part was the slogan of the beer, "We Make Water Fun". And they did.

We went back to the campsite and started the fire and hung out having a quiet and relaxing evening. At midnight, it stared to rain and this was only the beginning. 300 km's put on the truck, and everybody's still here.

Day 25

We're slowly making our way back home now. We started the morning with a tear-down of the tent site in the RV park we stayed at in West Yellowstone, then we showered. While Brett was able to get in and out pretty quickly, Rhonda had to wait for the other females in the showers to finish. It seemed like all the women in the campground were in the bathroom all at once.

We hit the road with a fairly relaxed day of driving to Helena, Montana to look up some campsites around there. Brett was pretty excited about the prospect of driving 70 mph down the secondary highways (it is the posted speed limit, after all), but we need to warn anyone else who does this: Montana is pretty light with their driving signs, and you need to slow down in a lot of the corners, even if there is no sign saying you should.

We hit some construction on our way to the interstate, but it was a short wait before we were moving again. We gassed up and ate in a little town east of Butte, then headed north down a secondary highway towards the interstate and Helena. This bypass saved us about a half hour of driving; go team GPS! (This team consists of really only one person- Brett.) Our lunch consisted of a KFC/A&W restaurant, with root beer on a pull tap (like real beer). Brett got his special root beer in a frosty mug, while the Pepsi drinking Rhonda had a styrofoam cup, not being part of the special club. This was our first time trying A&W in the States, and we are sad to report that while they do offer a mama and a papa burger, there is no teen burger on the menu. Brett tried the closest thing to a teen burger, but it wasn't the same. Rhonda enjoyed a KFC chicken wrap with fries and gravy. The highlight of this meal was the fact that the KFC gravy down here is much superior to the stuff in Canada. It's got a darker, smoky flavour and a good texture and consistency, while the stuff back home is sort of gray, salty and usually pretty gelatinous. Sad that this is one of the major events of our day today.

We were on the road again, and soon found ourselves in Helena. We pulled off on an exit, and parked the vehicle. Brett's original plan was to stay at a place just northeast of Helena, in Black Sands State Park. Our GPS couldn't find it, but it did find us a state park in Lincoln, Montana, about 30 minutes away. It looked like the best approach to Glacier National Park would be using state highway 200, which is what Lincoln was on. We set our destination as Lincoln, and were on our way.

Brett was pretty surprised at how small Helena was. It's really no bigger than Drayton Valley, at least from what we saw from the interstate. We took our exit, and started making our way west through some small mountains. We drove over them, and found ourselves nestled in a valley with a creek and the highway running through it. We spied some national forest campsites, but our luck with them has not been good. They're usually very rustic and unkept, with outhouses, rather than any real facilities.

We stopped at the local ranger station for some camping spots, and we encountered a ranger who does 'real' camping, way back in the wilderness. Apparently, it's perfectly legal and accepted to backcountry camp in any national forest; it's just a matter of getting out there. Our ranger suggested a couple spots that were well away from it all, and required only short hikes. We thanked him for his time, and decided to check out the local state park on the edge of Lincoln. Once again, we were greeted with a campground in need of some serious upkeep. They had flushing toilets, but they were not exactly sanitary restrooms. We decided to head into town and see what they had for RV parks.

We found an RV park on the oter side of the town, and decided to pitch the tent there for $12 a night, only $2 more than the dilapitaed state park. Once again, the RV park is the best place to set up, with well manicured lawns, showers, a fairly well treed tent area, and a babbling brook flowing right behind our tent. While Brett was napping, 3 deer came out to eat on the lawn. When Brett came out of the tent they ran away. Strangely enough, we felt no need to try to get really close to them and take pictures or try to pet them. I guess we managed to avoid the curse of Yellowstone. The only drawback to this park is the fact that we can't drive to our site. We had to haul our gear about 50 yards to our chosen spot. This is what we consider hiking to our campsite. We definitely are not ready for back country camping.

After we set up, Brett laid down for a 2 hour nap and Rhonda read in the sun. We then went into town to dine on some ribs and fried chicken. Right now, we're sitting by the fire, enjoying a slightly windy, but relaxing evening.

About 350 km's put on the truck today, and we're all still in the truck. Next (and last) stop: Glacier National Park.

Day 24

We got up after a cold night's sleep (we managed to stay nice and warm, though). We got some complimentary cappucino from the RV office, showered, and set about our day: touring the park.

We got boxed lunches from last night's cafe, grabbed some breakfast to go from the local bakery, and set off to the park. Our day was definitely foreshadowed by the line-ups at the gate, and the fact that people were trying to cut into the express line we were in. After that little adventure, we got to drive maybe another 4 miles down the road before we hit the next roadblock. We probably lost a half hour slowly making our way through traffic, so everybody could stop and see... a bird. It was an eagle, which is pretty special to the American people, I guess. I can drive 10 miles from my place to see one though, so it wasn't really a big deal for us. As a side note, it wasn't even a bald eagle, we think that it was a golden eagle or something.

The next roadblock... we weren't even sure what caused it. However, we were soon on the Grand Loop, a big ring road that takes you through all the sights in the park. We made our first stop at the Lower Geyser Basin, where we saw some hot spring pools, mud pots, and a couple small geysers. Bacteria grows in the pools, creating huge blooms of slime and goo that are all sorts of colours, but tend toward yellow and red. We stopped again at the Biscuit Geyser Basin, and saw more of the same, but less spectacular. But we did see a guy all dressed in hunting gear, which seemed pretty new, especially since he still had the stickers on the back of the legs of his jeans.

Our next stop was Old Faithful, the most famous geyser in the world. We arrived there at about 1 PM, found a parking spot, and made our way to the viewing area. We then found out that the next eruption would be around 2:20. Brett decided to camp it out on the benches outside with a good spot, rather than wander around. After several false starts around 2:20, it finally erupted at around 2:25. Pretty cool. We got it on video on our camera, as well as some pics of the eruption.

Our next stop was the West Thumb Geyser Basin. Nothing too spectacular here. Just a couple small geysers, steam vents and some hot springs. It is situated on Yellowstone Lake, which is quite a pretty lake.

We stopped at Sulphur Cauldron. It turned out to be basically really stinky geysers that were not even that nice to look at. I guess we should have known from the name. More people were on the road taking pictures of the deer that were up on the bank. Once again, we were not all that excited. However, we did see a woman wearing a facecloth on her head. That was quite the sight.

Back in the truck. We drove for a bit, pulled over at a picnic site and had our lunch at about 3 PM. It was time to see some waterfalls. Next stop was Tower Falls, way in the northeast corner of the park. On our way, we hit another traffic jam. This time it was 2 bison beside the road. Getting past that block we managed to make it about another mile down the raod and then again there was a traffic stop. The same cars that had just stopped for 2 bison were now stopping for 1. By this point we were getting frustrated. This bison decided that he too had had enough and crossed the road and left. Finally we made it to the falls. We went down this path, that was basically leading nowhere fast, so back up the steep hill we went. Once again, back in the truck.

We decided that we had enough of the park and it was time to go back to the campsite. Unfortunately, we hit yet another roadblock heading sout towards the West Yellowhead turnoff, and it was a gooder. Some people had spotted a grizzly bear in some bush just to the right, and pretty soon, everybody just abandoned their cars right on the road to go and see it. People were walking pretty close to where the bear was. It wasn't until a park ranger showed up that some semblance of order was restored. He ordered everybody back to their vehicles, and a few people actually listened. It was very frustrating to be stuck behind 4 unoccupied vehicles right on the road itselfvand to see somewhat clear roadway in front. Eventually, we got through as people pulled ahead and off to the shoulder. The funny thing was that we never saw the thing ourselves, even though we sat there for about 10 minutes. Maybe it was someone's idea of a joke. Who knows.

Two elk held up traffic on our way back into town. A real exercise in controlling your emotions on the road, and Brett almost lost control a few times (good thing Rhonda was there). We weren't back in town until around 8:15 PM. We did some souvenir shopping, and grabbed a late meal to go from McDonald's.

I would say we only put about 200 km's on the truck today, but we spent close to 5 hours in the vehicle. But, we're all still in the truck.

Day 23

Driving. That pretty much sums up what we did today.

We left the little RV park in Idaho and headed west to Jackson, Wyoming to grab some supplies before we headed into Yellowstone for the night. We hit the K-Mart in Jackson, gassed up and we were on our way.

We passed through Grand Teton National Park, which has some mountains in the west dropping down to alpine valleys in the east. Pretty nice. However, we encountered some major road construction leading up to Yellowstone's park gates; it set us back about a half hour.

As we drove up to the entrance kiosk, we were informed that campsites in the park are usually all taken by 10 AM. It was 4:00 by that point, and Brett had a little panic moment. The ranger suggested we try West Yellowstone, a small community just west of the park.

We set off through the park (at a max speed of 45 mph) through the 60 miles of road we needed to drive through to get to the west park gate. However, we got a taste of some of the stuff the park had to offer: geysers! We could see a bunch going off as we drove through the park, which was pretty exciting.

We finally reached West Yellowstone, and after a couple tries, we found an RV park with all the amenities we needed. We decided to stay for 2 nights and fit all the sightseeing into one day. We put up the tent, had some dinner at a cafe, then went back to the tent for the night. It got COLD that night, too! 36 defrees farenheit.

So far, we put on about 500 km's on the truck today, and we're all still in the truck.

Day 22

It's been 3 weeks already. Today was pretty boring. We got in the truck after a relaxing free shower, and headed north through Utah. We pulled over just south of Salt Lake City, and decided to take the western approach into Wyoming, through Idaho. We had planned on staying at a series of campgrounds through a National Forest area, but none of the bathrooms were up to snuff (outhouses are not our style). We pressed on to Bear Lake Resort in the northeast corner of Utah, but they had closed their campground area. So, we pressed on even further into Idaho. We now sit in an RV park outside of St. Charles, Idaho. Close to a town called Paris (yay Brett took me to Paris, Paris, Idaho. Not quite the same). The owners are nice and the campground is clean and well kept. We had a great supper of smoked pork chops, salad and grilled french bread. And now we are parked next to the showers to get a clear WiFi signal to write the blog. Next it's back to the site for a fire and then bed.

About 550 km's put on the truck, and we're all still in the truck. Our phone no longer works, so expect collect calls home instead, mom and dad. And keep reading our blog!

Day 21

We woke up at the early hour of 6 AM (on purpose this time!) to join our rafting tour down the Glen Canyon. We packed everything up, and were almost finished when a father in the campground started shouting his daughter's name (we'll call her Michaela, to protect her identity). He soon had all the mothers in the campground searching for his lost child, along with the rest of his family. He was constantly shouting, "Michaela!", and "Has anyone seen a small child?!" He quit after about 3 or 4 minutes of this. It seems that the child in question was in the back seat of the truck they were in the whole time. He soon apologized to the campground for the disturbance. He looked pretty angry, so I'm sure that Michaela will not do that again.

We hit the road to the rafting centre after that disaster was averted. We boarded buses, and drove down to the Davis Dam, where this tour company launches from. It's one of the few places on the Colorado River that you can launch from. Grand Canyon raft tours last anywhere from 3 to 16 days because there is nowhere to pick the people up in the canyon. Although one company offers a one day raft excursion that ends with a pickup with a helicopter. Very expensive. So we decided to take the Glen Canyon trip and see what that had to offer.

To acces our launch point, we had to drive down a 2-mile long tunnel in the side walls of the canyon. This tunnel was protected by National Security and apparently only this company and the employees of National Security canuse it. We felt pretty special. At the bottom, we were directly underneath the highway crossing bridge, so we had to don helmets while in the area, in case people threw stuff. We boarded our rafts right beside the dam, and we set off down the canyon. Now we encounter some pretty interesting people on our travels and there was a family of 5 on our trip who definately stood out among the group, especially the 7 year old, Elliot.

Gorgeous views and cool air greeted us during the first part of the tour. With it being a deep canyon, the sun wouldn't warm it up down there until noon, and the water coming out the dam was getting drawn from the bottom of Lake Powell, so it was really cold water. Elliot refused to sit on the side of the boat (the best spot) and proceded to sit with us who got on the boat last in the middle of the boat seats. Elliot was front and center swinging his knees and enjoying himself.

We took a break about halfway through the raft tour on a secluded beach that had a little trail up to some ancient petroglyphs made by the Pueblo Indians who ihabited the area over a thousand years ago. Very cool stuff! As we were approaching our stop, the guide said very loudly and clearly, "There will be a bump when we land". Elliot, who we think might exist in another world, or possibly dimension did not hear this at all. As we were all looking towards the shore, we hit the bump, which was followed by a loud thump. Elliot had hit the deck pretty hard and our arrival was punctuated by the loud thump as all of his 7 year old body hit the floor of the boat pretty hard. No one has seen him fall, but we all felt pretty bad when he started to cry. Fortunately he was okay, but unimpressed by the petroglyphs.

We boarded again, and as we went further and further down, the canyon started to widen up and become more hilly, rather than a deep gorge. Elliot started the ride on the side of the boat with his family, but when his dad tried to have him put his leg over (we were allowed to) that was enough of that. Elliot slid down to sit next to Brett. He quickly became fascinated with Brett's tattoo and spent about 5 minutes closely looking at it. Elliot then spent the rest of the trip doubled over looking at the floor of the boat. His mom caught Rhonda's look of concern and asked Elliot what was wrong. He stated, that he "Had to go to the bathroom". Needless to say, Elliot did not have very much fun on this trip. We ended the tour at Lees Ferry, an old ferry site that marks the end of Glen Canyon and is the eastern border of the Grand Canyon National Park. We boarded the buses and took a 45 minute drive back to Page, AZ. To sum it up, both Rhonda and Brett agree that Elliot needs to be a better listener. LOL

Rhonda and I hopped in the truck, and after a quick detour to the Walmart for some supplies, we were soon on the road to Utah and Bryce Canyon. After driving for about 2 hours, we found the road to Bryce Canyon, entered the park with our annual park pass, and set off to... well, where should we go? We looked at the map, and decided on Bryce Point, one of the many lookouts into the canyon.

Some spectacular rock formations greeted us as we approached the point, and they only got better as we headed further up. After enjoying the view for a while, we hit the truck, and found a public washroom. It was around this time that Brett noticed that Rhonda was experiencing some discomfort. Time to find a campsite for the evening!

We drove further up the road to our planned destination, which was a state park by a lake. When we got there, it looked more like a gravel pit with an outhouse. No way were we staying there! We drove further up the road and toured around a potential spot at an RV park. The funny thing was that EVERYBODY had a quad ATV. What's up with that? Anyways, this site was way too much like a parking lot. We pressed on, up to Rock Candy Mountain. We found home for the night in another privately owned RV park, and it was there that we discovered that there's a big ATV rally in the area that weekend.

As we pulled into our site, we found a nice secluded area for the tent, access to the river with a fire pit down there, but no picnic table. Thank goodness for the portable kitchen! It was the second time we had pulled it out on the trip (the first being our first night of the trip, and we only set it up for the cool gadget factor). We dined on bacon, eggs, and toast; nothing like breakfast for dinner! Rhonda went to bed right after supper and Brett sat by the fire until it refused to burn. It was an early night.

All in all, we put about 450 km's on the truck today, and everybody's still in the truck.

Day 20

The oppressive heat of the Arizona sun got Rhonda up and out of bed at 6 AM (it was actually 5:45, but whatever). Well, maybe it was the noise from the campers around us packing up and leaving, too. Brett managed to stay in the tent and sweat it out until about 8 AM. We hung out for a bit, drinking water and chattting. At 9, we showered and headed into town to try and catch the rafting tour down Marble Canyon. When we got there, they told us that they were booked up for the day, but they had room for us on the 7:30 AM tour the next morning. As much as Brett wanted to raft, he was a little unhappy about the early hour. Oh, well, no rest for the wicked (Rhonda must be quite awful then)! We will be joining them tomorrow for the raft/float tour, then we'll be on the road again, heading north through Utah.

So, what to do with the rest of this gorgeous day by the immense and beautiful Lake Powell? The beach, of course! We grabbed some supplies, a fan for the tent, and some water. We also got ourselves an electric cooler that runs off the DC outlets in the truck. We've been spending a horrendous amount of money on ice, and this cooler (for $59) would save us that expense from now on. And it is another gadget, and we love those. We have more power cords in the truck than Rhonda has in her whole house. While Brett was pushing around the cart in WalMart, a young boy with a touch of ADD/hyperactivity chastised Brett by saying 'SLOW DOWN!', as he proceeded to touch and slap everything in sight (including Rhonda). We encountered him again in the electronics aisle as he demanded of his mom, "I said I want a cellphone!" He made this statement with his teeth clenched and with a lot of force, obviously he is the boss in his family.

We headed down to the beach, and sunned ourselves for a few hours. Brett took a dip in the warm water. It's very nice down there. The only problem is the sand. It is extremely fine and blows around in the wind. After a while it feels as if you are being sand blasted. Also, there are these spikey things that are like thorns that stick into you, and we have both experienced that wonderous feeling. But so far no scorpions in Rhonda's boots, so Brett hasn't had a chance to play the hero yet (but he has been opening doors since Washington).

Right now, we're hiding out in the laundry room of the campground, basking in the air conditioning, waiting for our laundry to finish. Tonight looks like dinner at Sonic, then back down to the beach to float around on some tubes (Rhonda really wants a tube and has since the last 2 beaches), then back to the campground for the night.

Day 19

We're going to rewind a bit and go back to last night. After we posted, at around 8 at night, we decided to hit the town and see what happens late at night in Williams, AZ. Rhonda got dressed, and we walked down to the Sultana, a small local bar on the 'strip'. Rhonda and Brett enjoyed a beer, but not much was going on. We just sort of observed the locals playing pool and hanging out. There was a two woman welcoming comittee that were, let's just say that they were not really that welcoming with all of the swearing and shouting (not to mention that one of them was wearing her McDonalds work uniform).

We decided to try another bar, the Canyon Club. We saddled up to the bar and were about to order a beer when a very friendly but inebriated man spotted us and joined us. We did some quick introductions, and he bought us a round. His name was John, and he was from LA. He asked us our names and where we were from (and he did again many, many, many more times throughout the night). John asked us about our relationship, Brett quickly responded that I was his mail order bride from Nova Scotia, which confused John and he left us alone for a while. We got to know Jackie the bartender, Melvin the school coach, and another local who was actually from Manitoba originally. Jackie gave us some advice about the Grand Canyon, which was really cool. The bar also had a group there from Belgium that was having a great time playing shuffleboard and when the sherriffs came in they had their picture taken with them. At this point we were babysitting John so that he didn't get arrested and trying to keep him under wraps. It was a great night, lots of fun and very educational. What a place, including the very interesting bathrooms. We were the interesting strangers in a small town bar.

In, the morning, Brett had a rather interesting experience checking out. There was pretty disgruntled lady in there complaining about getting in at 3 AM and having to wake up her hotel neighbor, blah, blah, blah, and she thought she was entitled to a discount. The hotel clerk thought different, so the lady decided it would be appropriate to throw the call bell at the wall and announce how rude and inconsiderate everyone was. Brett got out as soon as possible, he was kind of scared I think. As we pulled out, the clerk and her family were on the street, awaiting the arrival of the local sherrif. The uhaul truck that the lady was driving was still there so we think she got into some sort of trouble. Of course the uhaul truck might explain some of her attitude.

We were back on the road, headed to the Grand Canyon's south rim, which was about an hour north. We drove, had lunch at the village near the rim, and then boarded a shuttle bus to see the lookout points into the canyon. We stopped at 3 of the 7 lookouts, and were stunned by the sight of the canyon itself. Brett managed to get really close to the edge of the canyon for a great look. It's an amazing sight, to see all that rock carved away by the Colorado River.

We headed back to the village, and hopped into the truck. Destination: Page, AZ. This is where the rafting companies on the river launch from, and it happens to be the home of Lake Powell Resort. We arrived there at about 6 PM, after driving through the Indian reservation between the south rim village and Page. You wouldn't think people could live out of truck campers (without the truck attached), but they do out here. It's like seeing a third world nation out here.

We arrived at Lake Powell Resort, and got back into camping mode. We set up the tent, grabbed a pizza from the local pizza joint down the road, and enjoyed the spectacular view of the lake against the red cliffs of the canyon walls. Now we sit under a beautiful moon, with out computer and out LED lights, talk about roughing it.

About 300 km's put on the truck today, and everybody's still in the truck.

Day 18

Today was all about leaving Las Vegas. We got up, showered, packed, and headed to the check-out line. Oops, wrong line; check-out's over there! We got ourselves sorted out, headed to the truck, and drove to the nearest WalMart to get some much needed supplies, such as soap, razors, and foot scrapers for our gross blackened crusty heels. There's an image for you.

We then hit the road, with a final destination of the Grand Canyon. We drove for about 4 hours, and nothing really exciting happened, other than a 75 mph speed limit on the interstate. And a huge dust devil, that was blowing around the tumbleweed that Rhonda has been looking for all this trip.

When we arrived in Williams, a small town on the interstate that happens to be on the exit to the canyon, we noticed some dark, ominous clouds and thunderheads heading our way. The canyon itself was still 60 miles away on a secondary highway. Brett's plan was to camp in one of the three campsite areas around the canyon itself. But with thunderstorms on the way, we elected to stay in Williams for the night instead, hotelling it once more.

We found an Econo-Lodge, checked in, and walked down the street to a barbecue restaurant with covered swinging picnic tables on their patio. Rhonda enjoyed a 12 oz New York steak, while Brett opted for a 1/2 barbecued chicken dinner. Both were delicious.

On the way back, we inquired about joining a float/raft tour down the canyon itself. Well, for the low price of $170 US, you too could get up at 3 AM to drive down to the heli-pad at the canyon itself, and take a 3 hour bus ride to the raft itself, float for a few hours, and take even longer getting back via the bus, since you'd be stopping for souvenirs at the gift shops. Well, there goes that idea. We were hoping for a morning or afternoon float down the canyon, nothing more than a few hours. I guess we will have to see what is available when we get to the Canyon.

So we are hanging out in the hotel room. This town has a definate western feel to it, with saloons, country music and lots of BBQ.

Day 17

We had some late-night laundry issues which kept us up until 3 AM, and we needed to check out of the hotel by 11 AM the next morning. Tired as we were, we were up by 9:30 AM, showered and packed and checked out by about 10:30. We set the GPS for the Hoover Dam, which was a surprisingly short half hour drive. We thought that it would be a quick tour.

After finding one of the last parking stalls in the dam $7 visitor centre parkade (at the top, exposed to the full force of the Las Vegas sun), we headed down to the dam visitor centre. Once inside, we encountered a massive line-up of dam people just inside the centre itself. We asked the clerk what the huge dam line was for, and she replied, "the powerplant tour." Great, the one dam thing Brett wanted to see. However, she informed us that the tour groups are 120 people each, and they leave every 15 minutes. Well, that's a little better. We paid our dam $11 tour fee each, and got into the dam lineup.

We were still waiting in the line for a good 45 minutes before we got into one of the dam tours. And it started with a visit to the theatre room, to watch a dam video straight out of a junior high science class. It was so boring it was laughable! The best part was the close captioning, especially when the music and explosions happened ("MUSIC" and "EXPLOSIONS") After, we took a giant dam elevator down to the inlet pipes, where the water powering the dam turbines flowed through. Our dam tour guide talked a lot about how the main purpose of the dam was actually to prevent flooding further downstream in the California agriculture belts, and that power generation is just a nice bonus. You could feel the pipes rumbling as they carried '88,000 gallons of water a second' to the turbines. Incidentally, that was the next and last stop on the dam tour. We saw the tops of the 8 or 9 turbines on the Nevada side of the dam (the generator rotor & stator parts) while the turbines themselves were another 4 or 5 stories below where we were. Dam.

With the tour finished, we had a walk around for a few moments, soaking up all the dam heat (113 degrees). They're building a dam huge roadway bypass bridge across the canyon, only 1/4 mile past the dam itself. It should be done in October 2010. They have the suspension cables, the arches and the pillars pretty much done. All they need to do is build the roadway that will go over the top of it. Watch for a Discovery special on it coming your way in about a year and a half.

By the time we were done hanging out at the dam, it was getting near time to check in for our last night in Las Vegas. We got a room at the Luxor for cheap. So, we drove down to the Luxor Hotel, Brett dropped Rhonda off, and Brett went to try and find a parking space in the check-in area (15 minute parking only). After Brett finally weaseled into one of those spots, he rejoined Rhonda in the check-in lane. We checked into our room after parking the truck (in the top deck of a parkade AGAIN!). We're staying in the pyramid part of the hotel, so we get angled windows with a view of the Excalibur Hotel, and a little of the New York New York Hotel, too. The elevation is not even called an elevator, it is an "Inclinator". It goes up at an angle and sounds like it is having a really tough time doing it.

After settling in, we hit the Strip, by first taking the tramway to New York New York. We saw the cool NYC decorating in the hotel and the roller coaster. Yes, Rhonda chickened out of going on the roller coaster, she blamed it on having just eaten. We had just had our first and only Vegas buffet, and it was an experience. After, we crossed the street to the MGM Grand, then down to street level to see the vendors on the street. We grabbed some souvenirs for some friends at the M&M Store, then we hit the Miracle Mile mall, but by then we were pretty pooped. We exited the mall right in front of the Paris Hotel, and across the street was the Bellagio. Rhonda had been gushing over seeing the fountains at the Bellagio, so we crossed the street and were treated to 'Luck Be A Lady' by Sinatra playing with the fountain show. Brett was awestruck by the spectacle (and the engineering behind it). Maybe now he understood why Rhonda had been "gushing" over it.

We cabbed it back to the Luxor and grabbed showers before tonight's event: Cirque De Soleil's Mystere. Another cab ride to Treasure Island, and we arrived just before showtime. Before the show started, they had a 'clown' ushering people to their seats and making a great spectacle of it all for the audience. Once the show started, it was sheer awe. An amazing spectacle of colour, dance, acrobatics, and technical theatre. It's safe to say that were were both stunned by the performance. It was really beautiful.

After, we took a cab to the Bellagio to see the fountains at night. We saw 'Luck Be A Lady' again, and the finale, 'The Star Spangled Banner'. Very nice. Once again, we cabbed it back to the Luxor, as by this time, Rhonda was in quite a bit of pain from her heels.

After Rhonda had changed her heels out for some more comfortable footwear, we decided to head down to the casino level and do some actual gambling. With $10 each, we had some fun on the slots, but lost it all. We finished off the evening with a McDonald's late night meal from the hotel food court and retired.

Only about 80 km's put on the truck today, and we're all still in Vegas. (But not for much longer)

Day 16

We got up at the crack of noon, putzed around the hotel room for a bit, showered, and got dressed up for a hot day in the sun. Then Brett looked out the window, and saw how cloudy it was. He checked the weather forecast, which called for clouds and wind, but the temperature was still going to be 41 degrees Celsius.

We decided that today would be the day we hit the outlet mall here in Vegas. We hopped in a cab and arrived at our destination. You know how malls are big buildings with the main thoroughfares in the building itself? Here in Vegas, they have outdoor malls, more like giant plazas, but you still go inside to the store. The walkways between shops are all outdoor, and they have giant misting fountains that spray water mist over the shoppers to keep the heat down. It was a big surprise to Brett. But he maintained his cool (despite the heat).

We were there to get some nice dress-up clothes for our evenings out. Brett got a couple pairs of jeans, 4 tops, some new dress shoes with the pointy toes, and a new reversible belt. Rhonda bought 3 new dresses and 2 new pairs of high-heels and a pair of jeans. One of her dresses came with the CUTEST little sweater! He's reallly kidding. I will willingly donate that sweater to anyone who wants it. But the dress under it was really quite good.

We cabbed it back to the hotel, decided on the outfits we would wear for the evening, and showered. This is where it gets interesting... Brett got a war wound getting into the shower when he smacked his knee on the faucet. While Rhonda showered, he had to run down to the truck to grab a giant band-aid. In the meantime, Rhonda sliced her finger open on one of her leg razors, when she was digging in her toiletry bag.

After the wounds were patched up, we headed down to the bar, grabbed a couple singapore sling slushies in the giant Stratosphere super-cups, and cabbed it to the Rio Hotel & Casino. Tonight was our night for Penn & Teller (the one Brett wanted to see). Looking fabulous, we were ready for Vegas and all it had to offer us.

We got our seats, finished our drinks, and got a couple more in the theatre lobby. While Brett opted for a Guiness beer, Rhonda got another 'singapore sling'. It's in quotations because it ended up being close to 4 shots of gin in a 5-shot glass. It was more like a martini with ice than anything else. Needless to say, while we both enjoyed the show, we couldn't quite feel our lips by the end.

We retired to the bar and grill in the Rio to get our only meal of the day (club sandwiches with mixed french fries). It was now time for the most exciting part of our Las Vegas evening... laundry! See, the hotel here has free laundry machines (something we'll never see on our trip again, and it's high time we both disd our laundry anyways). In the meantime, we'll be watching X-Men Origins: Wolverine on pay-per-view! We sound so exciting, but hey we got dressed up and went out earlier.

All in all, a very productive and Vegas-filled day. 0 km's put on the truck (for once!) and we're all still sitting pretty here at the Stratosphere!

Day 15

We got up this morning in Mojave, CA to some sweltering heat. After packing up the truck, we realized that we had not cleaned out our cooler in some time (since before arriving in San Fransisco). Actually, it was not as bad as we had thought, seeing that everything was in its own sealable container or Zip-Loc bag. After emptying and cleaning it out, we set off towards Vegas. We stopped briefly in Barstow, CA for lunch at a Bob's Big Boy restaurant, and filled up the truck ($3.09 a gallon; yipes!).

We hit the road again, and encountered a big traffic backlog at the Nevada state line. We were stuck in traffic for about a half hour or so, crawling along at not more than 10 mph. We have learned that traffic jams kind of kill our excitement. It opened up again, and we soon found ourselves in Vegas.

We saw all the big hotels and casinos as we drove in from the south along the Interstae to the north end of the Strip, where our hotel was. We got really nice rooms at the Stratosphere for $50 a night (their week day rate). After parking the car, we stood in the registration line for about 20 minutes. Brett gawked at all the sight in the hotel lobby and casino. When we got to the front of the line, we were directed to the check-in line (oops!), which was a little ways down the lobby. We were a little nervous about our reservations, seeing as we booked them at about 11 PM the night before and the website said that our reservations should be on the system within 7 days (?!). Thankfully, our reservations were in the system. We had a good talk with the check-in clerk about the hotel, its amenities, and everything else(including a "tops optional adult pool" on the top floor). We parked the truck, grabbed our luggage, and made our way to the room. It has a strip view, and it's only 2 floors from the top. Nice! Brett's only issue with the room is that there's no fridge. Oh, well. Seeing as you can take your drinks everywhere you go that shouldn't really be an issue.



Once we got our wi-fi connection sorted out, we went back downstairs to visit the concierge and find some show tickets. Brett was set on seeing the Penn & Teller show, while Rhonda was set on seeeing one of the Cirque De Soleil shows. We're staying in Vegas for 3 nights, so we were hoping for 3 show tickets; one for each night. We got P & T tickets for Monday night, and we settled on the original Cirque show "Mystere" for Tuesday night. We still needed something for tonight, though. The Blue Man Group has a show here in Vegas,and we had thought about it, but tickets were pretty pricey. What the hell, it's Vegas! So we got 2 tickets for this evening's later show at the Venetian.

Rhonda was going to dress up a little, but Brett didn't have any really dressy clothes, so it was time to go find some decent evening wear. We went shopping in the Stratosphere's hotel shops, where Brett soon found a nice button-up shirt to wear, while Rhonda found some perfume.

We went back to the hotel room to figure out where we wanted to stay on Tuesday night. We had only booked 2 nights at the Stratosphere, and we weren't sure whether we were staying for a third night in our original plans. With 3 evening shows to go to, we needed one more night in Vegas. The Luxor (the big black pyramid on the Strip) had some reasonably priced rooms during the week, so after a lot of consideration and deliberation, we booked a room there for Tuesday night. We are actually staying in the pyramid!

We dressed up and took a cab to the Venetian. Our cab driver was interesting and pointed out the sights, but he was of the "The Old Vegas was SOOOOOO Much Better" category. I guess after being here 35 years, you get a bit disgruntled. Our Blue Man Group tickets came with a free voucher for Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum, so after wandering around the Venetian's lobby and grounds for a bit, we went into the Wax Museum. It was much nicer and much higher quality than the wax museum in Newport, OR (imagine that!). When we first went in, one of the first statues is Oprah. One lady in frongt of us quickly dismissed the likeness, saying that she is not that skinny at all (imagine it being said very loudly with a southern accent and a dismissive tone. It was pretty funny). It even had a 'Scream' tour, sort of a haunted house-thing. We went in after getting some careful instructions from a zombie girl. It was Brett, Rhonda, and 3 other tourists in our little group. Brett and Rhonda fared pretty well, but the other 3 were pretty scared by the whole thing. Lots of actors in costumes, loud noises, flashing lights, and stuff. It was lots of fun!

After getting out of the wax museum, we wandered into the Venetian's Grand Canal shopping centre. It feels like you're outside, with the sky painted on the ceiling, and little water canals all through the centre with gondola rides. There were some outside displays going on, with a volcano exploding, it was pretty cool.

We eventually found our way to the Blue Man Group theatre, waited in line for a bit (there was a guy with programs and the two behind us asked if they were free, and the guy responded with "This is Vegas", I guess that was all that needed to be said.), and got our seats, which were quite good. The show itself was really cool, with lots of pantomime, audience participation and (Brett's favorite part) lots of 'found' percussion. They even stopped the show to point out the late arrivals, which was pretty amusing. It was funny and interesting. We loved it! Our first Vegas show was a success.



We took a cab back to the hotel, grabbed a midnight supper (Brett tried corn beef for the first time, and I think the last time.), and retired for the night. A great (if overwhelming) day. About 400 km's put on the truck today, and everybody's out of the truck for the next few days.

Day 14: Things we've learned about the USA

Nothing too exciting today. We drove from last night's stop somewhere along the I-5 to Mojave, California. Look for it somewhere in the desert east of LA. It's a small town just off the interstate, and we are once again staying in a Motel 6 for the night. Camping is pretty slim around here unless you want to camp in a parking lot/RV park. It's pretty desert-like out here. Hot during the day, and it cools down some at night. We drove through Bakersfield today, and we saw a house foreclosure auction. They're starting the bidding at $69 000 dollars. Cheap! We also saw a guy driving his lawnmower on the street.

We rolled into town here at around 3:30 PM, looked for the best hotel deal with a pool, and found that Motel 6 does the trick. Too bad they don't clean their pool here, though. We had gone down for a dip before supper and a movie, and saw that the water and the bottom of the pool were pretty icky. Instead, we suntanned on the pool deck for a bit, showered, then headed into Tehachapi, CA to see the Harry Potter movie. We're back now. Not much of an entry today, so we'd thought we would give you guys a list of everything we've learned about road tripping in the US...

1. Motel 6's always have the same tacky bedspread

2. Turn signals are optional

3. Cash makes gas cheaper

4. US McDonalds have cheap and terrible ketchup

5. Even skunks can be friendly

6. 'Campground Full' isn't always the case

7. California does not necessarily mean hot weather

8. Don't rely exclusively on your GPS

9. 'Best Restaurant on the Trans-Canada' is a relative title

10. You only get one warning from Rhonda, then you're on your own

11. US cell phones suck

12. Shark pens make you happy

13. You can get coupons for everything, even cigarettes

14. Beer is cheaper than water, and available everywhere

15. No matter how old you are, your mom will always tell you to be careful

16. Camping near the coast means you are always damp

17. Brett's favorite pose is 'the point'

18. Prison is a depressing place, even if it's just a tour

19. Iced tea is not the same as it is back home

20. 'Showers' don't necessarily mean hot showers

21. Bring extra batteries for everything

22. They have all of Canada's Bud Light Lime down here

23. Flip flop heel marks will not come off; deal with it

24. White Castle is hard to find

25. Make sure you take the trip with someone cool

That's all for tonight. 350 km's put on the truck today. And everybody's still in the truck.

Day 13

Before we start today, We need to say that you all need to comment, so that we know this blog is worth doing. We're killing ourselves trying to find internet access, so please post something so we know this blog is worth keeping up.

Today we got up, determined to see if our ticket 'reservations' for the Alcatraz tour were the real mccoy or just bogus. We showered and loaded the truck, and tried to set off back to Fisherman's Wharf. However, the GPS was having a lot of trouble acquiring a satellite signal. So, we did it the old fashioned way, and followed the signs (take that GPS!). We paid our toll to cross the Golden Gate Bridge, got lost in the marina district, and finally found some parking near the wharf.

We set off to find the man in front of Joe's Crab Shack. He called someone, handed us off to somebody else that we had to follow for a block, and that someone handed us off to yet another person hanging out outside a souvenir shop. We did get our tickets for both the harbour cruise and the Alcatraz tour. Apparently, the Alcatraz tour is always booked up full about 2 weeks in advance. These 'booking agents' somehow get assigned a pool of same-day tickets from the exclusive Alcatraz tour company they can sell, along with some other tour they piggyback onto the Alcatraz tour. This could be a bus tour or harbour tour. To be honest, it sounds like the booking agents themselves book the tickets themselves just so they can scalp them off at a higher price. And you can't just buy the Alcatraz tickets; you need to get a package, or no Alcatraz for you! What a scam. But hey we did get to go to Alcatraz and the boat cruise was kind of fun too.

Anyways, we left the seedy guy (who was at least funny and amusing), and headed down to Pier 33 to seeif our Alcatraz tickets were legitimate. They checked out, so we headed back to Pier 41 for some lunch: a pretzel, a hot dog and some nachos. Delicious! You've got to love "carnival food". We checked the time, and decided to do the 1 hour harbour cruise of the San Fransisco bay. Along the way we found a guy completely dressed and painted silver who was like a robot. We gave him some money and he came to life and posed for a picture with Brett. Later was saw some gold versions too. It's interesting how some people make money.

We boarded the ship, and we all received little audio headsets to listen to an audio guide point out the sights and stuff. Pretty neat! Rhonda was tempted to listen in a different language to see what she learned, but curiosity got the better of her, and she didn't want Brett to know everything and she would still know nothing, so there went that idea. We got out as far as the Golden Gate bridge, turned around, and did a close-up of Alcatraz Island. Took lots of pictures and gained some funny tourist comments ("It's cold. I'm from Chicago, and I know cold and this is cold!"). We were back at the harbour after the 1 hour cruise, and we set off to Pier 33 to board for the Alcatraz tour.

Rhonda picked us up a frozen lemonade cup, which was pretty sweet but refreshing. It was by far the nicest day we had seen for a long time. Mark Twain once wrote that the coldest winter he'd ever endured was a summer in San Fransisco. I'd have to agree. The breeze off of the bay is quite chilly, and San Fransisco is surrounded by water on 3 sides, which makes for a chilly city.

We soon arrived on Alcatraz Island. It's quite run-down (one of the reasons they shut the prison down in the 60's), and it's a fair hike to the top where the actual cell block is. We passed old apartments where the guards could house their families, a machine gun tower, the warden's house, and a reconstruction of the gardens the well-behaved prisoners were allowed to keep. Brett called his mom from 'prison' for the second time on the trip. Amazing that they have cell phone reception on the island!

We found ourselves in the cell block at the top of the island, where we got an audio tour of the building. It featured check-in for new prisoners, you could stand inside various cells, we were told of various break-out attempts and riots in the prison, and we even got to see the cells of probably the most successful breakout attempt; you know, the one where they dug out the vent in the back of their cells, placed plaster replicas of their heads on their beds for night count, then climbed the utility corridor behind the cells, out the top, and slipped into the bay on home-made rafts. The cells showcased their tools, the plaster replicas on the beds and the false wall they had made.

All in all, it was a very depressing, but cool tour. We headed back on the 5:00 boat and made our way back to the truck. On our way we saw a tour group on Segways, Rhonda quickly wondered why she had been doing so much walking. Our plan was to head out of the city, and start the drive towards Las Vegas. It would take us through Bakersfield, CA, which is not very far from Los Angeles. We got to the truck at about 5:45, but we didn't make it out of the city until about 7:00, and we didn't make it out of the heavy traffic until about 7:45. We pulled into a Motel 6 about halfway in between San Fransisco and Bakersfield at about 9:30 PM. Rhonda was very happy to realize a bed was close by. She started to get worried when we passed by the two other "bigger" towns and saw that the sign read next gas 1 million miles away (actually it was only about 42, but it felt much longer). We ate our first McDonald's meal tonight, and it is no different here. Looked in the mirror and realize that we were sunburned (actually probably a combination of wind and sun burned).

All in all, a very tiring but good day. About 350 km's put on the truck today. And everybody's still in the truck.

Day 12

We got up this morning to a dew-soaked tent. At least we were dry, and our furry friend from last night's antics had gone to bed. We wiped down the tent as best as we could, packed the shell and poles, and put the soaking wet fly in the top cargo container to let it dry out some while we drove. We made ourselves a quick coffee and tea, packed up and hit the showers. Although yesterday's showers were the pits with no hot water, we've had pretty horrible luck with showers while camping down the coast. Today was the turning point for that, though. Hot showers, no waiting, and no need to feed it coins, either! They were free showers. It's about time.

We hopped back onto the US 101 to get down to San Fransisco. It took us a little inland, through San Rafael and Sausalito. Brett panicked a bit just before we were heading onto the Golden Gate bridge. It's a toll bridge, and the fee to cross is $6 US. Brett didn't have exact change, so we made an emergency exit up to the Marin Headlands. After driving around and around the Headlands, we finnaly found their 'posted' visitor centre, nesled deep in the hills. We asked about camping, and they said they had a few cancellations, so we could camp for one night in one spot, and another night in another spot. "It's a half-mile hike into the sites, so you can park here or here." "Uhhh... what about some camp spots where you camp where you park?" "Well, you asked about camping, so that's what we have around here." Not gonna happen. We have way too much stuff to cart around. So there went the camping idea.

After consulting the driving atlas, we decided to head back up the US 1 highway, which ran back along the coast. We soon ended up in Point Reyes National Park, where we saw some campground signs on our map. After closely consulting the large posted maps in their visitor's centre, we realized that they were all hike-in sites, as well. Our last ditch effort was to camp at China Camp, a natural area just outside of San Rafael, and right on the San Fransisco Bay.

We wound our way out of the Point Reyes area, through San Rafael, and down to the China Camp area. Once again, we were foiled by the walk-in camps. That was it, we're gonna hotel it here. Brett entered Motel 6 into the GPS, and we soon found ourselves back in San Rafael at their Motel 6 location. We checked in, laughed at the bedspread, tried and tried to connect to their wi-fi network, and finally gave up. We decided to head into San Fransisco, with a toll ready and see what Fisherman's Wharf was all about.

The GPS got us into the area just fine, but finding parking was a litlle tricky. We happened upon a private parking lot where a lady was kind enough to give us her $20 all-day pass. We paid her back $10, which was how much it would have cost us to park there just for the evening anyways.

Our fist stop was the original Del Monte Cannery, which is now converted into a series of shops and small pubs. Right outside, we encountered a booth advertising tour tickets. We asked about Alcatraz tour tickets, and she immediately took an interest in Rhonda. Rhonda apparently qualified for free tickets and parking for the tour if she just attended a short seminar on time shares... "and you can go too, if you want, I guess" she says to Brett. Not interested. We just want the Alcatraz tickets. Well, she can only sell us a package deal that includes our choice of bus or boat tour. We go with the boat tour and the Alcatraz tour. She calls someone, and fills out a very 'official' looking piece of looseleaf. "You can pick up your tickets from the guy out in front of Joe's Crab Shack tomorrow. That'll be $150 for tomorrow, less a $20 deposit right now." Hmmm. We paid the $20 and proceeded to spend the rest of the night wondering if we had just been swindled. We didn't pay too much attention to the sights, with this concern in our minds. We soon departed after a walk up and down the docks, and retired to our hotel room.

With all the running around we did, we put on about 250 km's. And everybody's kickin' it back in the hotel room with some pizza for dinner.

Day 11

Here's a fun-filled day. Our camp had no hot water for our morning showers, but we still had to pay. To top it all off, Rhonda's neighbor in the shower was just like the mom on Jon and Kate Plus 8. She yelled and was basically pretty mean to the 2 kids she had in the tiny shower room with her (which wasn't a good idea to begin with). All around, it wasn't a great way to begin the day.

Today was laundry day for the two of us. Brett had run out of shorts to wear, and Rhonda's favorite shorts were dirty, too. So, the GPS took us to the nearest laundromat, down the shore in Arena Point, or so it said. When we arrived at the GPS 'destination', it turned out to be a deli, and they had no idea about there ever being a laundromat at that location. They pointed us further down the shoreline to Anchor Point, where they knew there was a laundromat. To top it all off, the GPS had no idea where the new laundromat, or even Anchor Point was.

We arrived in Anchor Point, quickly located the laundromat using the Mark 1 eyeball, and threw our laundry in. We even got to use the new laundry do-it-all sheets Rhonda found in Washington! As soon as we had started our loads, everybody else showed up to do their laundry. Once again, we are the jerks who get the last available ones! Haha!

As our laundry was washing, we headed over to a mexican restaurant across the road for some lunch. While Rhonda looked over the menu, Brett went to use the 'washroom'. The whole building was nice and clean, but the bathrooms were located around the side of the building. They were not even labelled as washrooms. Brett finally figure out what one was the washroom. He enetered a darkened room, and tried furiously to find the light switch. It was nowhere to be found. As his eyes adjusted to the blackened conditions, he noticed that the flourescent light fixture was flickering very, very dimly. He sucked it up and did his business, more by feel than anything else. He finished and went to wash his hands with the unavailable soap, paper towels, and non-functioning hand dryer. Fantastic. If you remember the 'worst toilet in Scotland' from the movie Trainspotting, Brett thinks he's found the worst toilet in California.

We didn't find WiFi, but we found a really cool grocery store, and bought some cool snack packs with cheese and meat. And we got supplies for a gourmet supper. We headed off back down the road again. At the next town we found a coffee shop with WiFi and updated the blog.

We went to Botega Bay and asked if they had any sites left. They had many and sent us off to choose 3 that we liked. This was a very unusual situation for us, as we are used to being the jerks who take the last spot. We drove around and chose 4 spots (we are overachievers after all) and paid for our site and got ready to set up. Little did we know that we certainly were in for more than we paid for! Then we headed into Botega Bay and tried to get the phone working. But alas, the phone still sucks. We got firewood and stocked up on some necessary supplies.

We went back to the campsite and set up. Once that was accomplished it was time for dinner:
Pan seared smoked pork chops
California mix salad with cherry tomatoes, cheddar cheese, and a balsamic vinaigrette dressing
Grilled french bread slices with a balsamic vinegar dip
$34.95 per plate
How's that for camp cooking?!

After dinner, we brewed up some hot chocolate and took a walk down to the beach. It turned out to be more like a death march, than a leisurely stroll. The beach was much further away than either of us anticipated. We soldiered on and, after about a half hour walk, we were at the beach. At the sandy, windswept beach, we sat down and relaxed for a while, just observing everything around us. Some of the things we saw included a father with his two daughters. Dad was digging an enormous hole in the sand. Why? We're still not sure. But we got pictures!

Today ended up being a real wildlife day for us. We saw our first California Condor, some deer, a cute little bunny, sandpipers on the beach, and a whole lot of earwigs in our camp food locker. We saved the best for last.

We were sitting by the campfire having an intellectual conversation (ok that part might be fiction, but I swear the rest really happened!). Rhonda heard a noise in the bushes by the tent. She casually looked over and saw a "cat". Well, it took about half a second to realize that this cat had very distinct markings. She jumped out of her chair, alerted Brett, "Skunk!!!!". Then she ran to the truck. Well everyone knows that Brett has "rock and roll ears" and he said, "What?". Rhonda is fairly generous and caring, but in situations like this one, she only gives one warning. Brett looked over at what Rhonda was looking at, and then he jumped out of his chair. By this time Rhonda was in the truck (thank goodness it was unlocked!!!). Brett jumped in too. Oh crap, the keys are on the picnic table by the skunk. Spare set! Yay. We start the truck and pull out. Then we realize we have no idea what to do. So we pull in with the headlight illuminating the site and watch the skunk. The people across from the site are watching with great interest (and probably amusement), all the goings on. They soon realize what the commmotion is all about. Dad comes over and says that there are some very friendly skunks and foxes in the site. They are very used to people, and in fact he had to chase away both last night. Funny, our check-in ranger didn't warn us about any skunks or foxes. Our new 'friend' made several appearances over the course of the evening, even startling Brett on a midnight stroll to the bathroom. However, we all got along just fine, and nobody smells any worse, except for maybe our new camp buddy. Rhonda is still laughing at the event at this moment, especially about being on skunk patrol all evening ("Hey Brett, is that you moving? Oh Crap! Skunk!") and the fact that we now know who is going to survive any attack, Rhonda who has better hearing of course!

We drove about 100 kms today, but it was a twisty road that took a long time. Everyone is still in the truck, and our little buddy has been left behind for the next campers.

Day 10

We got up in the redwood forest campground, and grabbed some showers. This took a little skill, as each of the showers was one whole room, with no separate area for the actual shower. You could spray down the toilet, the sink, the mirror, even your towel and clothes if you weren't careful. Brett managed it fairly well, while Rhonda unfortunately had to wait for Princess, who spent 15 minutes in there and hadn't even got to the showering part.

We threw in just a little gas. It was $3.07 a gallon. We were paying $2.47 a gallon up in Florence. We were hoping for more reasonable prices, but whatever. We hit the road again, off to the Avenue of the Giants. It's a scenic road that goes parallel to the US 101 highway, but it takes you through several areas of old-growth redwood forest. Just before we got there, we made a detour into Target to get some supplies. They were woefully inadequate in that department, unfortunately. However, Brett got the 2010 GPS map update there, so he was happier than usual, and the increase of the GPS abilities is really starting to worry Rhonda about her status and necessity on this trip. lol.

Back on the road, we detoured onto the Avenue of the Giants. Our first stop was a small house made out of the trunk of a redwood tree. Inside, it was about 20' across. We then drove through another tree, drove on top of a fallen tree log, and even stopped for the farmer's market in Myer's Flats, CA. It was a bustling hub of business among the THREE stands they had set up for the entire market. Pathetic.

Fuel was becoming an issue by then, so we pulled into Leggett, CA for a fill-up. No difference in price there. We sucked it up and filled the tank, then we took off to Fort Bragg. On the map, the road's fairly straight, but it's a completely different experience driving it. Lots of steep curves, and you couldn't get past about 40 mph before you had to slow down to 15 mph for a sharp turn. It was like that for 20 miles. Pretty cool, but pretty tiring.

We towards Mendocino and started thinking about campsites. The first campsite that we tried was full so we managed to find a back way to the highway. At the end of our detour, we discovered another campsite. Alas, it was full too. But once again, we decided to ask if there were any spots. Yet again, another camper cancelled and there was one spot left. And we took it being the jerks that we are (especially since there was another car lined up behind us who got rejected). We dumped off our stuff and looked at the cell phone. No signal. We really wanted to call home so we jumped in the truck and headed to Mendocino. Well we got service, but apparently the phone is unable to call internationally yet. Stupid phone that Rhonda came very close to chucking in the ocean. Brett called the company, but apparently you cannot use the cell to call for trouble shooting. Stupid phone.

We decided to have supper at this guidebook reccommended place. Brett enjoyed his fish and chips and Rhonda had a good steak sandwich. After supper we found a coffee shop with WiFi and had some tea and updated the blog. This coffee shop was full of interesting people and lots of dogs (all pitbulls).

We went back to the campsite and started to set up the tent. Rhonda was blowing up the air mattresses and she heard Brett ask, "Do you know what poison oak looks like?". After Rhonda's reply no, Brett proclaimed that he now did. So Rhonda sent him to the washroom with the cool soap strips, put on some Benadryl and a bandaid. We finished setting up the tent and made a fire.

We hung out by the fire (really close to it actually because it was cool and damp). We heard some crackling in the bushes and were somewhat scared (in the morning we felt really stupid because we saw some really scary bunnies and a squirrel).

200 km. And everybody's still in the truck.

Day 9: Super Monkey BALLS!!

We woke up at 7:30 this morning to a guy reving his Harley. After realizing that he had woke everyone up, he proceeded to yell, "Good Morning". What a start. We kind of went back to sleep for a little while. We then packed up and had bagels for breakfast. Proceeding to the showers, we realized that we didn't have any quarters. Back in the truck and back to the store for quarters. After showering, we got in the truck and started to drive. We had decided to head into the Redwoods for another night. We planned to go to Flint Rock Campground. It looked really isolated on the map and trailers and RVs were not allowed. Yay. Well, it seemed like a great idea at the time. It turned out to be a walk in only, up a steep cliff in fact. Not for us! So we kept going. We found this field with portapotties, really really not for us. It was looking like we were going to go back to Jedediah Smith. Then on a spur of the moment decision, we decided to head south on the 101 again.

We stopped at a Ranger Station to get info. There was a guy there who was bargining for a map. He declared that he had 25 cents and a mint. The clerk replied that the mint looked kind of tasty, but no thanks. He then offered to lick it first. "It makes it sweeter!". He was one of the more interesting characters on our trip so far.... but wait, it gets better...

We got to Prairie Creek Campground,deep in the California Redwoods. It had a campground full sign. Oh well, let's just ask in case. Apparently someone had just cancelled. Yay for us. Once again, the last campsite is ours. Once again, we are those jerks. And it still feels good. It was a great site, kind of isloated, and really large. We set up our tent and back on the road we went.

We headed to The Trees of Mystery, mainly because we were curious about what was so mysterious about these trees. And Rhonda wanted to find out if giant trees meant giant squirrels. They had a gondola there and since Rhonda missed out on the Jasper one, Brett was deteremined to fix this. We hiked up and looked at all of the sights. We encountered a family of 4 with 2 kids. One of these kids was really hyper, and his dad explained that he had been cooped up in the car for much too long. As we were walking by this kid, he proclaimed that he was "Super Monkey Balls". He was climbing trees and this was his superhero name. Brett and Rhonda looked at each other to make sure that each had heard the same thing, and we both started to laugh. We wished that we actually knew this kid and could remind him of this moment/ nickname in 15 years!

At the lineup to the gondola, Brett met a kindered spirit, who liked his Slayer hoodie. According to Brett, Rhonda almost left him behind. According to Rhonda, Brett almost made her go up the gondola alone. But they both got on and it was pretty cool.

At the top, we had a quick look around, then got back inline to go downn the mountain. Oh, look, it's Super Monkey Balls and his family getting off the gondola! And he's as obnoxious as ever, too. Good thing we're going down.

Brett was determined to find a drive-thru redwood tree. We found one just down the road from the Trees of Mystery. As we were paying our $4.00 toll to drive through the tree, the sweet old lady working the toll booth remarked about how both of us had landed such good catches in each other. She asked if it was just the two of us and when we responded yes, she said, "Why, you don't need anyone else when you've found perfection!" We seem to please everybody, wherever we go. And we felt really great after meeting this lady!!

After getting some pics of the Nissan inside of a tree, we hit the road and grabbed some groceries. We had decided that it would be a spaghetti dinner night, but the general store had no hamburger. We managed to cobble up a Polish sausage dinner instead, complete with sauerkraut and mashed potatoes.

That night in the campground was the coldest we've seen. We both changed into hoodies and jeans, and made sure we had plenty of extra blankets for a cool, cool night in the redwoods.

Only 250 km's put on the truck today. And we're all still in the truck.

Day 8

The plan today was to head down to Brookings, OR, right on the Oregon-California state line. Brefore we left, we needed to swap the oil in the truck and we needed to give Mo's Restaurant one last goodbye. Brett also managed to coupon shop for cigarettes (imagine that coupons for everything). By chance, we got a $10 off coupon for Oil Can Henry's, an oil change chain here in the US. After that was done, we headed down to Oldtown in Florence OR to Mo's restaurant for lunch (more chowder in a bread bowl). By chance, they had a farmer's market set up down the street. We toured that, specifically looking for some fresh baked goods, but none were to be had. Oh, they had lots of custom glasswork and stuff, but they were short on fresh produce and baking. And lots of tie dye. We didn't know that tie dye still existed, but we have found a place where it is very very popular!!

After lunch we went back on the highway and started driving. We looked at the map and realized that the Redwoods National Park was much closer than we thought. So with a change of plans (and a change of GPS directions), we were California bound. As we got to the state line, we hit an Agricultural Inspection Site. We maintained our honesty and proclaimed our blueberries, but once again, they were only interested in citrus fruit (and Jolly Ranchers still don't count). We passed the inspection with flying colors. Aparently we are not the scary characters that we thought we were. I guess we will have to work on becoming more unsavory characters for the next Inspection Site.

So again down the highway we went, looking for really big trees. We passed the main campsite Jedediah Smith, because of the scary line up (and the GPS didn't tell us to stop). Brett boldly followed the GPS directions and soldiered on to Gaspe or something, a little town about 20 miles past the state park. The map (yes the old fashioned map and Rhonda reading it. TAKE THAT GPS!!) told of 2 campgrounds just past that town, so we headed onward down the highway east. We ended up missing the first campground, but pulled into the second (and last) one. After a quick drive through, we decided on looking elsewhere. The highway was just too close to get any peace and quiet. We knew we missed a campground so we doubled back, and soon found ourselves in Panther Flats Campground. We ended up scoring the last site in the campground, and it wasn't too bad a site. This place had showers, at least... until we saw the low water level warnings posted at every tap in the park. At least they just suggested some water conservation, and it wasn't a big emergency yet. And we were going to have our showers!

We still needed dinner, so we doubled back to Gaspe and hit their tiny general store. Sadly, it was picked pretty clean. We couldn't make any big extravagant meal with what they had, so we settled on hot dogs over the campfire. Brett managed to score the LAST hot dog buns in the store, too! One of the store customers struck up a conversation about finding some camping in the area. We told him that we got the last site at Panther Flats. Now we're the jerks! And it was kind of a good feeling.

We drove about 400 kms today. And everyone is still in the truck.

Day 7

Today was all about finding some lesss expensive accomodations, then just relaxing in the Newport-Florence, OR area. We started the day by packing up and getting out of the hotel room, then hitting the road north of Florence to find a campground. We pulled into the first one we could find; it was called Sutton State Park, and it was about 5 minutes north of Florence. We drove around for about 15 minutes until we found a spot, but we soon realized that we didn't have the change needed for the site. The National Park campgrounds work on an honor system. You pull in, pick a spot, then go back and pay cash for your site at a self-serve deposit box. Our site was $10, but all we had were $20's, $50's, and a few $1's. The park caretaker was right there, so she let us set up a bit, then go back into town for change. While we were there, we grabbed some lunch to go at a deli. We resolved to keep a stack of $5's and $10's in the truck for National Park camping site use only.

After lunch, we headed back north to Newport and to the Oregon State Aquarium. It's only 40 miles, but it takes about an hour to get there, with the twisting and tuning Coast Highway. We arrived at about 2 PM, and headed in. At first we were kind of disappointed with what the aquarium had to offer, but then we discovered the Cavern of the Deep. It was a series of glass tunnels with all kinds of fish life swimming around them. It was pretty cool, Rhonda especially liked the sting rays. There were lots of cool jelly fish and a tide pool where we could touch the sea creatures (Brett was kind of scared at first or maybe he was thinking of his mom's be careful warnings..., but managed to overcome his fears and touched most of the creatures). We bought a cool shark pen that lights up in the gift shop.

After the aquarium, we headed further into Newport and found a parking space. We walked down the streets and looked into a few shops. Brett tried his first salt water taffy. Then we went to the Ripley's Believe It Or Not Museum. That was pretty cool with some shrunken heads, but there was one room that was was surrounded with lit up "stars" that made it feel like you were in space. We then ventured into the Wax Museum. To be honest, it was a mix of a lot of goofiness and a little kitschy coolness; it left us with a 'why are we here?' sort of feeling for us. But Brett did get to hang out with Johnny Depp. Last stop was the Undersea Garden. It's actually a 150 foot boat on the dock with a giant aquarium 10 feet below the ocean surface. The viewing gallery is a glass and steel tank immersed inside the aquarium, so you're inside looking out at the aquarium. A diver drops into the aquarium and shows you a bunch of different sea creatures. He'll bring it up to the glass, point things out and play with it for the audience. Brett liked most of it, but Rhonda felt pity for the poor sea creatures. They were being hauled out of their happy places and put on display and even thrown around so that they would swim. Kind of mean I think (I wouldn't like it if someone did that to me. Would you?) Brett only felt pity for the dungeness crab; it looked like the wolf eel was having a lot of fun with the diver.

After that adventure, we headed into Mo's Seafood Reastaurant. They boast the best clam chowder, and they do not lie. The line-up to get in can vary from a 20 minute to 1 hour wait (we waited for about 20 mins). It is well worth it. Brett had a seafood variety platter with a clam chowder starter (shared with Rhonda), and Rhonda had a cod, shrimp, and salmon linguini alfredo. It was delicious. We were seated at a table with another couple (that is how busy the place is.) First they asked if we were nice. We responded with the fact that we are Canadian so who knows if we are nice. They asked one of the typical responses, must be cold there... but they were pretty nice. We both got some dessert to go for later that night by the campfire. Brett is still on the hunt for the best peanut butter dessert in existence.

We returned to the campsite after grabbing some groceries and firewood (and Rhonda's jacket which she left in the previous night's hotel room. And it was at the front desk waiting. Yay Comfort Inn!) , and had a nice, relaxing evening by the campfire. Well, except for the hand dryer in the bathroom that would not shut off, because about 5 women who were camping that wanted to wash and dry their hair. They ran the hand dryer for about 1 1/2 hours, which killed the hand dryer I might add. Rhonda was pretty grossed out by the amount of hair left behind as well. We imagined them to be female bigfoots with lots and lots of hair.

We have left the campground of a much healthier breakfast (bagels, using the new campstove toaster). We just had showers (we had to go to a seperate place from the campground because we have learned that many state campgrounds have no showers). We are off to get the truck's oil changed and more of Mo's chowder (there is a restaurant here too and Rhonda really wants to experience chowder in a homemade breadbowl). Then out of town and back on the road, heading to California.

All is still well with us, and we are still having a lot of fun. The weather is nice and cool, a refreshing change. We put on about 250 km on the Nissan. And everyone is still in the truck.