We rethreaded a blind on Friday
morning. Joan had found some instructions on how to do this on the
internet. It worked out pretty well.
On Saturday, we met John's brother
George at Gold Bar Park. We walked along the river valley, and
across the North Saskatachewan to Rundle Park. We stopped at a table
along the pathway and enjoyed a lunch of roast beef sandwiches and
vegetables with a cheese sauce for dipping. On the way back to the
parking lot, in Gold Bar Park, we saw a mother duck with a group of
really small ducklings One of the ducklings was more adventurous
than his siblings, wandering further away from Mom, and diving under
the water every once in a while. A bit later, in another pond, we
noticed some goslings. Then George treated us to some triple thick
milkshakes at the McD's in Walmart at Capalino Mall.
We had lunch of John's sister, Ann, and
her husband Daniel at Cora's in Edmonton Sunday morning. Then we
drove to their place, and went in their car out to Elk Island NP. We
walked along the Shoreline trail, taking pictures of the pelicans,
and a various other birds in the lake. We were surprised to see so
many pelicans on the lake. We also got a distant shot of a bison along the highway.
We left the trail to go around a little
peninsula at Beaver Bay, which Ann believes was the old site of Camp
Agape, a United Church camp where we spent a few summers when we
were children. After getting back to pick up our truck at their
house, Daniel gave us a bit of double-sided tape to reattach one of
the deer whistles, which had come loose shortly after we installed
them last summer. That may come in useful driving through northern
BC and the Yukon this summer.
Monday morning, we packed up the
trailer and headed west from Edmonton, and then northwest through
Whitecourt, Fox Creek, and stopped in Sherk RV Park in Valleyview.
We had looked up friends from university Gary and Janice, that we
hadn't seen forever. After university, they had come up to the
Peace country and have been farming here ever since. We had lost
touch with them a while ago, but were able to find a phone number for
them on the internet, so were able to spend a good evening with
them.
When we tried to run the living room
slider in on Tuesday morning, only the back end of the slider was
moving in. As a result we had to stay an extra night in Sherk RV
park. It was a very nice park with lovely clean facilities, wi-fi and
our neighbours were very friendly. We checked underneath the
trailer, and found that the shaft connecting the two rails for the
slider wasn't turning. After the park maintenance fellow and John
had no luck identifying the problem, and while waiting for one of the
mechanics in the shop next door to get a chance to take a look, we
phoned Woody's in Grande Prairie. They did not have an answer as to
what we could do to get the slider in, and if we drove into Grande
Prairie with the slider out (fortunately on the side next to the
ditch), they could look at it on June 20. They recommended we check
with Happy Trails, who have 17 service bays instead of only 3. The
desk person at Happy Trails was able to get some advice from the
foreman about what to look for, and sure enough, the problem was that
a sheer bolt, connected the shaft between the two rails, had broken.
The head end of the bolt was on the ground under the trailer. We
were able to line the bolt holes on the shaft up with the driver, and
slip the bolt in enough to run the slider back in. Spending the
evening with the living room slider pulled in gave us a good idea
what it would be like to have only the one slider in the main area.
We are glad we have two, making it much more comfortable a living
area.
Wednesday morning, we successfully got
everything ready to go, and headed into Grande Prairie to get a
replacement bolt (or 4). On the way to Grande Prairie we encountered
numerous animals, deer, elk, coyotes, and a moose. As we were
traveling on a 4 lane divided highway with loads of traffic, stopping
for pictures was not possible. Once we got to Grande Prairie we
discovered that the RV dealer doesn't carry the required bolts, so
sent us to Fastenal, down the road. They were very helpful, even
though we were only buying $2.00 worth of bolts. The fellow even
came out to see where the bolt went, since he also has a trailer with
slide-outs. After successfully installing one of the replacement
bolts, we carried on to Dawson Creek to the Northern Lights RV park.
We got setup, had a quick sandwich, then went into town to pick up
some supplies, and get some information from the visitor information
center on the self-guided historic walking tour in town, and took
some pictures of the Alaska Highway Mile 0 marker. It was very
windy, so we had some problems getting a stable satellite signal.
The wind was gusting from 30 to 50 kph, which was moving the signal
from around 60, which we find satisfactory, all the way down to zero,
and back again. It makes it an interesting discussion during setup
when the signal varies that much while trying to tighten up the dish.
Fortunately, they had a cable connection, with only about 10
channels, so we hooked that up as well as back-up to the satellite
until the wind dies down (we hope).
We decided to do the trip to Tumbler
Ridge and on to Kinuseo Falls in Monkman Provincial Park on Thursday.
We took a quick look at the Dinosaur Gallery in Tumbler Ridge, but
decided that $8 each was too much for a smallish looking museum.
After programming our GPS to go to Monkman Park, and seeing that it
was heading us the wrong way, we made a U-turn and followed the
highway signs back the other way, and found the sign telling us where
to turn off the highway. Unfortunately, it only had the 2k notice
sign, not the 'turn here' sign, but we noticed on the other side of
the highway, so did another u-turn. Once past the coal mining
operations, the road turned to gravel, with fairly heavy washboard in
many places. We stopped at a gravelled area just past the Murray
River, whose valley the road travels along, and had lunch. At one point further along, there was a
little lake a few hundred feet below the road, at which John
commented that it didn't look like moose country. Ironically, just a
bit down the road, we saw a moose standing at the edge of the road.
We stopped to get a photo, and allowed the moose to take a good look
at us before it carried on across the road and up the hill on the
other side.
We
managed to make between 30 and 60 kph for the 50 km to the falls.
However, it was worth the trip, with a very nice waterfall, with a
couple of viewpoints.
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