North America

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Google Embarasses Itself

I’m back to where I was in ’08, trying to decide how I’m going to get to the south Okanagan from Banff, and, of course, want to go a different route. I had thought to dip into Montana and Idaho, but there are too many reasons why I don’t want to cross the border with Miranda at this time.

So, I decided to see if I could hit Radium Hot Springs and the Crows Nest Pass in one fell swoop. I put into Google Maps the following locations:

A) Banff

B) Radium Hot Springs

C) Crows Nest

D) Osoyoos

Without asking for any clarifications, this is what Google spit out:

(I particularly like the part where it has me go to Australia and then come right back around to BC.)

At any rate, the Crowsnest Pass is out of my way, but I will be going through Radium Hot Springs and the Kootenays, a route a friend tried to convince me to take back in 08′. Let it not be said that I don’t pay attention to comments!

This route puts me at three easy days to Osoyoos while, not counting today, I have nine days left before I start paying rent. I’d like to divide the mileage up into shorter days and perhaps spend a day or two in another location outside of the national parks system.

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Quick Look at Hinton and Thinking About Jasper

I ended up driving into Hinton for dinner tonight and also to gas up the toad. Highway 16 shoots straight through town and on each side of it are the usual big box stores, including a Walmart and a Canadian Tire. There might be more to the town, but at first glance it doesn’t seem like much.

The restaurant choices were uninspired so being in the mood for shrimp I ended up at Joey’s Only Seafood. Never been to that chain before even though I have lived and traveled through many towns with one. The food was adequate, reasonably priced, and had generous but not not exaggerated quantities. It wouldn’t be my first choice next time I go out for dinner, but for tonight it worked. I had a shrimp and chicken combo with rice and veggies.

I then gassed up the toad, at 91.9! I will make sure to gas up both vehicles at the very limit of Alberta to take full advantage of the price here!

While I had planned to go to Jasper tomorrow, I may end up hanging out at home instead. Both vehicles badly need an exterior cleaning and I have a few things to troubleshoot. There doesn’t seem to be enough to do in Jasper to justify the 140km round trip in the toad, nor paying the park entry fee twice. I might take up Croft’s suggestion from 2008 and instead get up early on Wednesday, park Miranda on the edge of town, and then explore at my leisure. Decisions, decisions. 🙂 Whatever I do, I do not want to spend a night within the park borders; I simply cannot justify paying $40-$50 to boondock on Crown land!!!

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Faster Than a Speeding Bullet!

The Hinton KOA has wi-fi, but it’s of the satellite variety. They are upfront that it is ‘not high speed.’

I haven’t tried it. Why bother when there’s high speed cell service out here?

In Dawson, a good download speed was 1MBS, but I usually hovered around 985kbs. Well, I’ve been hitting more than 310mbs tonight in rural Alberta! It’s incredible! I had no idea I could get speeds like that from an aircard! I can even stream video! With these numbers, I’m definitely going to be hitting my 5GB limit in no time!

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The Big Horn Highway

Since I was going to lose an hour today, moving into Alberta time, I wrangled my butt out of bed by 8PST and was on the road within the half hour.

Gas in Dawson Creek was the cheapest I had seen since leaving the Yukon: 106.9. Having only a third of a tank left and heading into unknown territory I was going to take advantage of this low price when suddenly I remembered that several Alberta guests this past summer told me that gas is very cheap in Alberta. Having more than enough fuel to get to the next big town, Grande Prairie, I decided to see if this was true.

Immediately after Dawson Creek, you enter the oddly named town of Pouce Coupe. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say the town lost its accent and is actually Pouce Coupé or Cut Thumb. As I said, odd name. 🙂

The first gas station after the Alberta border is a Fas Gas offering easy RV access, which is more important to me than price. Even when the price is 96.9. Ninety-six point nine. Ninety-six point nine. Less than a dollar a litre!!! I sure was glad I didn’t gas up in Fort St John (109.9) or Dawson Creek!

I pulled out the GPS for the first time in so long that it thought the nearest Walmart was in Fairbanks, 400km away! I put in the town of Hinton so that the GPS could give me an estimated ETA time. It said 2:30ish PST which felt like a reasonable driving day.

Out of Dawson Creek, one takes BC highway 2, which becomes Alberta highway 43. At Grande Prairie, you need to turn south to highway 40, The Big Horn Highway, and then it’s a straight shot to Hinton, gateway to Jasper. Thanks to Mile by Mile I knew to expect a good, but isolated, road with some steep grades.

Except for some rough patches near the end, the road was a dream to drive! The grades were all short and sweet and the landscape was amber and verdant as far as I could see. Which wasn’t far seeing as I drove straight into fog and snow all day. The conditions weren’t bad enough to pull over since the snow wasn’t sticking to the road, but the limited visibility meant for a slow pace. A lot of people honked at me today. With only a tiny handful of places to pull over, there wasn’t much I could do to soothe their impatience.

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The RV park I’d picked ended up being closed for the season even though the website said they were open well into October! I was not pleased since there was no way to turn around. After driving hard for six hours, the last thing I wanted to do was unhook the car and figure out how to turn the motorhome around. At least, I did that instead of pushing on down a tiny road hoping to find a place to turn without having to unhook!

There were a couple of other options, the nearest of which was the KOA which I knew was open. Like many RVers, I avoid KOAs since they are very pricey, but I decided to check out this one. Lo and behold, a FHU site was just $30.90, taxes included. It must be an off season rate! I paid up for two nights, but won’t be hooking up the water and sewer tonight since it’ll probably go down to freezing. I’ll just finish off my fresh water tank with an indecently long hot shower and then refill the fresh water and dump the black and grey tomorrow… after I get back from visiting Jasper!

For tonight, I am debating driving into Hinton and having dinner… but staying home with a movie and leftover spaghetti sounds sooo appealing.  It seems that the more I settle into my RVing life the less of a tourist I become!

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This is Awesome!

I can’t believe I’m boondocking and working on my main computer while surfing the net. If I could only get my generator back on line life would be perfect! My batteries are holding up well, but are definitely due for a good charge. Tonight I need to ration my battery usage to ensure I’ll have heat throughout the night (I have to wonder if the weather is ever good in Dawson Creek!).

Before anyone comments, I’m still having the same issue I’ve been having with the generator–no gas is getting to it and it looks like I’ll have to change out not only the fuel filter but also the entire line. The project is too daunting for words and I’d rather focus on finding a tiny portable genset, something with just enough juice to recharge the batteries but not actually run anything. I don’t need or miss 120V power when I’m boondocking and can’t bring myself to sink money into the onboard generator without knowing that it’ll definitely pay off. I’ve seen several possibilities for less than $100 on Craigslist, but I’m always too late. I’ll keep checking.

At any rate, thanks to Google (and Telus!), I have plotted my way to Banff, concentrating on getting to Jasper. I’d really like to get to an RV park near there tomorrow because the batteries need charging, but the distance seems a bit ambitious on an unknown route. I have lined up where I hope to stay and made a note of the distances between the major centres so that I can decide mid-afternoon whether I need to stop or keep going.

The weather forecast for the next few days isn’t promising. The prairies have been hit with a cold snap and there is a snowfall warning for Jasper. So, I’m highly motivated to get to a place where I can justify paying for hookups in case I need to hang out for a few days. But I am not wavering on my itinerary. It took longer than I thought it would, but I am finally making my way back to places I thought I’d see in the spring of ’09!