The Trip to Vancouver Island

We left Casper May 23 and traveled through the green spring grasses and of  Wyoming and Montana. This was a great relief from the drab winter colors of the plains. We spent the night in Butte and then headed west. Pressing our way through the plains and mountains of Montana into Idaho we  spent the night in Sandpoint. A colorful sunset presented it's self to us over the lake there.

The next day we drove up the panhandle of Idaho to Canada. We traveled west in Canada just above the U.S border to the Johnstone Creek Provincial Park where we spent the night in the small eleven site campground. There is an abundant amount of  mountain scenery along highways 1 and 3.

We arrived in Vancouver, B.C. on the 25th of  May and found a campground. We decided to take just the truck and go find the ferry launch site. Found it ok, but on the way back we were introduced to the great world of  GPS and highway construction. After following directions which kept us going in circles we had to finally revert to back tracking to the route we followed coming into Vancouver to get back to the campground.

Took the ferry over to Vancouver Island on the 26th of May. The bufett on the ferry was very good.

The site seeing on the trip was awesome.

We are camping at Weir's Beach Resort. Our camp spot was  on the beach  about about 50 yeards from the water. There is a small pond behind our camping spot which has a family of swans and several families of mallard ducks. The swans dive to the bottom and bring up weeds for the youngsters to eat. The young mallards dive and splash all around the pond.

 

      
  

Hitting the Trail

Well, the big day is here we leave this morning. It is off to Alaska! Over coming emergency room visits, tooth implant procedures and planting the garden in the wind and the rain we are ready to proceed "North to Alaska". Our first major stop will be Vancouver and Victoria. We plan on spending Memorial Weekend on Vancouver Island site seeing in Victoria. Additions to this blog will appear when I find a wi-fi hot spot along the way. We might be frequenting McDonald's and Starbucks when we find them.

Testing Skills

Richard, Charles and I went to Pathfinder yesterday to test our fishing skills before Richard and I head to Alaska with our wives. Charles is a part time guide on the lake and had told us the fishing was good.  Charles provided the boat and we didn't get on to the water until about 9:30 AM. Pathfinder is a rather large lake again as the drought seems to have ended and is almost full. some say that it will spill this year which it hasn't done for at least 10 years. Well, we had to do some looking and hunting for the fish and the correct lures. For a while I thought that Richard had lost his skills over the winter but finally things fell into place for him and he boated several fish. He caught the largest fish which weighed 3 lb 10 oz. We boated 16 fish between 2 lb 8 oz and 3 lb 10 oz.  There were 12 rainbows and 4 browns. We stopped fishing at3 PM.

Some of the rainbows.

Today I had to go to the doctor for a procedure to be done on my throat. I had to be put under at the doctor's surgical office for an endoscopy. Everything turned out the way it was supposed to and I am feeling fine.  I have lost a day of getting ready for our trip and now will be pressed to get the 300 plants placed in my garden but I will get it done! 

Getting Ready

Richard and I worked on the 5th wheel on the 8th.  Richard is the mechanic an I am the assistant. We replaced the brakes, replaced the seals and repacked the bearings. Since we are working outside and the forecast is for 10 inches of snow the instillation of  access ladder, top rail and folding hand rail is on hold until later in the week. We have most of our stuff ready to load.  Hope the weather clears so we can take a small test run to shake out the kinks. I am to have a treatment on my throat this week and I hope there will be no complications to postpone the start of our trip.