Month: September 2012

Jasper

This is my third post about our three week road trip. We are now entering week two. The first two posts are here and here. If you would like to see all of our pictures they are on Flickr here.

Wednesday morning we woke up in Banff. It was overcast.

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We headed up to Lake Louise and it was already clearing. How can a beautiful Fall day in a stunning place like lake Louise not be a wonderful day.

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As we drove up the Ice Fields Parkway towards Jasper all the clouds disappeared. It was a perfect day.

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We decided to take a hike. The guide book described the Parker Ridge hike as the best short hike off the Icefields Parkway in Banff National Park.  It wasn't a long hike but it was up to the ridge ahead of Duke in the picture below.

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I am going to keep repeating myself but as i said it was a stunningly beautiful day. At the top it was a bit windy but what a view!

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I took this panoramic shot from the top.

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And here is Duke starting down. When we got back to the car we drove on to Jasper where we are now.

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My Mother lived in Jasper from about 1930 until 1940. Her father was a train engineer for the Canadian National  Railroad. I wrote a post about him and my Grandmother here.  The picture below is of my grandparents and my Uncle Gordon and their dog Sailor in front of their house in Jasper.

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This morning we found the house and talked to the lady who lives there now. She runs a B&B – Juniper House.

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This afternoon we took a hike south of Jasper. The trail is called the Five Lakes trail.

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We had a picnic lunch beside one of the lakes.

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Any complaining about the smoke that I did early in this trip I now officially take back. I would trade it any time for the absolutely wonderful weather we have had since we got into the Canadian Rockies. It has been in the 70s and clear. Absolutely perfect Fall weather. I couldn't ask for anything better!

Into Canada

Duke and I are on a three week road trip. On Monday we left Post Falls, Idaho and headed north into Canada. The border crossing was easy and quick. The smoke from western fires that has plagued us the whole trip continued as we drove north along Lake Kalune. You can just barely see the mountains through the smoke at this wonderful picnic lunch spot. It is a gorgeous lake that seems like a fiord.

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At the north end of the lake the road ends and there is a free ferry. It was about a 30 minute absolutely beautiful ferry ride. Soon after that we arrived in Nelson where we spent the night. We stopped at one point to taste wine. The guy pouring our wine told us that Nelson is a hippy town where a lot of the Viet Nam war draft protesters settled. It is a beautiful town nested next to the lake.

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On Tuesday we drove from Nelson to Banff in the Canadian Rockies. As we headed north the smoke cleared. We took another free ferry ride and found a totally deserted provincial park for our picnic lunch. One of the great things about travelling this time of year is that the roads are almost deserted and we have the parks to ourselves

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It started to rain as we drove into Banff but who cares! The smoke is gone and the mountains are breathtaking. Today we head up the Ice Fields Parkway to Jasper.

Fall 2012 Road Trip – Idaho

Duke and I left Reno last Thursday on a three week road trip. We are planning to do a circle north through Idaho into Canada over to Vancouver and then back south to Reno. Day one, Thursday we drove 400 miles from Reno to Jackpot, Nevada. Jackpot is on the Idaho border in the north east corner of Nevada. We stayed at a casino there called Cactus Pete's. It was much nicer than I expected it to be. Our room was stylish and comfortable, the food was good, and the people were really nice. The package deal we had included food credit and $50 free play and we won!

On Friday we drove from Jackpot to Sun Valley, Idaho. On the way we had several serendipitous experiences that reminded me why I enjoy road tripping so much.

We stopped in Twin Falls to look at the Perrine Bridge over the Snake River. It is 486 feet from the bridge to the river below. According to the Lonely Planet Guide Book people travel from all over the world to BASE jump off the bridge. We were lucky to be out on the bridge when a guy jumped. It was really cool to watch. Here is my picture of the bridge and a video I took of him jumping.

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http://www.flickr.com/apps/video/stewart.swf?v=109786
 

 

After Twin Falls we stopped at a  the Silver Creek Nature Conservancy
Preserve. It is a pristine trout stream that is used
by fishermen and includes hiking trails. We took a two mile hike through the preserve. The
creek is crystal clear and we just happened to watch a fly fisherman
catch a beautiful trout.

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 After leaving Silver Creek we just happened to go through the little town of Hailey  when they were having their Fall Festival parade. We stopped to watch.

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We spent Friday night in Sun Valley. We had a great Pizza at Wise Guy Pizza Pie. Notice the tally of guys with socks and sandals. Personally I don't have a problem with men in socks and sandals.

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Saturday we drove from Sun Valley to a bed and breakfast out in the country near Cottonwood, Idaho. The Sawtooth Mountains and the Salmon River are beautiful but unfortunately there was so much smoke from forest fires that we could hardly even see the mountains. We did have a nice picnic lunch.

 
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You can really see the smoke in this picture I took when we were filling up with gas in Grangeville

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Driving through all that smoke hurt my eyes and throat so it was sure nice to wake up this morning and be able to see the wheat field beyond the yard of the B&B where we were staying. Our first stop this morning was the Nez Perce National Historic Park on the Clearwater River near Lewiston.

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Farther north we had a picnic lunch on the shore of Lake Coeur d'Alene. Tonight we are staying in Post Falls. Before dinner we took a hike in Qémiln Riverside Park along the Spokane River.

Tomorrow we head into Canada. If you would like to see all my pictures from the trip they are on Flickr here.

 

 

A Flat Tire and a Fat Lip

In the last few weeks Duke and I have taken two three day camping trips in the Nevada Outback. The first trip to Berlin Ichthyosaur State Park and Columbine Campground I described in my last post. The second trip was northeast of Reno and directly north of Winnemucca.

When we headed north from Winnemucca we were on pavement until we reached the little town of Paradise Valley, Nevada. From there we took a good dirt road north about 6 miles to a Forest Service campground called Lye Creek. I think there was only one other camp site in use. We had a wonderful steak dinner and enjoyed the evening. 

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  The next day we headed north again on more remote dirt roads. We stopped to have a look at an old mine site. The entire route must have fantastic views but unfortunately it was very smoky because of several northern Nevada wild fires.

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 When we were about 30 miles from the nearest paved road we ran over this remnant of a fence post in the road. There was a loud whoosh as the air blew out of our right front tire.

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The spare tire is stored under the bed of the pickup. You are supposed to crank it down to get it off the truck. But the secondary latch on the mechanism that holds the tire under the truck wouldn't release. The instructions include steps to take if cranking the tire down doesn't work. We went through those steps several times… jacking the spare and the release mechanism up and down again and again but nothing worked. We always carry lots of extra food and water. I was beginning to think that we might have to use it.

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Surprisingly we had enough cell phone coverage so that we were able to get through to GM OnStar. They connected us to a maintenance guy at the Chevy dealer in Reno. He had no suggestions for how to get the secondary latch to release the spare. But he asked if we had a air compressor. As I was thinking " Who carries an extra air compressor?" I was amazed to hear Duke respond "yes, why?"

The maintenance guy suggested that letting the air out of the spare might give us enough room to maneuver the spare off the mechanism holding it in place. We said we would give it a try. Duke let the air out of the spare. There was still no way to release the spare but we now had room to access the piece of metal what was holding the tire on the truck. So Duke pulled out his bolt cutters. They are about three feet long. I described them as big but he says they are small bolt cutters.

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Duke and I laid on our backs under the truck for over an hour while I held the piece of metal with channel lock pliers and he used the bolt cutters to  little by little cut through the metal and bend it enough to get it off the truck. At one point the bolt cutters slipped and slammed into Duke's lip just under his nose. Although it must have hurt like hell and the swelling gave him a very fat lip he was very lucky not to break his nose or lose a tooth.

 
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 During this whole process the jack was holding the spare up out of the way. We were finally able to get the spare released and lower the jack. But the jack no longer worked. It wouldn't go up or down. Duke also carries a spare jack!! He used the air compressor to refill the spare tire. He used the spare jack to jack up the front right side of the truck and then he replaced the blown tire with the spare.

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The whole process took us over 5 hours but thanks to the patience, preparedness and ingenuity of my wonderful husband we were exhausted but on our way again. 

We camped for the night along the Quinn River and made it home to Reno the next day.

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All our pictures from this adventure are on Flickr here.