Friday, Saturday, Sunday; October 17, 18, 19, 2008

The trips winding down. Friday we go visit with the factory personnel where our Phoenix Cruiser motorhome was built in Elkhart, Indiana. We wanted to see one with a larger bed - the only thing we missed from home while we were gone. Then on to Cave City, Kentucky where we spent the night at a very nice Good Sam Campground. Gail was getting really excited. Tomorrow she will get to see our Nashville grandchildren. Saturday we're off to Nashville. At the risk of being hollered at, I couldn't resist taking this photo of Gail with her hair in rollers, a morning ritual while we had been gone. Needless to say, we were both as happy to see the kids as they were happy to see us. We spent the night with them and we all celebrated Gail's 71st birthday. Sunday morning we drove home and said a prayer of thanks as we arrived after driving 8000 miles in seven weeks. Westward Ho was concluded.

Thursday; October 16, 2008

We awoke to a bright morning and prepared to drive down through western Michigan arriving in Elkhart Indiana for the night. But first we had to cross the Straits of Mackinaw Bridge. The first time we ever crossed this bridge, we were newly married and we crossed it riding a motorcycle. At that time the bridge was only a few years old. Gail still remebers looking down at the water through the roadway grates and being very nervous. Today as we approached the bridge, Gail finally saw a Moose, the first one of the trip. On our drive through Ontario we had continually seen warning signs for these animals - but we never saw one. Having grown up in Michigan, our drive south through the state was one of reminising. We stopped at ski areas previusly visited with our family and friends, little towns we always enjoyed and the first retirment home my parents had.

Wednesday; October 15, 2008

Another 400 mile day to get to Sault Ste Marie, Ont and cross over into the U.S. at Sault Ste Marie, Michigan. Many of you may know that the Locks from Lake Superior to the North Channel of Lake Huron are located between these two cities and countries. This was a very senic drive. Canadian Highway 17 follows the Lake Superior shoreline very closly and you continually see the lake as you travel. We're sight-see'ers, thus we stopped a number of times to get out of the coach and look at waterfalls, gorges, bays and cliffs. We have attached a few photos including one of Katerine Bay - named for our youngest grandchild, do you believe that? We crossed into Michigan at 7 PM. Lake Superior White Fish and Yellow Perch were on our minds for dinner. We had a lovely dinner at the historic Ojiboway Hotel which was built in 1926. It was 10 PM when we arrived at our campground for the night. We were right at the exit of the locks.

Tuesday; October 14, 2008

Up at 4:30, we slip out of Winnipeg at 5:30 for a 425 mile drive headed for Thunder Bay, ONT, CA on the northwest shore of Lake Superior. At this time we are leaving our friends behind and starting the drive home. Our last week out! We have always wanted to round the north shore of lake Superior having done the south shore with our children a number of years ago. Not a lot to talk about here. This was truck driving to get to TB. Long straight roads through wooded and rockys countryside. As we got closer to the lake, things began to change. We arrived early enough to visit downtown Thunder Bay and see their waterfront. In the distance in the attached photo you can see the entrance light for the Harbor. The other photo is the fabled "sleeping giant", an island in the Harbor.

Sunday, Monday; October 12, 13, 2008

We arrived in Winnipeg to spend the next two nights at the Red River Expedition Center. Sunday was Canada's Thanksgiving Day to celebrate the harvest. Gail, Susanne and Carol came up with the idea to go out to dinner having a traditional Canadian Thanksgiving Dinner. Gail located a very nice restaurant and the three couples of us separated from the group for dinner. Monday morning a Tour Bus picked us up early and we began a tour of Winnipeg. This city is very European and has a large French contingent. Our first stop was the Asinine Gardens Park. For all you children out there, this is the home of Winnie-the-Poo. He was created in the building pictured. This is a lovely park with gardens, outdoor sculpture, and historic buildings to wander through. Its certainly popular with the locals as people were walking through the park on a cool and damp Sunday morning. Our second stop was the Provincial State House which, considering this was Canada's National Election Day, we were allowed to enter by pre-arrangement. A magnificent building patterned after King Solomon's Temple. Mid-day we stopped at the Central Market area to have lunch in the food court and do some souvenir shopping. In the afternoon we went to what I consider one of the finest historical museums I have ever been in. The museum guide with the aid of exhibits traced the orgin of Manitoba from several thousand years ago to modern times. Take a look at this website. http://www.manitobamuseum.ca/ We finished up the evening with our Caravan Farewell Dinner at a German restaurantand and then, one more nightcap in Bernie and Carol's Motorhome.

Friday, Saturday; October 10,11, 2008.

We boarded the train in Curchill on Thursday night at 10:30 for our rebound trip back to Thompson. This time we had a sleeper compartment with bunk beds. We slept much better than on the previous trip up. We awoke Friday morning to see our first snow of the trip on the ground. Time during the day was past with several of us acting out a murder mystery plot and with the others having to figure out who the murderer was. The photo is Bernie as a German Braumister. We arrived back in Thompson at 8:00 PM to a wet, cold and muddy campground. Saturday morning we struck out for Grand Rapids which is half way to Winnipeq down the west side of Manitoba and is not much more than a fuel stop. We dry camped in a "pull off area" and had a "woody woopee" dinner (our term for a pot luck dinner). Look at a map of the Province of Manitoba. We were driving beside Lake Winniipeq all the way down.

Wednesday, Thursday; October 8, 9, 2008

This was the crescendo we had been building up too for the last twelve months. It wasn't a disappointment! We traveled the Tundra for two days in a Tundra Buggy with our driver/guide Mark driving and occasionally - Gail driving. We saw seven Polar Bears, numerous Artic Hares, Ptarmigan birds, Red Foxes and various bird coveys. Temperatures were forty degrees or so but the winding was howling pushing the wind chill lower. We left the hotel at 8:30 every morning and returned at 5:00 PM. We had breakfast and dinner across the road from the hotel and lunch on the Tundra Buggy. Churchill has a year round population of 800 persons of which two thirds are "first nation" people. The Canadians living here are truly outdoor enthusiasts. The town is wide open from the perspective we live our daily lives in. The community polices itself and we were told they don't have crime problems. Lawbreakers get one chance to recover their senses! A one way ticket out of town takes care of those that can't adjust. If you're wondering about the bears - they come off the Hudson Bay ice in late Spring as the ice is breaking up. They spend the warm months out on the Tundra mating, hibernating and giving birth. In early October they began wondering toward the shore line in anticipation of the ice freeze which will occur by mid November. They spend the cold months on the ice gorging them selves on Seals and building up a layer of fat to live on the following Spring/Summer starting the cycle all over. We made friends with a tour guide whom we will be corresponding with. Would we go back? Maybe in the May/June time frame to witness the migratory birds leaving to head south. This was certainly a once in the life time experience we'll always remember.

Monday, Tuesday; October 6 - 7, 2008

In Thompson MN CA we stayed at the McCreedy Campround along side the Churchill River and a float plane base. Mrs. McCreedy operates the campground and is certainly a very entertaining woman with a lot of stories to tell. Gail spent Monday catching up on laundry and walking around the Thompson towncenter. In the evening we boarded the train for our overnight (and next day!) ride to Churchill on the shores of Hudson Bay. We left our RVs in Mrs. Mcreedy's custody until our return on Friday night the 10th. A word about the train ride. We learned the train is always guaranteed to be late and off the schedule and we certainly learned it is no express. While we had a sleeper compartment, we still had a restless night with the noise and slow moving and swaying of the train all of which is no fault of Canadian Railways. Other than some ocassional sidings, there is a single rail track from Thompson to Churchill which is plus/minus 325 mile long. These tracks are laid over the Trunda and therein is the reason the train schedule is erratic. The tracks are coniually moving around in the soft earth which doesn't provide for high speed rail travel. At times we would slow down to a crawling speed and ocassionally we would have to pull off on a siding and sit for a period of time while a freight train would pass us by. This track is also used to move grain to the shipping port at Churchill where it is sent on to Europe. We arrived in Churchill at 5 PM on Tuesday and procededed to our hotel, The Tundra Inn.

Catching up on the blog; Novv. 1, 2008

If you've been watching our Westward Ho blog and wondering what happened, this message will let you know we didn't get eaten up by the Polar Bears or lost in the Canadian Woods. We made it home fine without any incidents arriving in Chattanooga on Sunday afternoon October 19th. Needless to say, business activities have consumed Bob since we returned and this blog fell thru the cracks. Disappointingly, we also had an issue with our camera that has caused us to erase and lose a number of photos taken between 9/28 and 10/10. We'll catch the blog up on a daily basis and post photos where we can. We're happy to hear so many of you have been watching our trip unfold. We just feel blessed and fortunate we were ale to do it. Regards, Bob & Gail

Friday, Saturdday, Sunday; October 3,4,5, 2008

We’re driving north up the east side of the Province of Manitoba with the destination of Thompson scheduled for Sunday night the 5th. On Friday night the 3rd we stayed at a city owned campground in Dauphine. This area of the Province is heavily settled by descendents from the Ukraine area of Europe. We toured a historic Ukraine Catholic Church in the evening and then we were hosted to dinner by ladies of the church. The evening was concluded with some audience participation in the dancing customs of the Ukraine’s. It was an educational and fun evening for all of us. Saturday the 4th we spent the night dry camping at an Indian Casino at the city named, The Pas. On our drive here we discovered Tamarack Trees for the first time since leaving home. Their colors were changing continually in various shades of yellow as you can see in the attached photo. Sunday the 5th was more of the same scenery as we passed numerous large inland lakes. Just outside of Thompson we stopped at Pisew Falls. See photos attached. Monday we leave via slow passenger train to travel to Churchill MN on Hudson Bay for our much anticipated viewing of the Polar Bears. We return to Thompson Friday the 10th. Having passed the 55th Parallel at this point in our travels, we are getting ever closer to the Arctic Circle. photos to follow

Wednesday, Thursday; October 1-2, 2008

We spent Wednesday night 10/1 in Williston, ND. Oil drilling in and near the county has created a boom in the population with workers coming in from all over the US. No signs of a weak economy here! Bob is beginning to feel like a Nomad. Today he had a haircut at The Super Wall Mart while Gail picked up a few grocery items. Driving through large grain farms and oil rigs, we arrived at our campsite in the Turtle Mountains and at The International Peace Gardens just north of Dunseith, ND and on the Canadian border. The turtle you see in the photo is constructed of discarded vehicle wheels. Here we met up with eleven other coaches and couples to form the Fantasy RV Caravan that would travel into Manitoba and on to Churchill to view the Polar Bear migration there. We closed out the day with a social gathering of the new group members and a celebration of Gail’s 5th year since her cancer surgery. Thursday the 2nd was spent touring the International peace Gardens. Our tour was conducted by the senior gardener. This was a stunning place and a tribute to the international peace keeping efforts of Americans and Canadians. We were all very impressed with the place. The following website will do a better job of describing it than I can. Please take a minute to look at it. http://www.peacegarden.com/ Photos will follow at a later date.

Monday, Tuesday; September 29-30, 2008

Monday morning we awoke to a beautiful view of the east side of Glacier Natl Park from our KOA campsite at St Marys. The famous “road to the sun” was closed going west at Logan Pass. This still provided an interesting thirteen mile trip. We discovered our Grandson Jackson has a glacier named after him. We took a second road to “Many Glaciers” as named by the Indians. Once again, the scenery here was indescribable. The attached photo showing the glacier reflection in the lake will give you an idea of what we were seeing. We left Glacier Park in the early afternoon and drove to Havre, MT to hook up with our other traveling companions who had taken a different route. Gail is shown here leading the discussion to plan out Tuesday’s route. On Tuesday we drove across Montana’s prairies to Williston, ND – large farms, ranches and Indian Reservations. For those of you who would remember the Huntly - Brinkley Report, we passed Chet Huntly’s birth place at Seco, MT.

Sunday; September 28, 2008

After church, Bob, Gail, Bernie and Carol toured Waterton Park beginning with the area where Buffalo wander freely. The Aspen trees provided a host of colors, lite green, yellow, gold and orange. Glacier peaks were awesome to see. The village in Waterton is a cute little town where deer roam freely. We had lunch there and then struck out for St. Marys, MT on the east side of Glacier National Park. We crossed into the USA at Chief Mountain, MT (pictured) following a route of indescribable color provided by the Aspen trees. This is open range country and we had to be alert for cattle on the roadway.

Saturday; September 27, 2008

We arose early at our Lake Louise campsite pictured here and went for a walk along the Bow River with Don and Suzanne. We then struck out for a 300 mi drive to Waterton, AB passing through Calgary. Waterton is a Canadian National Park bordering Montana and our own Glacier Park. We arrived late in the evening at late twilight, photo attached. Here Gail and Carol had a memorable experience. RTM stayed at camp while Gail and Carol drove into town to locate a church to visit the next day. The girls came across a large herd of Elk with two males fighting over the females. They were so close they could hear the clashing of the horns of the two males as they fought. They sat there for some watching this mating ritual and of course, they didn’t have cameras with them to record the event. This experience made Gail’s trip who is ever on the lookout to see wildlife!

Thursday, Friday; September 25-26, 2008

RTM spent Thursday morning communicating via email and telephone on EMS issues. Early afternoon RTM, GDM, BJ and Carol went to lunch at The Banff Springs Hotel. While there we ran into two other coupes traveling with us who were out on their own tour of the town. See that attached photo of Carol, Judy, Suzanne and Gail. This was our second visit to this hotel. It’s a wonderful hotel and having been completed in 1888, it has a lot of history. You can learn more about it at this website. http://www.fairmont.com/banffsprings Friday we had several highlights. Gail and I went hiking on the trails that surrounded our campsite. Immediately we came across the deer pictured here. Later in the morning we discovered the site of the former town of Bankhead which had been built at the turn of the century to mine coal for the Canadian-Pacific Railroad. The town was abandoned in 1922 and 48 homes and churches were moved overland to Banff. An unbelievable feat considering the terrain! If you look closely at the attached photo you will see foundations from some of these buildings. The next neat experience was viewing Lake Minniewanka, see photo attached. The water temp in this lake never rises over forty degrees and huge trout have been caught there. In the evening we drove to Lake Louise for a viewing of Mirror Lake there and dinner at a restaurant serving wild game entrees.

Wednesday; September 24, 2008

Once again we awoke to a weather change. The little duck pictured seemed to want to travel with us. Banff, AB was the destination for four of us while Kelly and Jane struck out for Jasper to see some of Kelly’s childhood campsites. We’ll meet up with them again on late Friday. We drove the Canadian Trans-continental Highway through the Revelstoke Mountain range. Awesome scenery! As we approached the Lake Louise and Banff area, we saw fresh snow on the top of the Canadian Rocky Mountains. We’ll spend Wed evening and Thurs in Banff driving over to Lake Louise on Friday morning.

Tuesday; September 23, 2008

BJ, Don and Jim got a round of golf in on a brand new course built into the side of a mountain. RTM chauffeured the ladies around to wineries. It was a bright sunny day – perfect for sightseeing. We had a lovely lunch at Quails Gate Winery.