And So The Trip Home Begins

And so begins our trip home. Neither one of us happy but saying goodbye to loved ones is never easy.

We drove across Alberta and spent the night in the city of Lloydminster which literally straddles the provincial border. As you are driving through town you get to an intersection that is marked with the boundary.

Today's trip was retracing almost the exact route we followed going out so there is nothing really remarkable. We both found it to be a long and taxing drive and are hoping the rest of the trip is better.

There was no signs of wildlife in this stretch although we did see some Beefalo. 

OH and then there was that hit that looked to have crop circles. Proof the Aliens have visited?

We are taking a different route through Saskatchewan today so hopefully I will have some interesting things to share tomorrow.

One Last Thing About Grande Prairie

Throughout the city of Grande Prairie they have painted the utility pedestals with various scenes. Most are wild life based but there are others that reference the oil fields. The pictures go all the way around the pedestal as a continuous picture. I managed to capture some of them on film.

The Last Day

It is hard to believe this is the last day of our stay in Grande Prairie. The past 4 weeks have flown by. The trip had 3 purposes: To spend time with our grandson, Connor, to celebrate Thanksgiving with our son for the first time in over 5 years and to celebrate Connor's first birthday.

Our first objective was easily reached. In our first 2 weeks here we saw Connor every day. Then, last Saturday, the day before our Thanksgiving celebration was to happen, was the day I had my car accident. which cancelled the dinner and threatened my chance to attend the birthday party. The day before the birthday party  we decided that we were going over to see Connor no matter what. I was a little afraid I would not be able to climb the stairs, but I did it. The next day I was a little worse for wear but the pain medication is doing it's job. I will make the party!

From Connor's birthday, a little gramma cuddle....lasted just long enough to snap the picture.

Last sleep in Grande Prairie. Due to my injuries I can not sleep lying down so I was sleeping in one of the lounge chairs.  Rick decided after tucking me in that I needed something to cuddle so he gave me Marvin the Martian.

Tomorrow morning Rick will return thev rental car at 9 and we will be hitting the road home at about 10:00 am.We already had our route planned out and our over night camping arranged so it will be a matter of driving from point A to point B until we end up at home on October 13th. I hope to be able to update this page with our adventures each evening, but that will depend on a few different things, like access to wifi, how much driving we do in a day and what time we finish setting up camp. No worries, though. If I don't get to write about our adventures daily I will definitely get you caught up when we arrive home.

A Very Bad day

As Rick stated in his post on Facebook - on a f*cked up scale of 1-10 this day was a 13.  The morning started out fine. Rick went and picked up Dan and Connor so they could spend the day with us out at the trailer park. We had planned on a glamorous lunch of hamburgers and hotdogs. Nothing was too good for our boys!!  We picked up everything the day before except buns. So shortly after they arrived I left to get the buns. 

I should explain a little about where our trailer park was located. Grand Prairie is in the process of building a bi-pass around the town. Most large cities have them - a way to avoid going through the town when you are just passing through and thus avoiding all of the traffic. The -pass is called Highway 43X and is still being built. Our park was at the end of highway 43x, down township road 722. The bi-pass ends at 116th (Also known as Range road 63) and the 4 lane road changes to a two lane paved road and then a dirt road. We noticed early on that people have a tendency to not stop at the stop sign where 116th street meets 43X. On the map below the star represents the trailer park and the red circle is the intersection. 

So I leave to get the buns and, just before the intersection of 43X and 116th St. my speed limit changes to 110 km/h. However, knowing what that intersection is like, I did not increase my speed to the speed limit, but took my foot off the gas, reducing my speed from the 80 km/hr I was travelling. Sure enough, I see a white truck dash across the intersection, but h cleared it just before I entered. Then, suddenly, a big navy blue pick up was directly in front of me. probably less than 10 feet away. I knew I was going to hit it as there was no where for me to maneuver around. Things pretty much went in slow motion until I hit the truck. I did try to break by way to little to late to avoid a collision. 

Because it was a busy intersection there were people there right away. A gentleman came to my car right away and asked me if if was ok and then asked if I needed to call someone. He searched my purse which was on the floor of the passenger side to find my phone but I remembered I had left it on the charger back at the trailer, so he took out his phone and dialed my husband's number and then handed me the phone. When Rick answered he didn't recognize the number the call was coming from and told me I had the wrong number!! I yelled at him and he finally realized who was on the other end of the phone. He went to the trailer park office and some one brought him to the accident scene, talking to me the whole time. I still had the gentleman's phone long after Rick arrived and the fire department started to work on me. I think I finally gave it to one of the firemen when the EMS arrived but I am not sure. I really wish I could have thanked him. 

After being transported to the hospital, it was determined that I had a fractured right ankle (I should not have hit the brakes when I knew i could not stop) and the seat belt had damaged my chest muscles. I had burns on my neck from the air bag and my neck was cut where my seat belt was sitting over my necklace. 

Our last week was not going to be what we had planned. 

Local Adventures

Beaver Lodge is a small town just north of Grande Prairie. It's claim to fame is that it has the world's largest beaver.

Alberta is where all the dinosaurs hung out back in their day and there is a strong connection between the geology that produces oil and the geology that holds the dinosaur fossils.

Many of the towns in Alberta have Dinosaur museums and Grande Prairie is no exception. The museum is small, but very well done and informative.

Challenges

Although this first voyage with Meander has been very enjoyable and almost flawless, we have had a couple of challenges along the way. Now challenges can be either experience makers or character builders. The two challenges we have gave us insight and experience.

First of all we discovered that Meander does not like it when her fluids dip below a certain level. For gas that level is at about a quarter of a tank. Any lower than that she will show her "Check Engine" light. She also does not like it if her oil supply drops. At All.

We had just filled up at the Michigan/Wisconsin border when, less that 30 kilometers down the road the engine light came on. Rick pulled into a rest stop and checked all of the fluids and discovered tht the oil was down about 1/3 of a liter. He topped it up and the light went off.

A check engine light is extremely stressful when you are driving a new to you vehicle. We will take Meander into a local dealership to have the oil changed and everything checked out before we start the long journey home.

The second experience was with our hot water. About a week ago I wanted to fill the sink to do my dishes and there was no water coming fro the hot water tap. Checked the cold water tap and it was fine. Weird!! After a day of internet research, it looked like it was the Check Valve from the hot wanter tank. Rick drained the Hot water tank and used the opportunity to also change out the zinc anode rod. (this keeps the tank from corroding) So back to the RV store and $60.00 later we had our replacement parts. It took less than 30 minutes and some interesting body contortions (because the water tank is not in a nicely reached area) to change out the valve and diode. Hot water again! Yeah!!

Tales from the Super Duper Pooper Man

One of the least pleasurable tasks around the RV is dumping the black water tank. We read a lot about doing it and found some really good tips & tricks on the web.

The RV came with a very short 5' hose that was likely original to the camper. It meant we had to get really close to the dump pipe and with not much practice it took a few attempts before we were within range.

The first stop at an RV store, Happy Trails RV. (not associated with our camp ground which is also named Happy Trails), We picked up a 10' hose. I had previously bought this device from eBay. It's called a Valterra F02-4350 Reverse RV Flush Valve.

What this device does is isolates your sewer hose and allows you to back flush your holding tank then after dumping the grey water rinse the hose with fresh water. No Stinkies! Although a bit pricey you might be able to find it online cheaper.  I paid $70 Cdn. I know, I know, way more than you wanted to know about poop in an RV! 😀😀😀