July 2016 – exitthecube.com

Back in the US of A

After being in Canada for over two weeks, many of those days being rainy days, we were ready to get back to the US of A. Before we left Canada we were able to meet up with another Canadian friend we met on the 2011 Tour de France trip who we have kept in touch with. He was on his way to an awesome backpacking trip in British Columbia so we met up in Banff which was great. On our way out of Canada we stopped for an overnight in Claresholm, Alberta at a campground that was different from any that we have seen so far. This one was run by the small town itself. It is in a town park with grassy areas. They had flush toilets and showers. Great deal, a site with no hookups only $15 CAD which is about $11.70 USD. .

Campground in the background at Centennial Park in Claresholm, Alberta

We wanted to get to a US Interstate to make some time so we entered the US at the Port of Sweet Grass, Montana which dumps you out on I-15 south toward Great Falls, Montana with nothing in between. Once in Great Falls we found there is not much happening there besides Lewis and Clark. They came through the area back in 1805 and there is now a Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center there which tells the story of their expedition. It was interesting to us but a guy at the grocery store who grew up here said he heard about it all the time, so he has had it with Lewis and Clark. Walking and observing downtown Great Falls, it seems to be in a declining state, buildings are empty and we also walked by a guy trying steal a bicycle by cutting the cable so that left us with a bad impression. On the flip side they had a really nice walking path along the Missouri River and there was a beer festival going on which was really cool except the price was too steep for us, $25 per person for two tastings, and then you pay more for additional tastings and there was only one hour left when we got there so we declined. Several Montana breweries were represented and there was some live music.

Empty building on Main Street in Great Falls

Path along the Missouri River in Great Falls

Once we were back in the US, it hit us, we can go anywhere we want to. And what the heck are we doing in Montana anyway? Eastern Montana is endless prairie and there is actually a heat wave going on and temps are in the 90s, which is not good sleeping in a van weather. When we thought about it, we had spent 20 nights in Montana both before and after Canada. How did this happen? This was not in any plan. Where should we go now? How are we going to get out of this hot zone? Montana is huge! It is the fourth largest state in the nation. We had no idea!

We still had our Out-of-State Resident Pass for the Montana State Parks that we bought at Big Arm on Flathead Lake several weeks ago so we decided to use it one more time at Lost Creek State Park near Anaconda. It was very quiet there and they have some nice waterfalls and a hiking trail and it was a bit cooler than the city. Then on to Bozeman, Montana. Found a great place, Suds ‘n Duds, where you can do your laundry, wash your RV and wash your dog all in one place. No dog, but we were able to use the other services. Seems like a much nicer town than Great Falls but we did not spend much time there because it was too hot!

Lost Creek State Park, Anaconda, Montana

RV Wash at Suds n Duds, Bozeman

Laundromat at Suds n Duds, Bozeman

There is a heat wave going on across the plains and temperatures are high. The Black Hills of South Dakota looks like a small pocket of cooler weather so that is our next destination. On the way out of Montana we stop at the Little Bighorn Battlefield which Tim is much more interested in than I am. History was never my strong suit. But of course when you go to the actual place where something happened it gets a bit more interesting. It is a national monument so we were able to use our national parks annual pass to get in for free, normally a $20 entrance fee. There were quite a few people there. I am seeing a trend at the national parks where Native Americans are being represented more, sharing their culture and heritage and getting recognition for their accomplishments. I especially liked this quote on the wall here from Crazy Horse: “We did not ask you white men to come here. The Great Spirit gave us this country as a home. You had yours. We did not interfere with you. We do not want your civilization!”

I liked this quote from Crazy Horse

Also of note is a rest area in Wright, Wyoming. They had a free dump station which we used, a little pond with a walkway, and a HORSE exercise area!

Walking Path at Rest Area

Horse Exercise Area at Rest Stop

Banff and Jasper

Lots of rain in Banff. Day after day of rain. And lots of rainbows.

One memorable thing about Banff is that I was able to get my hair colored and cut. I let it go quite a bit longer than my normal 5 weeks, so I was anxious to get it done. Back home I had the same hairdresser for years. Over the years she had dialed in the correct color for my hair. When we were planning on hitting the road indefinitely I asked her how I could keep my hair looking good while we are on the road. She had some experience with this situation because many of her clients are snow birds and spend their summers elsewhere. She was nice enough to write down the formula that she uses to color my hair, brand name, numbers and amounts. Since the brand was Redken, I went to the Redken website and they have a salon finder where you can search locations and what services are offered there. As much as I think it is strange to have a town in the middle of a national park, I was happy to find some salons right in Banff listed on the Redken site. One website even said they use Redken color so I picked that one, The Albion Room. I was sure to make an appointment a couple days ahead of time. Everything worked out great. The girl said she can just follow the same formula, no problem. Looked good and then she gave me a great cut as well. As time is going by, I start wondering to myself, how much is this going to cost me? To add to my great experience it turned out to be much less than when I get my hair done in Scottsdale. I was shocked!

On the topic of the town in the middle of the National Park, a guy at the hair salon said they do have lots of building restrictions in Banff because they are in the national park. More interestingly, he said to live in Banff you have to work in Banff, so this limits the number of people living here. The locals also had no idea why it has been raining every day in July, it is very unusual!

For those of you that have told us how beautiful Lake Louise is and that we just have to go there, this is what I saw…

And as far as the Icefields Parkway, one of the most beautiful drives in the world, here is what it looked like to me…

I guess it could have been worse, at least we were not on bikes, like these people…

Jasper National Park which is north of Banff is forecasted to have better weather so we head that way hoping for some relief from the rain. With our “no reservation policy” we stop at each first-come first- serve campground along the way on the Icefields Parkway but there are no sites available at any of them. When we get closer to the town of Jasper the reservable campgrounds all have signs saying “FULL”. We get to the Whistlers campground which is very close to town of Jasper and has 781 sites, surely they must have something for us. No sites available there, however they will gladly take our $15 if we want to go park out in a field with an outhouse 21 km up the road. Desperate at this point, we take it. When we first get there it is not too bad, not that many people, outhouses are clean enough. As the hours go by more and more RVs show up, things start getting crowded. One good thing is there are no fires allowed in the field. By 6:00 am the next morning the outhouse stinks and I am chomping at the bit to get the heck out of there. I had visions of the hurricane Katrina victims in New Orleans in the Superdome. I just can’t believe that there are so many people camping in Jasper that they have to push hundreds out to this “overflow” area. We show up back at Whistlers Campground before 9:00 am the next morning and get a site for the next two nights. I feel much better at a “real” campground.

The Canadian camping tourists are expert fire builders. It seems they can get a roaring fire going at will, any time of day, any weather, rain or not. Time for a meal, time for a roaring fire. There are huge wood piles in the campground. If you want a fire, you have to pay extra, around $8 / night, but you can then drive over to the huge wood pile, which has been in the mud as far as I have seen, soaking the rain, and get as much wood as you can put in your truck, bring it back to your site and burn it until 11:00 PM at night. There is an 11:00 PM curfew for fires and alcohol.

As for the weather situation, it has not improved. More rain in Jasper. Outside the Jasper Brewery they had this sign: Rain rain go away, come and have a drink today. We did just that.

Thinking the weather was clearing we head out to check out Maligne Canyon and Maligne Lake. There are supposed to be some trails out there. Walking around the canyon, seeing the waterfalls, it is raining like crazy and of course everything is very muddy. Well that just wore us down. We never made it to the lake and headed back to the brewery to console ourselves.

A couple bright stars in Jasper:

Since it is a functioning town, people do live here. We walked by this community garden. I am assuming each person has their own space they take care of. They were growing lots of lettuces, chard, kale. It all looked great.

On the way out of Jasper we finally saw some mountain goats up close, right next to the highway. We have been looking for them since Glacier National Park and have only seen one very far away until now!

Calgary and Banff

After being without internet for weeks at our campgrounds in Glacier, Waterton and Dinosaur Park we were yearning for some city services. We headed for Calgary which is the biggest town around here. It is kind of hard to camp in a city so the thought of staying at a hotel with wifi and unlimited showers was very appealing. When you see the Canadian prices, things seem quite expensive compared to what we are used to in Phoenix. However, you have to take into account the conversion rate which is in our favor at the moment, you can get $1 CAD for $.77 USD. So a hotel for $200 CAD is really about $154 USD, not as bad. Unbeknownst to us, the Calgary Stampede was going on, which is a big deal in these parts, so I am sure that raised the hotel rates as well. The Calgary Stampede, also known as the “The Greatest Outdoor Show on Earth” is a 10 day event featuring a huge rodeo, parade, concerts and exhibitions. In the end Tim got us a deal by the airport for $107 USD, but that is equal to about 5 nights in a campground! It sure was nice to have some indoor luxuries. When we are in the city we long for the calmness of the wilderness and when we are in the wilderness we long for the availability of services in the city.

While in Calgary we were able to get together with a friend that we met on our Tour de France trip back in 2011 and his wife who live in the area. It was great to get a glimpse into their lives here and to share our crazy van life with them. Another highlight in Calgary was the Calgary Farmers Market. Lots of fresh produce and natural products. A lot of the produce we saw was grown in British Columbia, not too far away. There were lots of delicious berries – blueberries, strawberries, raspberries and blackberries, yum!

Moving west from Calgary toward Banff we have a quick overnight stay at a provincial park campground near the highway. Very few campers there. The next day we head to Banff. This part of the trip was planned back in January when we knew nothing about van life. We heard Banff was really crowded so we made the camping reservations for a random week in July and now it just so happens rain is forcasted all week here. We do have flush toilets and showers in our campground and there is local transit into the town of Banff. Like Waterton there is a town in the middle of the National Park. It seems strange to us with our experience of US National parks which are more rustic, less commercialized. Here in Banff they are trying to sell something at every turn like hotels and tours. The park service employees are working side by side with the commercial employees. The availability of restaurants is not good for our eating-out addiction!

Our first full day in Banff we were lucky and had very little rain. We left our campground on foot following the Hoo Doo – Bow Falls trail along the river down toward town. We did not bring the bear spray and there were some sections where there were no people so I started getting nervous about bears! Especially since we saw a carcass that had been picked clean, may have been a deer, on another trail near our campground the night before. We also hiked Tunnel Mountain Summit which is a short steep trail that starts in town. The trails are integrated into the town, not what I expected, although I am sure there are many trails in the backcountry as well. At the top of Tunnel Mountain we found the red chairs. Canadian National Parks have these red chairs placed in special locations to encourage visitors to stop and take in the view.

Carcass near our campground

Bow River

Trail sign in town

Tunnel Mountain Summit trail

Tunnel Mountain Summit

Easing Into Canada

We had mixed information about what we could or could not bring into Canada. From what we read it seems like they can change the rules at any time depending on current issues. I was most concerned about food, fresh fruits and vegetables to be specific. I didn’t want to buy a lot of food just to have it confiscated at the border. So we were very light on fresh produce at the border and as it turned out, it didn’t take us long to get across. We had to show our passports of course and the guy just asked us about alcohol, fire arms and weapons. We told him about our 5 cans of Montana beer and our one can of bear spray and he sent us on our way.

There is a Canadian National Park, Waterton Lakes, which is right over the border from Glacier National Park. This is an easy place for us to stop that does not require a lot of driving so we decide to check it out. Since we are planning on going to other Canadian National Parks we decide to get the Discovery Pass, which gets you into all Canadian National Parks for two years. Normally it is for one year, however as part of the 150^th anniversary of the Canadian Confederation in 2017, they are extended the pass for two years. The pricing structure in the Canadian National Parks is different than the US Parks. If you do not have an annual pass there is a fee that is charged DAILY. In the U.S. the entrance fee is good for an entire week. It was more cost effective for us to get the Canadian annual pass.

We head for the first come first serve campground at Waterton which is Crandell Mountain Campground, and we had no problem getting a site. Something else that seems different at the Canadian park is there is a town right in the park, the town of Waterton. It is kind of nice because there are services available, restaurants and laundromat, however there is only one store with groceries which was fairly limited on fresh fruits and vegetables but we were able to get strawberries, bananas and potatoes but had to go with frozen green beans. The deer like to hang out in town here. We saw them sitting on lawns just like a dog would. They must know they are safe here. We even saw a mom with her two fawns, so cute.

Deer sitting in someone’s yard in Waterton

The highlight at Waterton was definitely seeing a bear crossing the road right in our campground! We were driving on our way out of camp to head into town. From what we learned at Glacier, I believe he/she was a black bear that was blond in color. Black bears can be any color and grizzly bears can be any color.

We hiked up the hill called Bear’s Hump to get a view of the town of Waterton and the lake below.

We also went to the evening program at our campground which was about cougars. This one was actually inside a structure whereas the campground evening programs we have been to in the US were always outside. The Canadian interpreters are young adults and the programs are very kid/family oriented. In the US, the interpretive rangers we met were older people with years of experience in the parks.

Turned off by the rainy forecast in the Canadian Rockies we decide to head for the Canadian Badlands of south eastern Alberta. The landscape is barren and exposed and the sun should be shining, more of what we are used to from our desert dwelling past. On our way out there we see endless fields of bright yellow flowers. A quick internet search determines they are growing canola on the prairies here east of Calgary.

When I hear the term “badlands” I just think of South Dakota because they have the Badlands National Park. This prompts the question, what does “badlands” even mean? At the Dinosaur Provincial Park near Brooks, Alberta they think the term badlands came from the early explorers because it was hard land to cross with no water or animals. Dinosaur Provincial Park is a hotbed for dinosaur fossils. The park is also very family oriented with a play area for the kids in the campground. Tourists are only allowed to go on certain interpretive trails unescorted and you have to pay for escorted tours if you want to go elsewhere in the preserve. This may be about protecting the fossils.

After weeks of very slow to non-existent internet service, we are due for some city services. Calgary here we come!

Month End Numbers

This deer was wondering around the campground at Waterton Lakes National Park not afraid of anything, cute eh? Now that I have your attention… a dry topic – month end numbers.

As the month of June comes to a close I would like to share some of the things I have been tracking. Since we left Phoenix on June 5^th we have been on the road for 26 days, not a full month but it is easiest to track by the calendar month so I am just going with that.

States Visited: 5

Arizona

Utah

Nevada

Idaho

Montana

Types of Campgrounds:

National Forest: 3

National Park: 2

State Park: 1

Private: 2

BLM: 1

Average Campsite Cost: $22.46

Cheapest Campsite: $10 (BLM)

Most Expensive Campsite: $44 (Missoula KOA)

Miles Traveled: 1,669

When we were planning this new lifestyle we kept looking on the internet for expense reports from other people with this lifestyle to see if we could estimate what our own costs would be. There is not a lot of information out there. One big area that was lacking was health insurance costs. The laws and rules on health insurance are constantly changing so there was a lot of outdated information out there. Like pre-retirement age people saying they are only paying only a couple hundred dollars a month for individual health insurance because they are healthy. Yeah right, that does not exist in today’s environment but apparently it did before the Affordable Care Act. Health Insurance is a huge topic for another time. We decided to go with COBRA from our jobs for the remainder of 2016 and reevaluate for 2017.

As I get older I am more comfortable sharing financial information. It is everyone’s personal choice on what type of lifestyle they want to live and everything costs a certain amount, it is just a fact of life. We have tracked every dollar spent since we have been on the road, and this is what we have learned so far:

We are still addicted to eating out
If you need to cut down on your data usage for a month, go somewhere where there is no cell phone service
If you need to cut down on your fuel cost, find a nice spot and stay there
Health Insurance is our biggest expense, a huge fee for nothing. We don’t even use it.

Here is another pretty picture for you from the Canadian Badlands, more on that later.

Glacier National Park, Part 2: Two Medicine is Just What the Doctor Ordered

The more I talk to people on their vacations, something becomes very apparent. Everyone is talking about how many days they have left and how they are trying to fit in as much as possible in their remaining days. Everyone is on a time table. I know this is the way things work, but then they ask how long we are staying and I don’t really have a definite answer for them because I am not really sure. Eventually I explain to them that we are out here indefinitely, as long as we like it and as long as we can make things work out financially. Then they are really interested!

At our jobs everything was focused on deadlines and I guess in everyday life we all have deadlines. Whether it is determined by upcoming events, weather patterns, business hours, family members, chores that need to be done. We have decided to try and take a break from deadlines. We are going to try to have a “no reservation” policy from here on out. That being said we do have some camping reservations in place already in popular parks in July and October which we will keep. The reservations just put pressure on us to be somewhere on a certain date, and many times there is a reservation fee which you do not pay if you just show up. This has worked for us here at Two Medicine on the east side of Glacier National Park. We were able to get a campsite and also a boat/hike tour without reservations even though it says you should make them. This is working for the time being but it is still early in the season up here and there are two holidays coming up, Canada Day July 1^st and of course the 4^th of July for the Americans. We hadn’t even considered the July 1^st holiday until some Canadians mentioned it to us. We are very close to the Canadian border and we are planning on heading to the Great White North very soon. We are trying to plot a plan so at the very least we have a place to stay during this holiday period and we would like to avoid crowds, but I am not sure that is possible.

We are in a part of the park called Two Medicine. The Blackfeet Indians inhabited this area before the white man came in and took over. The Blackfeet Indian reservation now borders the east side of the park. The story of the name “Two Medicine” is from the Blackfeet. It is something about a Blackfeet tradition of the young men fasting in a medicine lodge for four days. Two women were sent out to find a place for the medicine lodge and they each came back with a different location on either side of the valley. Both locations were used so there were “two medicine lodges”, so that is what they called this area. It has been shortened over the years to “Two Medicine”.

This area is quieter than other locations in the park, there are beautiful views, wildflowers, wildlife, hiking trails, lakes and rivers. The only drawback is no cell phone or internet service. I suppose this could be considered a positive for some people, forcing you to unplug from technology, however I cannot help but consider it a negative. There is service about 5 miles away in East Glacier Park. They do have a lot of bears here, both grizzly and black bears, and the park service recommends carrying bear spray when you are out hiking or biking… lots of talk about bears. Now I am not only afraid of being attacked by a bear but I am also afraid if I were in a situation where I tried to use bear spray I would injure myself with it and not the bear. They tell you to make noise when you are on the trail, which I knew, and hike in numbers. In order to avoid the whole bear spray situation we have gone on ranger led hikes with a group of people. We also learned about the wildflowers, medicinal plants, birds, animals, a bit of geology (not my favorite) and some stories of the Blackfeet. The interpretive rangers here are very good at what they do.

Ranger-led group hike

Ranger Kelly

Beargrass – bears don’t eat it, mountain goats do!

We went into a busier part of the park, St Mary which is about an hour from Two Medicine, for a red bus tour up the Going to the Sun Rd. It was a three hour tour to Logan Pass and back. We wish we had more time at Logan Pass, we were only allowed 15 minutes! There is a vehicle length restriction of 21 feet on the Going to the Sun Rd and our van is too long. There is a free shuttle bus that goes up there but it doesn’t start until July 1^st. We saw some wildlife on the tour, an elk, a herd of big horn sheep sitting on the snow, and the highlight was a black bear crossing the road! Finally, I see a bear and in a safe environment as well.

As the holidays approach things start getting a little crazy in our campground. The campground has a “FULL” sign every night. People are driving through looking for spots, getting frustrated and desperate. There are several law enforcement rangers here driving through as well. There was a bit of excitement at the campsite across the way from us. As far as we can tell the people were fined for a food storage violation. The rules state that you can only have food or garbage outside when you are actually there. When you leave your campsite, food is either in the provided bear locker or in your hard sided vehicle and garbage in the bear proof dumpster. An interesting tidbit we picked up from a ranger, he said Yellowstone’s bears are now trained to break into minivans because they know there is leftover crumbs and food from kids in there. He said the bears here have not learned that. We are apprehensive about heading into Canada during the holiday weekend so we decide to stay in Two Medicine over the holidays and hope that it can’t get too crazy here since the campground is limited to a certain number of sites, but all bets are off for the day-use crowds. Since this campground is first-come first-serve if you already occupy a site you can renew it first thing in the morning and just stay. I believe the limit is 14 days in the park.

Bears, bears, bears. Since we are staying longer in Two Medicine we figure we have to bite the bullet and buy some bear spray and carry it with us so we can go off hiking on our own. The bear spray is $41 and now that we have it we have to worry about where we are storing it and what to do with it when we are done. Instructions say if the can is empty you can throw it away but if it is partially full you have to take it to some type of recycling place, great. Also we are not really clear on transporting it over the Canadian border, one thing we read said you cannot, but a ranger here told us it is ok. Hopefully we can just bring it, because there are even more bears up there!

Tim agreed to attach the bear spray to his belt and we head out on what turned out to be a 10 mile hike to Rockwell Falls and around Two Medicine Lake. There was one section that was especially scary because there was a sign about a bear frequenting the area and the brush in that area was very tall with a narrow path. Ranger Pat says he likes to hike in Grizzly country because he has a heightened sense of awareness and is constantly taking in all the beautiful sights and sounds. When we were hiking, anytime there were no other people on the trail we were just yelling out to the bears. I guess it worked because we did not see any.

We only found one place in town where we could get showers and do laundry. Showers were $5 unlimited time and they give you a towel. There were 6 washers and 7 dryers and a constant stream of people in the laundry area with no room to do anything. But it is our only choice so we will be going back for a second round before we leave here. Campground has a free dump station and you can fill your fresh water tank there as well. We went to the town of Browning which is on the Indian Reservation, to get our mail and groceries. There was an IGA there but not what we are used to for groceries. No organic food and lots of processed foods but it is our only choice so pesticide laden blueberries and factory bread it is. Since it is on the reservation there were lots of dogs just wandering around off leash. I have seen this before, dogs wandering in the parking lot of Scottsdale Community College which is on the reservation and most memorably in the town of Supai at the bottom of Havasu Canyon. Backpacking there with friends years ago there were lots of dogs hanging around the camping area. They had learned to let the visitors pet them knowing they will get some food scraps.

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