Travel Update 22

We started out this week in southeastern New Mexico after having just visited Guadalupe Mountains and Carlsbad Caverns. From there, our next stop was White Sands National Park. We spent most of a day in Alamogordo, getting Aiden some exercise after a long day and a half of driving.

We decided to only stay in White Sands for one day since it started raining. That night it rained a lot and it started leaking in through the front window of the sleeping area. The bottom of the mattress was soaked that morning. Luckily the next few days would be pretty dry and warm. We stopped at a campground in the Gila National Forest where we decided to do some early spring cleaning. We took a full day to get all the bedding out, clean the dried over-the-cab area, reorganize some cupboards, sweep the whole RV, and most importantly caulk around the front window where we thought the water was most likely getting in.

The drive, both to and from the the campground, was the most picturesque we've seen since leaving Idaho back in October. It felt so good to be in actual mountains again. We even saw some old snow on the side of the road.

As we descended to the Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument, we started noticing a funny smell and shortly after saw some smoke coming up from the front tires. Turns out we had been going downhill for quite some time and Andreas had been on the breaks for most of it. The breaks were overheating. We were able to pull off the road and let the breaks cool down a bit before deciding it was best to get to the monument, where they would at least have a phone if we needed to call Good Sam (our roadside assistance). We drove there incredibly slowly, using our breaks as infrequently as possible, shifting gears to slow down, which we should have done from the start and a good lesson for our upcoming mountain driving.



Luckily there was no noise or grinding when the breaks were smoking, so we are very sure they just overheated and needed a break. The next morning the smell was pretty much all gone, only noticeable on the sweatshirt Andreas wore to get the video. We still took it slow, but the breaks worked fine while driving the next day with no issues. We'll get them looked at the next time we find a place that will do a free break inspection on our vehicle, but we're confident in their functionality.

We ended the week by driving Tucson, AZ. Here we'll be heading to Saguaro National Park and catching up with some friends and family in the area!

A New Fuel Tank

Hey everyone, we know we're a bit behind on the blog. We spent Christmas with family in Austin, TX and took that time off from writing to enjoy as much as we could. We're still planning on writing about our experiences from the Everglades to Austin and will be pre-dating those posts when we get them up. For now, we're on our way to Atlanta! We're currently in Monroe, LA and are safe and everything is well. We also have an exiting new experience since Christmas to share.

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We left Austin in the afternoon on December 30th. Not wanting to go too far that night we stopped near Temple. We were committed to catching up on our blog, spending a couple hours per day at a library during our drive towards Atlanta.

On our second day, after making it the library for a couple of hours of blog work, we made sure to stock up on sauerkraut -- sauerkraut is a tradition for Andreas's family on New Years Day -- but were too tired for a festive night. We decided to call it a day in Brushie Prairie park, in Frost, TX.

In the morning we woke up to a bit of a problem; our gas tank was leaking. After calling Good Sam, they advised us to call the fire department as a dripping gas tank can be a fire hazard. They also told us given that it was New Years Day, very few places, if any, that would be open and able to work on our vehicle.

Fuel tank dripping slowly

The local volunteer fire department showed up at the park we were staying at and was able to patch up the hole with a bar of soap. They strongly advised against driving it as the soap is a very temporary fix. So, there we were, in rural Texas, in need of a fuel tank and no mechanics working on New Years nearby with the volunteer fire department of Navarro Falls: Darren, the fire chief and Joanne and Tom, an older couple who lived close by. Then, almost out of the blue, Joanne offered to put us up for as long as we needed to get someone to come out and fix the tank. She said she wouldn't want us staying there with a gas tank that could start re-leaking and in the cold. Before we knew it, Kathleen put the kids in Joanne's car and Andreas got in Tom's truck and we all drove to their house, just a few blocks down the road. On the ride over, she asked Kathleen if we liked sauerkraut. Apparently, sauerkraut was also a New Years tradition for her and she had gotten way too much for just the two of them.

  

The ceramic shed and our home for the week.

When we arrived, Joanne pulled out an air cot and some blankets and set them up in her ceramics shed. She gave us a space heater and told us to make ourselves comfortable. Just as we were settling in, they received another emergency call, their third of the day.

In the evening we ate sauerkraut, mashed potatoes and pork chops and were thankful to be in a warm home. We may have been strangers to them, but they were kind and welcoming. We met their dogs: Sammie, a super friendly Dachshund, and Duke and Duchess, two very shy Great Pyrenees mixes. We learned that Tom was a long-time trucker with over 3 million miles of accident free driving, who loved fixing things. Joanne works as a caregiver and is very active in her community. Luckily for us, they even had ESPN so we were able to watch the Rose Bowl!

Rose Bowl in the ceramics shed

After the game, Andreas and Tom discussed whether they could replace the tank themselves. The hardest parts would be making sure we found the right tank and getting most the gas we had in the old one there out before trying to lowering it.

The next day, Andreas decided to drive the RV the short distance to the house. After not hearing back from Good Sam, the idea of fixing it without a shop seemed more appealing, mostly because it would save on repair costs. After raising up the RV onto a jack stand, taking a bunch of pictures underneath,  measuring out the tank, and a lot of searching around online we went ahead and ordered one. Unfortunately, it wouldn't be there until Monday, the 6th. In the mean time, Andreas and Tom were able to remove the old fuel tank after draining most of the gas through a fuel line that used to be hooked up to a generator. 

In the next few days we got to experience life in rural Texas as well as hang out in our cosy shed. Tom and Joanne completely opened their house to us, telling us to help ourselves to anything in the fridge and having us over for dinner every night. On Sunday we went with them up to church, including the Christmas party after the service. The church community was very small, with about six adults and six kids.

At the party afterwards everyone was very friendly and welcoming. There was a potluck lunch with tuna casserole, ham and cheese sandwiches, hot dog pieces in BBQ sauce and Joanne's bean and bacon soup. As well as a million desserts. After eating we took part in a white elephant gift exchange (in which we got a new lantern and a five gallon bucket organizer) and a fun game involving trying to unwrap a present with oven mitts on. We won that game and won some candy and a Walmart gift card. We were also gifted a "Survival Kit" with a mini bible and some religious books. When you add to that the knitted blanket that Joanne insisted that we take, we left pretty loaded. Not to mention the free housing and days of food that they wouldn't let us pay them for.

 

Aside from one awkward evening in which we were trying our hardest not get drawn into a political conversation on topics ranging from Trump to global warming, we got along with them very well.

The new fuel tank didn’t show up until 8pm on Monday night. By that time, Tom had already left for work for the week and we’d have to get the new one installed by ourselves the next day. It turned out to be quite simple in principle, but not trivial physically. We removed the old sending unit (fuel gauge floater) and fuel pump from the old tank and wiggled them into place in the new one, using the new gaskets provided with the new tank. The most challenging bit was lifting up the fuel tank into a position where we could secure it to the frame of the vehicle. Once we get the bolts in, but before tightening them, we used the pictures we took before to make sure everything got connected up the right way. 

Once everything was hooked up and tightened, we got it to start after a few tries of just hearing the engine crank. To our surprise, we had no leaks at all! Everything was in and tightened up properly. Our repair bill ended up only being around $100 - the cost of the tank. It could have easily been many times that amount when you include labor. We’ve been checking for leaks at every gas station since, but haven’t found a drop! Needless to say, we’ll be keeping an eye on it a bit longer before feeling fully comfortable with it. 

With the fuel tank back in order, we loaded up the RV and got ready to leave. We were seen off by Joanne who was sad to see us go. 

We feel so incredibly fortunate that we broke down where we did and that we were welcomed and supported by strangers who housed us and fed us, wanting nothing besides that we pay it forward the next time we see someone in need of help.

Post-Christmas In Austin

The fun in Austin didn't stop after the holiday was over! Aunt Julie still had plenty of great activity for us.

December 26th we used an App called Let's Roam to do a scavenger hunt around Austin. The app designs fun scavenger hunts in cities all around the world that they send to your phone. You then walk around the city looking for landmarks and answering questions. It is a great way to learn about a city and give your wandering purpose. We also discovered that they have fun little quests in app that you can use to win a free scavenger hunt. We did a few and won a free hunt so we're looking forward to doing another one soon! (We're not sponsored by this company, but if they feel the need to hire us, we'd be happy to be!)

For dinner we went to the a local BBQ place near the house, Salt Lick. It was absolutely incredible! Luckily we won some of their rub in the Christmas Eve Texas Hold 'Em tournament. We can't wait to try it.

On the 27th John flew back to Eugene, Aubrie and Uncle Chuck had to work, and Ben P had to study for a test he had coming up. Andreas used this day to work on issues with the RV. The RV had been having trouble starting when it was warm and we decided that we needed to replace the fuel filter. Andreas made an attempt at this before Christmas but unfortunately it was leaking so he found a mobile mechanic to come to the house and take a look it. Annoyingly when the mechanic got there he wasn't allowed to work on it because it was an RV, even though the fuel filter is the same as in a Toyota pickup truck. Luckily he did leave Andreas with the part he needed to stop the leak and we got our money refunded. So maybe this was a good thing?

The other issue we had been having was that the RV was making a terrifying rushing air noise when it was getting up to speed. We thought that this had to do with the climate control because the issue seemed to be worse on cold mornings when we had the AC on to de-fog the window. However we noticed in Texas that while the noise was happening the speedometer was vibrating almost as if it was getting blown. After some searching online, and talking to Andreas's mechanically inclined friends, we came to the conclusion that we needed to grease the speedometer cable. This seems to have helped the problem but not gotten rid of it entirely.

Disassembling the dash on the RV

Instrument panel removed to reach speedometer cable

The rest of the crew went up to explore Waco that day. In Waco we walked around Baylor University and then went over to check out Magnolia. Magnolia is the brand of Chip and Joanna Gaines who have the show "Fixer Upper." They have a massive store in Waco including a coffee shop and bakery and a courtyard full of food trucks. It was super crowded which was interesting because the rest of Waco seemed a little dead.

 

On the 27th we did an escape room. Kathleen was a little nervous about the escape room because the last time she did one it was unexpectedly horror themed. That time the room was dark and involved dismembered bodies and live actors rattling cages. This one, however, was fully lit and set in a mountain cabin. We needed to figure out where we were located on a map, how to reach a rescue crew and get ourselves out of the cabin to be rescued before a blizzard took place. We made it out just in time and it was a lot of fun. 

The next two days we continued relaxing and enjoying having a house to hang out in. We deep cleaned the RV, did all of our laundry again and took a final couple of showers. We eventually took off on the 30th after 11 very fun, relaxing days with family. 

Travel Update 7

One the things we wanted to see while driving through Connecticut was UConn. Located in Stores, it's a small college town with virtually nothing but the university.  Our plan was to put on our Duck stuff and walk around campus, but like most college campuses parking is not easy to find. It was also super rainy and gross. So we settled for driving through campus and taking pictures of the basketball arena. We're super ready for basketball season.

That night is Hartford, we mixed it up and instead of staying at a Walmart we stayed at our first Cabela's. We had been a Cabela's before but this one was something else entirely. We probably spent about two hours exploring the store. They have an aquarium! 

We also swung back through Pennsylvania to try to find the stickers that we lost in Travel Update 6. Unfortunately, even though we found our spot we couldn't find the stickers. Either they stayed on the bike rack longer than we thought or someone picked them up thinking they were trash. We're still bummed about their disappearance but we put the new ones up. 

For those of you keeping track of our RV maintenance we also had to replace the car battery. For some reason it kept popping open and leaked a bit of acid. It wasn't fixable, so it needed to be replaced.

In case you missed it, this time period also includes our trips to Salem, Plymouth, Cape Cod, Rhode Island, and Gettysburg but we decided that those all warranted their own posts. 

Fuel pump and M.A.G. towing

After visiting Assateague Island, our plan was to go to Salisbury for the night. We'd sent our first Amazon purchase while on the road to a locker there for pickup. That plan changed when the gas pedal all of the sudden stopped working. So, we did what we always do: call Goodsam. They wanted to send out a mobile mechanic. A state trooper stopped by while they were looking to make sure everything was okay. Goodsam failed to find a mobile mechanic and eventually failed to find a place that would tow us. Since we indicated that we were safe, they asked if we could spend the night where we were. I probably should have said no, because at 10 PM another trooper came by and told us we needed to call a tow company. Apparently after checking with dispatch, he changed his mind and we spent the night on the side of the road. Not the best sleep ever. 

The RV, at night, on the side of the road on MD 367.

In the morning we finally got our mechanic. He was pretty sure we needed a new fuel pump which would involve a tow to the shop. After calling GoodSam again to get towing covered, we were prepared to be spending a few days at their shop in Roxana, DE. 

 

Roxana is a tiny, tiny place. We’re not even sure that there is really a town there. We looked to see if we could find motels in the area and couldn’t find anything. Although our biggest worry was how would we catch the Oregon Ducks game. Given that there wasn’t a sports bar in the area either… 

 

Joe, the tow truck driver and mechanic worked his butt off for us to make sure we wouldn’t have to worry. He worked hard and made sure we were comfortable. He got a new fuel pump rush delivered, installed it, and epoxied a tiny crack in our fuel tank by 7 PM that same night. 

While he worked, we spent the day in the backyard of the house on the same property as the shop. They had a “bar” room that had a bathroom with its own shower they said we could use. When he was done, Joe offered that we spend the night in the lot since it was dark. We took him up on the offer as we felt comfortable there. Now we're sitting in the Wicomico County library in Salisbury thinking about how lucky we've been with the friendly people who have helped us.

Travel Update 5

Our second week of hurrying quickly across the country we didn't make any particularly interesting stops. However, we did stay at some really nice campgrounds. We wanted to do a very short, photo filled, travel update to show off a couple of places.

Waverly Lake, Illinois was gorgeous. We got into camp fairly early and stayed to hang out for a while the next morning. We even made a morning campfire to cook up a deluxe potato breakfast.

  

 

This section had some beautiful scenery but we didn't do anything very exciting as we were driving pretty quickly to make it to DC.

We did have an exciting incident happen with the RV. A few hours after leaving Lane Farm campground, driving through West Virginia we heard a popping sound. Shortly thereafter another, quieter one. At this point the RV became tricky to control. When going around corners it would make another muffled little pop and the steering wheel would shift in such a way that I needed to hold it at a different angle to keep it going straight. Luckily we were close enough to a small town that had a mechanic. We had broken a bolt in the upper control arm on the passenger side. Dave, the mechanic in Harmon, SC, was able to get it stable to the point of driving safely, but we would need to go get it fixed properly and re-aligned. While he was working on it, we noticed something else had gone wrong. Somewhere in our travels that day, we had lost our spare tire!

 

We got our RV fixed up at SOS repair in Winchester, VA the next day and continue on our way to D.C

Travel Update 3

We took off to Wrangell - St.Elias National Park from Anchorage on the Glenn Highway. This highway was absolutely stunning. The drive is a little bit tough at first because it can be a little narrow and winding, but the views and lakes are absolutely worth it. 

When you get towards the end near Glennallen, the Wrangell mountains come into view for a spectacular finish to the road as well.

 

After spending some time in Wrangell - St. Elias National Park (see our park post), it was time to start thinking about heading back down to the lower 48 but we were just 80 miles from Valdez and heard that the trip was well worth it. So we took the detour. The trip was truly spectacular. The mountains were so young and jagged that you could still see the sheering of rock from when the plates pushed that piece of rock up out of the ground. There are also a whole variety of different waterfalls. 

 

Just as we were about to get into Valdez, our second tire blew. This time it was the inner tire on the back, passenger side (the previous one was the outer tire of that pair). We took the outer tire off to see the damage and we at first thought that a metal bracket had come loose and punctured the tire. On further inspection, we decided the tire went first and the metal rods took the bracket out.

 

Lucky for us, this happened right across the street from a repair shop. We managed to cross the highway on the bad tire and spent the night in front of the shop. They got us a new spare and were  convinced that the beam that is now cut off did not actually support any of the structure of the vehicle or house. There is a structural cross beam right above where it came off. This was a secondary support that may help reduce the sway of the back panel but doesn’t hold any weight. I guess we’ll see…

With the fear of the possibility of losing our remaining 2 “older” tires (the front ones were newer than the back ones), we decided to head back to Fairbanks, to the place that actually had our tires, and buy more tires. Apparently our size of tire (14R 185C) is super rare, at least this far north. This drive took us up the Richardson Highway, which again had stunning views and several stops and informational signs about the Trans-Alaska pipeline which is used to pump crude oil from Prudhoe Bay all the way to Valdez.

We spent another couple nights at our favorite Walmart and were able to catch the Duck game against Montana at Lavelle’s Taphouse, before starting on our way back. We were once again successful at finding at least one duck. This time the man working at the food cart outside the tap house was wearing a duck hat and watching the game on his tablet. It turns out his son is a senior walk-on cornerback who plays mostly on special teams. It was fun to chat with him a little. 

Duck football at Lavelle's Taphouse

September 15th is officially the day that winter tires are allowed in Alaska so we decided that it was  about time to start heading south. That and we have a wedding to attend in two weeks down in Oregon and we want to see some things on the way south. So next up, we’ll be heading back into Canada. 

Expense Report: August

Some of you showed some interest in how much it costs to live traveling around the country, so we’re going to write a monthly recap of how much we spent and provide a little bit of info on how we feel we did in terms of spending. These will include things like how many times we payed for a campsite, if we had any unnecessarily spendy meals, etc. We are trying to find a good balance of living cheaply while still doing a some fun things because this is our honeymoon. We’ve broken it down into a few major categories. 

The RV and upgrades - since this is the first expense report, we’ll include the cost of the RV and some early maintenance we had to do. 

We bought our 21 foot RV used from an individual, not a dealer. We found it through Craigslist while shopping around almost a year ago. After that we needed to do a few modernization upgrades.

Cost of RV: $14,000

Solar panels: $340

Stereo $438

Insurance - We got comprehensive coverage on the RV through National General, as well as a Full-Timer coverage which is like a homeowner's insurance for non-motor accidents. We also opted for a GoodSam membership, as well as a roadside assistance plan from them. The membership itself will save us money on gas and propane at Flying Js and on merchandise from Camping World. The roadside assistance will give us some peace of mind (that we already needed for the tire!) if something happens on the road. The reason we chose GoodSam over AAA is that they are very much an RV club. They tow unlimited miles if something happens and include things like medical airlift if we get hurt while out exploring nature (how neat is that?).

Insurance: $348 for a 1 year policy. RV insurance is surprisingly cheap!

GoodSam: $50 for 2 years.

Roadside: $379 for 2 years. 

Maintenance - We’ve had some bad luck on this early part of the trip, but we also put a ton of miles on the RV. We blew a tire, had some work on the steering, and had to replace a pulley, fan clutch and a different pulley bracket in the engine. We really hope this month won’t be representative of what’s to come. A lot of the problems seem to be an age of the engine problem. With over 200,000 miles on the RV, it’s bound to have some aging problems. Considering that a brand new RV about this size would have cost us over $30,000, we’re still doing quite well. 

Home Depot Spending: $135

Fan pulley bracket: $850

2 new tires: $180

Steering / alignment: $217

Fan clutch and crank pulley : $675

Transmission + steering fluid flushes: $305

Wipers: $30

All totaled, our RV + bigger maintenance has cost us $17,694

We have also done 2 High Milage oil changes: $170.

Our trip really started on the 12th of August, so for the remaining expenses we will just summing up since then. 

Fuel - This is going to be our biggest expense when driving a lot (like to Alaska). We’re keeping a Fuel log in a google sheet that we’ll have viewable to anyone. It has locations and gas prices as well so if you’re curious what gas costs in different places definitely check it out: Fuel Log. We converted the Canadian gas prices to their rough USD/gallon equivalent.

This month we drove 3174 miles and used 257.9 gallons of gas, for a fuel economy of 12.3 MPG. 

Gas: $911 - A lot of driving.

Propane: $7 - We only filled up once on propane in Bellingham (on the 12th) and as of writing this we are sitting just under 1/4 tank. We’re only using propane for cooking and the refrigerator. We haven’t needed the hot water heater (bucket showers / laundromats) and we tried turning on the furnace once but it made a scary wailing sound. Looks like we’ll be bundling up if it gets really cold. So far 4 bodies have kept the RV relatively comfortable, even through the Alaskan summer nights

Food: $405 - We did really well not eating out in the first part of our trip. We went to a few coffee shops and only ate out 2 to 3 times. The rest of it is groceries.

Pets: $95  - We had to refill pet food containers and get Aiden a new rabies shot to get through Canada. Both kids are up to date on their vaccinations.

Lodging: $20 - We only paid for a place to stay once since the 12th. That was at Chena Hot Springs

Entertainment: $115.50 - $85.50 of this came from our Denali bus trip into the park, the rest was Chena Hot Springs. 

Overall we think August and September will be two of our more expensive months, mostly because we are driving a lot, but also because all of the national parks here and harder to get into. But we are pretty pleased with how we have been doing so far. 

Travel Update 2

After flushing our water in New Hazelton on Friday, we eventually got back on our way. We drove until it got late and we eventually settled at a pullout on Eddontenajon Lake, just south of Iskut, BC. It was a gorgeous still lake. We met a couple there from Belgium who had been traveling for eight months, through Mexico, Guatemala, and now Canada. It was a really peaceful place to stay for the night.

We drove 317 miles that day.


On Saturday we stopped for breakfast at a Cafe in Iskut, but the cafe wasn't actually open. Just the convince store which we thought was the cafe. It was confusing. They didn’t know the password for the WiFi that was advertised on the side of the building, which was half of why we stopped but at that point we were committed. We also got a kick out of the fact that the convenience store was playing a country radio station from Spokane, WA over the internet.


As we continued, we were excited to make the transition from Highway 37 to the Alaskan Highway. Unfortunately, about 10 km from the junction, we heard a pop and pulled over. We had blown our first tire! The outside tire on the rear driver side was completely worn down and had split. We decided we could make it to the junction on the bad tire. When we got there we ended up just give GoodSam roadside a call. We had a jack and a spare but we didn't really trust our jack and weren't sure about how to jack up the back of the RV. They found someone in Watson Lake, YT for us to come out and put on our spare, which was nice because shortly after we got there it started raining. We got our tire changed out and followed the guy into Watson Lake for a new spare. On the drive to Watson Lake, the rain started turning to snow and we were thankful for the luck involved in where we blew the tire. Any further out and we may have needed to hitchhike our way to the closest payphone. We spent some time putzing around Watson Lake, which was a cute little town with one main street, trying to figure out why the tire blew and wondering about whether we’re causing uneven tire wear because of our load, or if we needed another tire to replace the one next to the one that blew out. Those two are the oldest tires we have from the receipts we received from Darlegne when we bought the vehicle. We decided to drive a little further to Moreley Lake, BC — the road dips back into BC for a bit going west. There we had to share a camp spot with a couple in a van who also had a dog that Aiden didn’t really get along with, so we did not get much of a chance to talk with them. We tallied 363 miles, including a 21 km detour each way to Watson Lake.


On Sunday, we set out to make Whitehorse, which we did pretty easily. Whitehorse is the capital of Yukon, with a population of about 25,000 people. It’s pretty clearly run on tourism and the RV parks have a pretty heavy influence on the politics there. Everywhere in town had a no camping or overnight parking sign. Even the Walmart enforced this no camping policy. The town itself was quite cute though. It’s right along the Yukon River and had a cute downtown area that reminded us a lot of Bend, OR. We ate at a bar called the Dirty Northern and were happy for some meaty burgers after a week of pasta or beans and rice. If it weren’t for the blistery winds, we may have payed up for a campground too, but we decided to push on. We bought a new jack in town and we wanted to replace the other tire that was getting low on tread the people in Watson Lake thought we would be fine until Fairbanks and all of the tire places were closed since it was Sunday. We settled at a pullout along the Alaskan Highway next to Marshall Creek. The long stop in Whitehorse means we only drive 227 miles.

Monday morning, as we were eating breakfast and getting ready for the day, an older gentleman, John, and his grandson showed up at the creek to try their luck at fishing the creek. Turns out John has a son who lives in Eugene, so we shared a short chat before they decided to try another fishing spot up the creek. He offered us a cup of coffee if we decided to come back that way and stop by their house just around the corner from where we stayed. Hopefully we'll get a chance to take him up on it. We headed out shortly after they did and made it to Haines Junction before our first stop. There we saw signs for the Village Bakery, which seemed like a quaint place to stop and have a bite to eat. We stopped and worked on the blog for a little bit before continuing on to Alaska! It was an adorable shop but unfortunately their internet was really poor.

We made the border in the early evening and got to add a new sticker to the RV map! At the border, we did unfortunately lose 5 oranges that we had bought at a Walmart along the road, but we did get a dog treat from the border guard, so Aiden came out on top on that one.

We drove a little bit further before stopping at the Tetlin National Wildlife Reserve campground for the night. It was another very peaceful and free site that had about 6 sites, a lake and a photography blind. It was a very peaceful night and a lovely morning walking to the blind and just watching the wildlife for about 20 minutes.

On Tuesday we woke up and drove another 277 miles to Fairbanks, which deserves a whole post of its own.