Chop Chop Billy Goat

After spending three wintry nights in Glacier National Park we decided to have a driving day and go up to Banff National Park up in Canada, with a stop at an Old Navy in Calgary for some more warm clothes for Big Kid.

Crossing the border in the middle of nowhere Montana was quick and painless. We showed our passports, answered a few questions, and were on our way in less than five minutes.

In contrast, trying to go to the mall in Calgary in an RV with a toad (RV speak for towed vehicle) turned out to be impossible. We slowly circled the completely full parking lot, Ma navigating us over endless speed bumps, through the swarms of shoppers heading into the mall, and decided that Calgary and RVs are not a good combo.

As we approached Banff it started to rain and the temps dropped down into the low fifties; what would be considered a major winter storm in Tucson. During our day and a half in Banff we caught some glimpses of gorgeous peaks during occasional breaks in the clouds and mists, and managed to go for a pleasant stroll along the river where we were able to put the umbrellas away for part of the time. Also made a quick trip to Lake Louise, where there was a short enough break in the weather for us to see how beautiful it was. But overall Banff was a very cold and damp experience for us and with the weather supposed to stay grim for the next few days we decided to move on.

Driving north from Banff to Jasper National Park we passed through some of the most spectucular mountain scenery I have ever seen. It was mile after mile of craggy snow capped peaks, glaciers, roaring rivers, wrapped in mists and clouds. After leaving Jasper we finally escaped the clouds and cold, and when we arrived in Prince George BC it was in the low 70s and completely dry.

Our first stop in Prince George (population around 71,000) was the Costco for new tires for the toad. In our haste to depart Tucson we hadn’t really processed that the tread was getting too low for driving on wet roads. While we were there we did some provisioning before we plunged into the wilderness; the next Costco, and the next city of any size, would be Anchorage, 1,700 miles down the road.

We spent the night at a commercial campground in Prince George (our first), and then hit the road the next day for the final push to where our Alaska adventure would begin, the start of the Cassiar Highway near Kitwanga BC. All the guidebooks for driving to Alaska begin at Kitwanga for the Cassiar Highway route or Dawson’s Creek for the Alaska Highway route, and these are the places where civilization really thins out and where you get to highways that are, as the expression goes, miles and miles of miles and miles.

We stopped an hour short of the Cassiar Highway at Tyhee Lake Provincial Park. We have stayed in a lot of campgrounds over the years, and Tyhee is one of our favorites. It is located in a beautiful Aspen forest, the campsites are spaced far apart (we can’t even see any neighboring sites) and level, there are showers, and there is a great playground for the kids. The night we arrived there was a group of First Nations folks meeting for drumming and singing in the day use area, and our kids played with their kids on the playground. This morning a bald eagle flew right over the playground while the kids were playing.