Dozer’s Take on the Alaska Trip (09-15-14)

Warning- if you aren’t a cat lover or aren’t interested in reading a silly blog post- just move on.

Ok look, people with two legs get to do a lot more fun things on a trip to Alaska in a small camper than people with 4 legs.  Yeah, I guess I had a good time.  I got to go out a lot more often than I usually do, but most of the time, I was left behind.

I would sit and wait for hours for them to come back and feed me.

While they were gone, I searched for the food.  Eventually I found it, not that it did me much good.  It was on a shelf I couldn’t reach, and in a sealed container.  Drat.

I could see the food, and practically taste it, but I couldn't reach out and grab it.

That’s ok.  Little did they know that the minute they were gone, I ran up to the bedroom to snooze on their pillows.  They hate that. 

That’s what they get for bringing me in this tiny little camper.  I mean, really.  Look at the size of this counter!  And there are no food crumbs on it either!

I’m a CAT for crying out loud!  I need my caves!  They had to empty out most of this cabinet just to make room for me to lay down.  Hey, that’s not my fault!

I mean, really….  I don’t ask for much.  When Paul flew to California for a wedding, I wanted to go with him.  Was that too much to ask??? Apparently it was because I sure didn't get to go.













I’ll give them a little credit for trying to keep me entertained. They actually managed to find my favorite toy in a store in Canada.  That was good for about 5 minutes of fun.












Somehow they thought it would be “fun” for me to work for my food so they put it in a little ball that would spew it out one piece at a time.  But only IF I rolled it around.  Boy, did that get old fast.

Of course, occasionally  they would let me outside, and I would supervise whatever activity happened to be taking place. I’m a great supervisor.

I guess the scenery was pretty good in Alaska, when I got the chance to pay attention to it.










A lot of times I was too busy untangling the leash from the rocks and chairs that someone was inconsiderate enough to leave lying around.

When I had the chance, I liked trying to catch the squirrels  that live near the river and I almost got one.

There sure were lots of mountains and tons of lakes with fresh, clear water in Alaska.

I love drinking from the lakes.  I even learned how to stand on the rocks, so I didn't get my paws wet  (ok, someone may have shown me  how to do that).

Sometimes the lakes were really small,-I think someone called them “puddles”, but the water was still good!

I had a really good laugh the day I escaped.  I headed over to a nearby bush and tried to get to a nest of little moles.  I just wanted to play with them, but someone figured out that I got out, and put me back in the camper before I could introduce myself to my new friends.  A little while later, I watched the mommy mole pick up her babies, one at a time, and move them to a different bush! Gee, was it something I said???

One day there was an awesome jungle to explore.  I didn’t find anything to play with, but I heard lots of noises!

Mostly it rained.  I hate the noise of the rain on the roof, but at least it means the three of us can have fun together.  Sometimes I just practice my fishing skills so I can catch a salmon when I get the opportunity.

When I get bored with that, we play cards.  I like Phase 10 but I never win.  They won’t let me play when they get the Rummikub tiles out.  I thought I was supposed to mix them up!  How should I know that they are in a specific order?? Geez.

All the activity tires me out and I have to take a nap.  I take a lot of naps.  They call them “cat naps”.

Truck Camper Travel (09-14-14)

When we decided to “do Alaska”, we did a bunch of research and decided that for us, it made more sense to travel in a truck camper rather than our large 5th wheel.

Originally the reasoning was that the roads in Alaska and Canada are rough and can rattle apart a trailer and I didn't want our home rattling apart.  We actually didn't think the roads were as bad as we were led to believe.

As it turns out, the benefits of a camper were different, but even better than we imagined.  By traveling in a truck camper, we were able to travel down dozens of roads that we would never have attempted in the trailer, allowing us to see things we would have missed and enabling us to camp, usually for free, in the middle of nowhere, with spectacular scenery all around us.

For the first week, I was a little leery about the small space, but we got used to it pretty quickly.  Well, most of us did. One of us still insists that the truck camper is too small, and looks forward to moving back into the 5th wheel.

Dozer was so desperate to get outside sometimes, he learned how to leap through the sliding portion of the screen door, if it was left open.  Not good- we’ve had to be extra careful to slide that shut or keep the main door closed.

We would never have made it to Prudhoe Bay with the trailer.  The mud and grime on that road were amazing…We actually built our own “storm windows” for the back door, so much dirt was getting through.

…. but setting foot in the Arctic Ocean was priceless.

Wrangell St. Elias National Park, our country’s largest, would have been difficult to explore in the 5th wheel. As it was, we spent 4 days exploring this park.










Denali Highway, one of my favorite places, would have been passable, but not as comfortable to drive in a 5th wheel.








When we first started out, we stayed mostly in campgrounds, but then we reached Alaska and there wasn’t any need for the formality of an RV park most of the time.  The onboard generator performed flawlessly, and with a push button start- it was so easy to use! 



One thing would have made life in the camper easier, less stressful for Paul, and would have allowed us to stay “off the grid” for longer time periods- a solar panel.  Every 4-5 days we stayed in an RV park so we could re-charge the batteries without running the generator for hours.

We took advantage of our small size to stay in smaller, (usually state or federal) more scenic, less expensive, campgrounds.

With a smaller refrigerator we had to do more meal planning and less impulse buying, but each time we loaded up, we had more than two weeks worth of meals available. Sometimes we needed it too- there are many places that don’t have grocery stores around every corner.

We loved always having our “stuff” with us.  I've said before, its a totally different way of traveling but easy to get used to.  We have full access to all our food, drink, and bathroom, all the time. If we “forgot” to bring a map into the truck, it was a simple process to pull over and get it.  Priceless!

We had some issues with the camper along the way.  It is 10 years old.  Both the bathroom vent and the bedroom skylight had parts break that had to be replaced or repaired.  The weather stripping needed to be replaced around the door and windows, but overall we had no major problems.







What we missed the most about the 5th wheel was the double paned windows, the 3 inch walls to keep out the moisture, and the recliners. I also missed the ability to make more complicated meals. With just a few pots and pans, we were somewhat limited in what we could make, and the weather was not conducive to cooking outside.



   Although we had plenty of clothes, I look forward to wearing the rest of my wardrobe! We each bought a T-shirt and a sweatshirt in Alaska.


Sometimes we missed the door that keeps the cat out of our bedroom (we don’t let him sleep with us) but he behaved better than we expected and rarely jumped on our faces at 3 AM.







Had we wanted to, we could have sold the camper in Alaska and made money on it, even after the money we put into it-but buying the biggest camper we could get paid off.  We have spent 4 months in it and are quite comfortable, so we’ll hang on to it and hopefully use it in the summers to make traveling easier.  I look forward to revisiting some of our national parks when we can actually stay IN the park!
We will, however, be picking up a solar panel in Oregon this week.

Whidbey Island area, WA (09-05-14)

I’ve been suffering from blogatosis, or blogitis, whichever you prefer.  After a summer of constant blogging and updating, its hard for me to find the energy to blog right now. My blogging friends know that more goes into a blog post than just a “stream of consciousness”, although that’s what I try to make it seem like it is.

In Alaska and Canada I had to rely on my memory when writing my blog!! Usually when I am posting about something like the Klondike gold rush, I will Google it to refresh my memory, but that mostly wasn’t possible for the last 3 months. So yeah, I’m exhausted, lol!


Anyway, enough whining.  Here’s a synopsis of what we’ve been up to since we landed in Washington:

We met up with our friend Joe and his girlfriend Sharon.  Joe has a water/electric site outside his garage so after stuffing ourselves with Mexican food, we spent the night at his place.  We met up with them a day or so later for lunch in Port Townsend as well.  Try as we might, we couldn’t convince them to come to AZ this January.

The small town of Oak Harbor has a Military Appreciation Day, with free food for everyone!  We enjoyed the free ice cream immensely!

The following day the town park hosted an Antique Motor Car Club so we watched all the old cars being driven around the park.

Hiking: we’ve hiked several trails, including this hike in Deception Pass State Park, where views of Mt. Baker were prevalent.

Some of our “hikes” have been along the beach.  These are the hikes that have made us decide that we can not do this area justice in a few weeks, we we need to come back for a summer.  Being boaters, we love the water-especially the ocean, and this area has some spectacular ocean!

We both enjoy searching for, and collecting, sea glass.  A guy we met told us about a beach that has an abundance sea glass. Although our definition of “abundance” differs, we collected enough to keep us happy! (this isn’t all of it )

Finally.  While we were in Alaska, we went on several whale watches, but never got a good look at killer whales.  I had heard that northwest Washington was a good place to take a whale watch looking for Orcas (which are not actually whales at all, but the largest member of the dolphin family).






We signed up for a local whale watch and had an awesome day watching killer whales!