July 8 Homer the Monsons

 I'll actually back date a little.  We know officially have the band back together. Thursday night Shane and Deanna picked up Amanda and Travis, and Shane very kindly picked up Matt a 2:00 a.m. Nice to have all the kids here because it feels like we're officially starting the second vacation. We had a pretty quick overnight in Anchorage at a nice wooded city park. We headed out on Friday after a good night's sleep. We stopped in the wonderfully funky cool town of Girdwood AK (it was on the route). The 48th annual Girdwood Forest festival was happening and glad we stopped.

We timed it perfectly and had a nice stop. We ended the day on the Spit in Homer at the Heritage RV park. An amazing view of the mountains behind us. 

Saturday started off early to make our chartered trip with Captain Drew and deckhand Dave on the Patriot. We met another nice retired couple from Wisconsin.  After a pretty choppy ride out to deeper water we started hitting the Halibut hard...hard! I think our Midwestern friends kicked off with a Large 60 lb Hali.  it then it was one after the other till everyone had either a halibut or a rockfish. My personal best was a Halibut so large I needed Erik to help hold the rod while I reeled. ( 90 lb and my arms are still sore). 

We ended the day with 5 rockfish, 8 halibut, 2 salmon, and a monster called a ling cod. The Whites also had a great day but with lots of sea sickness. Their Hall was primarily salmon Three Kings and about a dozen pinks.  we dined one of the king Salmon caught by the Whites. It fed 8 people! Overall, personal best for each Monson. 

The Alaska Highway, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

 The last four Monson travel days North to AK have been very "interesting times" as the Chinese say..... The 1390 mile Alcan Alaska highway is not to be underestimated, nor taken under prepared, and we did both. :( 

 To understand how remote the Alcan is, for a 15hr+ driving stretch before Whitehorse, Yukon there is just 1 tire and 1 parts store (Ft Nelson), and 90% of the time no cell service for any help, gas, or a tow!  I can drive to from DFW to Ohio in that same time, while crossing 5 states!

   Nervously shoveling money into a mechanical fire is a good description of how we have moved forward day by day north west through our trailer bearing and axle problems on our RV.

  We had to totally replace our trailer axle twice, and swap 3 new tires while traveling through 4 provinces of Canada.  This was all during a 3 day Canada Day holiday, and most of the time out of cell phone range to boot.  Unfortunately we did not think to give ourselves some reasonable multi day travel margin, and that amped it up even more.  Many lessons learned.

  We had just one road travel day to spare before expensive reservations and deadlines will hit us at our Alaska destination, including picking up our oldest son at the airport and a high dollar booked charter fishing trip..  😥😒

  But thankfully we did overcome and persevere with the emergency help of 2 Canadian welders.  The first one's poor skills left us with a quickly bent axle and necessitated the second shop in Whitehorse, 2 nerv racking travel days later....        

 After Whitehorse that NW road from Destruction Bay to Toke has to be the roughest 10-hour driving day for me EVER!  Teeth rattling still doesn't describe it close enough.  Lilly was feeding me ice cream and wiping my brow to get me through the 200 miles of potholes and swells  :-( 

Heres a pick of our bent axle before Tamarack replaced it (again) in Whitehorse :(

Finally last night we did an easy US border crossing, followed by passing into our long awaited Alaska! 

    Anchorage arrival today to meet up with son Matt, and all of the Whites before we go salmon fishing down in Homer.  I think we all can mark the Alcan off of our bucket list, and I see no need to ever repeat this excitement again!  Nope... 

We're all super ready for our next and better Alaska chapter!  :-)

July 4 Monsons...it continues

 Happy birthday America. Another beautiful day driving up north we've seen plenty of animals which is a bonus and a blessing. And generally beautiful weather. However the axle continue to give us problems and start to bow which makes us all feel really nervous. 

We had hopes we would make it to Destruction Bay and make up time but ended up stopping in White Horse. Calling around we finally got into Tamarac welding, and spoke with Alicia. She was our best lead so far as they specialize in trailer fixes in general. After rolling in right before they closed, Chris gave us a quote and said they could install a new 6,000 lb heavy duty axle new tires etc. 

After talking through the different possibilities in the lobby of the Canadian Tire, we decided to stay the night in Whitehorse, get it fixed the next morning. Although it was throwing money at the problem, it felt good to have a sure solution with everything we had heard about the roads going to Tok. We got a great meal at a shawarma restaurant that also served delicious beer and had a good night sleep.

July 3 Monson

The day started off well from Grande Prairie with the hopes of making up some time. Unfortunately we noticed the axle seemed to be bending into shape a little like a banana. Not great. When really polite Canadians say "you should probably take a look at that eh" you know there's a problem. 

Eric is nervously checking the axle every 30 minutes so it has been slow going. We got busy noticing the beautiful lakes and wildlife of BC (moose, black bear, and caribou oh my). But didn't realize how far in between gas would be on this route. We drifted into a beautiful stretch of lakes on fumes right before Fort Nelson.

 We met another kindly Canadian at a repair shop and gave us some gas and suggested we could make it to Load Hot springs camp area. A great suggestion and a highlight of the trip so far. With the stress of wondering if we can limp and do the next being able to relax even for a little bit in the beautiful setting was wonderful. Will try to make it into white horse Yukon tomorrow as that's a bigger town with more resources. A French Canadian gave us a suggestion of tamarac welding in White horse.

5 Anchorage - Cabelas parking lot

Four groups of people from across these United States are all converging on the Cabelas Parking Lot in Anchorage tonight. 

- Shane and Deanna, travelling in via rental car from Talkeetna

-Erik and Lilly, bringing their RV from Tok, AK

- Matt from Euless, Texas including a layover in Salt Lake City

- Travis and Amanda from Denton

and if it all works out..... we'll be camping on an asphalt parking lot in the largest city in the state. 

Cabelas lets folks camp in teh back of their parking lot for free, so.... why not.  Matt is the last to arrive, about 1am (will feel like 4am to him). 

once we roust tomorrow morning, we'll be bound for Homer!

4. Talkeetna

 We thoroughly enjoyed our trip to Talkeetna on the 2017 journey, so we were happy to return this trip, though it's weird without the kids and fellow travelling companions Erik & Lilly. 

Day one in Talkeetna we took the "Hurricane Train" which just runs north out of Talkeetna, hitting several official stops along the way, and a handful of unofficial stops as well. Views from the train were excellent, and it was enclosed, so it wasnt hot/cold/windy as many other train rides would be. It was eye opening to see many private properties along the route that are pretty well ONLY accessible by train. We met a couple from Anchorage that had a "summer home" about 45 miles north of Talkeena.  The property had been in their family for a couple generations, and they said there was always work to do at the property up there.  Pretty cool. 

Next day we piddled around town and visited all the retail shops in town.  It was July 4th, so the town had a parade, and all sorts of festivities. Talkeetna is the "remote party town" for Anchorage locals. Seems like lots of folks come up here to "let loose" and so the festivities were many. :)

This morning, we did a flightseeing tour with K2 Air adventures.  Unfortunately, the clouds were low and thick, so we couldnt get "above" the clouds safely, which limited our tour to lower-level glaciers only.  Still cool to do, but a definite let-down after our 2017 trip, which included several laps around Mt. Denali. 

the kids fly up tomorrow, so we're very excited to get them. we'll leave Talkeetna about 10am, picking up the RV at noon, then dropping off the rental car that afternoon. Kids arrive about 9pm and we're sleeping in the Cabelas parking lot that night.  :)

Hopefully, Erik and Lilly will get to town on schedule.  they've been suffering some trailer related travel woes, and are currently in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory getting a new trailer axle, the 2nd of the trip. =(

Deanna, please add some pictures to this post too. 

 

3. Glacier View, AK

 I assumed that Glacier View, AK was going to be a near total bust.  It's just a string of RV parks, ice cream shops and (Matanuska) glacier hiking spots along the Glenn Highway. the only thing of note "to do" is visit a big ice cube.  

and the lodging option we'd selected was a "glamping" tent - the same sort of tent that we use when we go elk hunting, except with more features like a full size bed for 2. 

Well, thats all true.  

We checked in mid afternoon and got setup in our swanky tent. 

then we headed to Sheep Lodge for dinner based on recommendations from the camping spot staff. 

Sheep Lodge turned out to be awesome food, and while there we made fast friends with a pair of newlyweds, Jacob and Carmen from Missouri.  Shane had halibut cakes and Deanna had a burger. 

We ended the night in the "commons area" at the tent campgrounds, and at about 10:30pm, a momma moose plus two calves walked right thru the middle of camp, passing within 30 yards of us and less than that to our tent sleeping quarters. 

The next day we did a 2.5 hr glacier hiking trip with the folks that control access to the Matanuska Glacier. It turned out to be deannas favorite thing of the trip so far. We got to see a ton of features of the ever-evolving glacier, and of course, Dee took a ton of pictures. 

That evening we went to dinner at the other RV park with a dining hall.  It wasnt near as good as the Sheep Lodge. 

The next morning while eating breakfast, another momma moose walked within 30 yards of the commons area, again.