RV'n 4 Jesus: September 2015

Alaska will always hold a piece of my heart and I pray I get to go back some day. But now, it was time to head back to the "lower 48" or should I say "back to the outside!"

We took a different route this time so we would come out in Montana instead of Washington. That route added about 500 more miles to our journey. All I can say is that the west side of Canada was truly breathtaking. I felt so very privileged to have been able to drive through that area to see it all with my own eyes. So many people either fly to Alaska or take a cruise up there, which is all great too, but WOW you miss so much along the way. I don't think there is anywhere (in the US) more beautiful than western Canada and Alaska.

OK - so about our trip, as you may remember, on our way up we rushed to get Zackary to his assignment that we literally just pushed every day to get as far as we could and said we would see stuff on the way back and boy did we.

Our first day heading back into Canada we left Tok, Alaska, and headed to Whitehorse for the night. At our first gas stop (OK and an ice cream) in Canada it was miserably rainy and COLD! As we were getting back on the road, we saw a hitch hiker, as we past him, I made eye contact, he looked like a kid, I drove past and he kind of did a "thanks anyways" kind of smile and shoulder shrug. At that point I looked at Momma and said I gotta stop, he's a Zackary! So, we stopped. It was so funny, he turned around and looked at us like, really?!?! so mom jumped out of the front seat and waved him on up, Dad opened the door and we welcomed him into our home. His name was Michael and HA he was 20 also, same age as Zackary. What a pleasure it was to meet him. He was from Germany and came over to hike(hitchhike) around Canada and decided to go to Alaska while he was here and he was now on his way back to Canada. We were privileged enough to get to give him a warm SAFE ride to Whitehorse, he was heading exactly where we were headed. Of course we asked 20 questions about his trip, how, why, how long, all that and yes, I did ask, isn't it scary just hitching rides. His reply blew me away, he said since he got here he hasn't had one bad experience. He has had nothing but friendly people stop and has had the best time meeting new people. How cool, he also said that everyone does it back home, it is just the way we travel.

Whitehourse Wal-Mart rv park :)

So we got to Whitehorse, dropped Michael at the campground where he had reservations and we went on to our campground....Wal-Mart! Now this Wal-Mart was crazy funny. There were as many rvs/campers/vans/whatever you can sleep in, there overnight than I think you would find at your typical campground. They were packed on our way up and again on our way back. Also, Whitehourse Wal-Mart is where we got our ketchup chips (that Zackary and I fell in love with). I haven't found them anywhere else except Canada. So, I will say, I did have to make a purchase of chips, and I will not incriminate myself on how many bags were purchased and how many are left....we will just move on to day two! :)

Our next day we drove through some amazing country making our way to Laird Hot Springs. What a cool, or should I say hot (hehe) place...The temperature averages anywhere from 105 to 128. Momma and I decided to take a dip, WOW, that was awesome! Being from Florida with springs all over the place, you mentally expect it to be freezing cold, but it was soooo nice, little warm getting in, but quickly your body adjusted. We had a great time there. Oh and this is where we also saw our first bison. He was a few miles before we got to the park, and hysterical, he was walking right in front of a bison crossing sign, so yes, we had to get the picture of that. They have really smart bison in Canada...LOL!

As we packed up to head on to our next day, it happened...the slide would NOT close all the way! WOW, talk about a panic attack, what on earth do you do? We tried going in and out and pushing and pulling and of course praying the whole entire time, and nothing. WE couldn't get it in. It was in as far as we could get it in, and it still stuck out about 5 inches. We were literally in the middle of no where, the closest big town was over 300 miles away. SO, we decided to see if the RV would start with it open still and PRAISE GOD it started and we hit the road. Our NEW plan was to leave it the way it was and head to Edmonton (the big town over 300 miles away) and find someone to look at it to fix it.

So we were off to Edmonton. As we headed down the road, we past a few more bison, so

we stopped to take some pictures, and a few more miles were a few more, then we turned a corner and there was an entire herd of bison on both sides of the road. It was amazing! We pulled off the road and took pictures, videos and just watched them, it was fascinating, I loved it. Daddy quit counting at 52, and that was only on the right side of the road. It could have easily been close to 150 bison. We immediately began again, thanking God for the beauty, for the wild life, for everything and with one turn of the road, it all went away. I felt so blessed by getting to see those bison. We were bummed with the situation in regards to the slide, but after thinking more about it, we even found we were praising God that it was the front slide and not the back one. We can live without our front slide, but the back one we can't. See, He is in everything!!! Even knowing which slide we needed. He knows our needs!

We pushed on as far as we could that day, trying to get as close as we could to Edmonton because we knew we couldn't make it the whole way, but it was getting late, and it was a long day, so we decided to try to find a campground....WOW did we ever find one...It was a road side campground, self pay, pick a spot yourself kind of place, but it was BEAUTIFUL and located on Summit Lake. WOW, the mountain view with the lake! Oh, and did i mention we were literally on the lake? I mean when I pulled into the spot, my front tire was only 3 feet from the waters edge. Now that is my kind of water front campsite! I would have loved to stay there for dayyyyyyys, but we had to push on to get to Edmonton.

I know I said 300 miles and most of you would be scratching your head thinking why would it take more than a day to get there, well RV driving is soooooo different from a car. On a good flat road, we don't go over 60 (best gas mpg), now add in mountains, HA I wish I could get up to 40 on most of the mountains, then going downhill or should I say down MOUNTAIN you can't go but 30/40 because its top heavy. So days are long and we have just changed our travel lingo to how many hours we drive in a day instead of miles, it works better that way :)

Now, I have to start the God story of the slide here. We are in another country, we know nobody, wing and a prayer just to find a place to stay for a few days until we can get our slide looked at and not to mention needing to find a place to look at the slide. To say the least we were praying and I called on some prayer warriors to pray with us. As we were heading toward Edmonton, we found only 1 campground listed for Edmonton in our Milepost book (best book ever...LOVE IT) so, we called them. Now Edmonton is a really big town, like over 100,000 people or something like that, SO, we called this ONE campground and HA, it is located on the road we planned to drive to get to Edmonton, before we get to the city. So WOOO HOOO, it is right off the road we already going to be on, less than a mile. THANK YOU JESUS! Now, we are needing a place to look at our RV....only at one stop along the way did we get wifi, I was able to google, RV repair in Edmonton. A whole page came up and as I was scrolling down the list on who knows how many I just stopped on Fraserway, it said it had been in business 45 years so I clicked on it, sent them an email message asking for an appointment that we would be in town on Tuesday. When we got to Edmonton, and checked into our campground, we checked the email and HA, they replied and could see us the next morning at 8:30. WOOO HOOO - GO GOD!!! THANK YOU! Wait it gets better. We decided to go find the place that night so we wouldn't have to in the morning, so we headed out and wouldn't you know, less than 5 miles from our campground was Fraserway! What a hoot, WE PRAISED GOD OVER AND OVER!!!! I can't tell you how many times He does this stuff with us, so WOOO HOOOO - our apt was at 8:30 and we didn't have to leave until 8:15.

We get there in the morning at 8:30 and I would love to tell you we were in and out, but nope, we pretty much spent the day there waiting for an estimate and to hear the out come. We had bathed the whole situation in prayer (and prayer warriors) so we waited, and waited and waited some more. The service manager finally came out and had a huge smile on his face and shook his head and said to us "I have no idea what just happened." He told us what all they did, change motor, change cords, yada yada and NOTHING! It didn't work, nothing they tried worked. So they put all the old parts back on it and were putting the slide back into the closed position so they could get us back on the road and that we could get it looked at back in the states or back home. (Which we told them if they had to do that that was fine, we can live without that slide) OK, now this is where it gets really good....He laughed and shook his head again and said, "we just got fed up, we tried it all, and one last time the service tech hit the slide button completely frustrated, and it went in!" HA, it started working again. Just like that. The manager was just dumb founded. He said, "I have no idea why it works now, it shouldn't, but it does, goes in and out no problem, we didn't do anything because we put it all back together with your old stuff." We all laughed with him and of course I said, it was ALL GOD!!! That's how He does things with us. SO, the service tech himself came out and talked to us, explaining even more on what all they did, he said, it shouldn't work, but it does, so yes, again, I say, It was all God, we bathed this slide in prayer. He showed us all kinds of things with the slide, spent about 30 minutes of his time talking with us. It was a great experience. SO, once again, there are no coincidences, God put us at that RV park with that service department on that day with honest and reliable service techs. Oh and by the way, our slide works better now than it did before the mishap. GO GOD!!!

Oh, one other thing about Edmonton, they have the largest mall in the world. Not sure about that, but the paper said it was...So, if you know me, you know I never, ever go to the mall (unless a friend drags me there :)). I couldn't pass up the opportunity to see the largest one in the world...but I will say it was pretty cool. Water park, river, amusement park, pirate ship, oh yea and every store you could ever imagine. So that was a fun little experience we had while we were there before we pushed on to Banff, the Canadian Rockies.

I had no idea what I was in for. After Alaska, you feel like there are no other mountains that will ever compare, but I was wrong, Alaska and the Canadian Rockies - WOW - most beautiful places I have ever seen. I am now truly a mountain junkie, I LOVE THEM!!! We arrived in Banff, not thinking about the date and assumed it would be no problem to get a site. WELL, when traveling, you lose days and you don't realize it is Labor day weekend at an extremely popular destination...until the sweet park ranger tells you. She asked if we had reservations, explained they were mostly booked solid except for the dry camping sites. She could fit us in 2 nights with only electric hook up and 3 nights with nothing. As we were discussing that, the other ranger over heard the conversation and said he just hung up with a cancellation, it was FULL hookup for the entire time we needed it for. WOOO HOOO - THANK YOU GOD! So we took it. Now this campground was facing Tunnel Mountain, a seriously cool looking mountain and mom jokingly said, does our spot come with a good view? She giggled and said, well they all are pretty good, but can't guarantee, yada yada. So we laughed and said beggers cant be choosers and went on. She gave us our info and we followed the map to our site (they had over 300 sites in this place) and when we turned the corner, the trees opened up and we were FRONT ROW NOTHING BLOCKING STRAIGHT SHOT VIEW of Tunnel Mountain. Would you please join me? WOOOO HOOO GO GOD!!!!! We got parked, hooked up and settled and we opened the window and just sat in awe of that mountain. On our location, the whole day, we were praising God in joy, praise and were truly worshiping Him. He blessed us so, regardless of good or bad, I will still praise Him, but it was truly a day of a serious holy high reveling in His goodness.

Now, we were here for 4 nights and 5 days, so we had a whole lota stuff planned to go do. Again, when traveling you don't always check the weather, so you are very thankful for ranger stations that post the weather. It was to rain for two of those days and snow 3 of those nights....OK THEN. And the weather for the time we were there stayed in the 30's and 40's during the days. We loved it! Got to catch up on some rest, got to see some really cool sites with cool clouds and I got to dress for winter!!! I've totally become a boots, scarves and hats kind of girl, bring on the winter!!! We were snowed on 3 times while we were there, I drove in it twice, woke up with snow all over the car and ground. Loved it! We saw some of the most amazing beautiful country and I praise God for this opportunity. Sometimes as I am standing in awe of what I see, I want to pinch myself, I can't believe it. Which directly turns me to my knees to thank and praise God for this. It is all for Him, by Him and to Him! God's glory!!!!

So, much happened during those 11 days, sorry this post is so long, but I just don't want to leave anything out. One last thing before I leave you with all the beautiful pictures. A little story about our travel in the park up into the mountains on a one way in and one way out road. We were finished with our trip up, had our picnic lunch on the way down and figured we would head on back since it was an hour ride to get back to where we were camped (the other end of the park). We came around a corner and nothing but brake lights, so we slowed up and came to a stop. We waited, waited and waited, finally heard a report back from someone that walked down the mountain to see what had happened. The report back was that there had been an accident and we would be stopped anywhere from 4 to 6 hours....AHHHHHHH - WHAT? All I heard was I would be trapped in this car for 6 HOURS!!! I think I started having a slight panic attack, just the thought of being in the car, nowhere to go, nothing to do, no cell svc, no wifi, no potty, NOTHING - IT WAS COLD TOO!!!! AHHHHHH! Ok Ok Ok, I need to calm down, I started reliving it again...LOL. SO, I will report, it totally changed when we heard another person say that there had been an RV and a car involved in the accident and there was a fatality so we had to wait on the investigators to do the recreating thing of the accident. Then it gets all too real, it wasn't about me, someone went on a weekend holiday and they wouldn't be coming home, and of course my first thought as I prayed, Did they know God? Did they have that relationship with Jesus? Are they rejoicing in the arms of their Father, or NOT? Life ends, and is over in a blink of an eye. I again, pray that everyone that reads this post knows the answers to those questions, and as one of my most precious dear friends says, "it's not do you Know God, but does He know YOU?" If you have questions or doubts, please private message me, or talk to someone. It is a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. We are nothing without Him, He paid the price for our sins that we could never pay. He suffered the wrath of God that we are due. Christ ALONE makes it possible to have a relationship with God. It is so much more than going to church, it's a daily walk, dying to self and living in and for Christ. And if yes you know you are one of His children, I rejoice and ask you to please pray with me for that family that lost a member and that God would move in their family to reach out and comfort them as well as the survivors of the accident. I can't imagine how it would feel after being involved in an accident with a death. SO please do pray for all that were involved as well as Michael (our new friend from Germany) for God to do what only He can do, open hearts and open eyes!

I know this one was a long one, and I am glad you stuck with me through all of it. I hope you enjoy the pictures. Though they do the scenery no justice, but you can at least get a little taste of the beauty.

(Oh, and just so you know...we were there for only 4 1/2 hours and the time flew by, God helped me through, and I realized a few things during that time. When traveling in a car where you may get stuck in traffic 1) Make sure you have a blanket. 2) Make sure you have snacks. 3) Make sure you have a cards/game. 4) Make sure you have someone to chat with. Speaking from experience!!!)

Praising God for His beautiful creation of this earth and how everything works and continues creating and changing. Again, this is the sin tainted version, I can only imagine what He has prepared for us.

To God Be The Glory!!!!!!!

Kristi
Carol & Bob
Galatians 6:9-10

Traveling to Banff