Update at last...

Irene's been managing the blog up til now, so I guess it's my turn to post the updates.

Oh hell...where do I start. It's been a few days since our last blog, but internet is not commonplace at many of the villagehotels along the ALCAN.

DAY 1: We left Fort Richardson on Saturday, July 19th for Haynes Junction. Those of you who are familiar with Alaska, are well aware of the frost heaves in the roadway created by the Alaska permafrost; these are probably most prominent on the Alaska-Canadian Highway between just outside of Palmer and Haines Junction, Alaska. Just before reaching Tok, the bolt heads snapped off our hitch cargo basket with our cooler, storage bin and contingency gas can. Fortunately, I had some extra ratchet straps to secure the basket to the truck long enough to hobble into town. Between my toolbox and the village hardware store, I was able to re-assemble the basket with industrial-strength bolts and press on after a 2-hour delay. We reached Haines Junction that evening. With only two hotels in town, we had only one choice; the one that didn't close at 9:00. Other than the retro blue fixtures in the bathroom and stained carpet, the room was livable. As Irene walked over to the hotel bar to ask if the rooms were "pet friendly", she almost tripped on the dog sleeping next to the pool table.

DAY 2: Pretty uneventful day. We made it through the Yukon territory and into British Columbia. The Yukon reminded us of the most beautiful parts of Alaska, but was very desolate. British Columbia was mountainous and seemed to contain most of the wildlife. The roads were windy and trees/wildlife were plentiful. We gassed up in Toad River and liked the area so much that we decided to spend the night. The cabins we stayed in looked run down from the outside but were nicely remodeled inside. According to history, these same cabins were used by the crews that built the Alaska-Canadian Highway in the 1940s. As much as we loved this area, the sulfer in the water was so strong that the smell in the room was almost unbareable.

DAY 3: The ride through British Columbia was quite eventful. We took photos of a young grizzly bear feeding along the highway and less than a mile down the road had to stop for a herd of buffalo in the road. Not 2 miles down the road, a young moose was drinking from a puddle...this was all within a 5-mile stretch. As we trekked south, our surroundings became more domesticated -- we grabbed a bite at McDonald's and stayed in a Quality Inn hotel. The pet rooms doubled as smoking rooms, so we had to smuggle the mutts in the back door. You'd think the little dog would be the easiest to sneak in, but Peaches started barking within the first 5 minutes in the room. I think she's getting lonely in her kennel during the day because now she's going into Bayley's kennel with him. The look on his face would make you think we were putting a porcupine in his kennel.

DAY 4: Alberta is definitely the least appealing territory of our trip. Irene blended in with the natives, but they were looking at me like I was their next meal. Our gas stop of the day was short and sweet. It was midnight when we stopped for the night in Weyburn, Canada. We soon learned that all of the hotels in Weyburn, Canada had NO vacancy due to contruction and oil workers. We were also informed that every hotel up to the U.S. border would be full. Driving another 2 hours to the next town was not an option, so we were forced into vagrancy and slept in the truck at Walmart. You don't know hard living until you've slept in the cab of your truck in 50-degree weather. T-shirts kept the fluorscent light from coming through the windows. Ghetto fabulous.

Day 5: Dead-ass tired isn't the word for it. We crossed the border from Canada into North Dakota this morning. N.D. is very non-descript other than the two Air Force bases and farmland for miles. We made a pit stop at Minot AFB to pick up some groceries and hunkered down in a hotel outside of Grand Forks. Both the base and city of Grand Forks seem to be quite nice. By the way, if you ever get picked up for an assignment to Minot, I recommend claiming homosexuality or becoming a conscientious objector -- that place SUCKED.

We should hit Marquette, Iowa tomorrow evening. Until next time...

Woo-hoo!

We did it, we passed our housing inspection! We were up until 2am cleaning and then went to lodging to get 4 hours of sleep just to return back for more cleaning at 6am. We were (and still) are so tired but it's all downhill from here. Just a few more little outprocessing to do and we're outta here.

We always say it but we can't believe how our time here has flown. It feels like we just got here yesterday. We made the most of our time here, I'll post some pics later of our time in the Last Frontier. I've always wanted to come here and I'm so lucky to have lived here. Alaska's such a beautiful state. During the summer when the sun is out and the sky is clear you can almost fool yourself into thinking you're in one of those National Geographic/Discovery magazines/shows. During the winter wonderland it's like living in a postcard. We'll really miss it here, especially once we get our first sunburn in AZ.

This is a picture of Gary after our inspection. What a relief. I'm too wired to sleep and I'm afraid if I lay down I won't get up anytime soon. Moving is so stressful and it was even more so because of where we were living. We've heard so many horror stories about what the inspectors do and how much they charge once they're done. The main thing we were worried about was the carpet. We went through one of the rooms with a black light and couldn't believe how many stains we saw. The carpets look perfect without but once you get the black light shining you see all kinds of stains. Apparently, the inspectors know exactly what they're looking for. Our inspector sprayed water on suspicious stains, set her light right over the stain for a couple of minutes, and then bent down to sniff. She had the maintenance guy sniff to confirm but he said it was not urine (whew!).

Peaches has developed wheezing attacks. They started Saturday and haven't stopped yet. I don't know what it's from. I have to massage her throat but Gary did a search and they recommended plugging the nose to get them to breathe through their mouths. Works like a charm but still worries me. We were babying her when she first started it (and she was milking it) but now that we know how to stop it she's not acting so sick now.

Hopefully, I can keep our blog updated. It's nice because we have Internet in our hotel room. We're going to grab some lunch and head over to the housing office for final payment. Woo-hoo!

Oh, the other pictures are of Bayley, tired from the move, and Gary cleaning the fence before the inspection.

Hard times...

Well, the movers are gone and we're sitting in an empty house. We're really missing the camper right now. The dogs are loving the extra play space, especially Peaches. She runs around like she's been set free. Bayley has problems choosing where to lay. He'll pick a spot, change his mind and move to another spot. I think it makes him tired because he's been sleeping more than usual. I accidentally packed the wrong air mattress (queen) so we had to make a special trip to Wal-Mart to get a queen. We splurged and got one with the pillow top. I think it lost some air last night because it was sinking a little in the middle this morning. Gary loves telling the air mattress story to our friends. When we took it out of the box yesterday we were shocked to see it was the twin and not the queen. I couldn't do anything but laugh. And I laughed hard. The look on Gary's face was hilarious! He was mad of course but he got over it. We watched a movie, Stop Loss, on the laptop to kill time. We're using the twin air mattress as our "couch" and we set the laptop on top of the tool box in front of us. Not a bad set up. Okay, gotta feed the dogs. Thanks for stopping by!

Oh, 20,800 lbs of our stuff will be waiting for us in AZ.