The Oregon Trail and Our Alaskan Trail

On our way to Seattle we stopped to visit The Oregon Trail National Historic site near Baker City in eastern Oregon.  As usual the National Park Service does a splendid job of interpreting the story of those 500,000 intrepid pioneers who mostly walked from Missouri to Oregon from 1845 to 1869.  They had it tough.  It was said you could follow the trail by following the debris left along the way.  And by the graves along the way.

Now here we are getting ready to trek North to Alaska.  Not so much drama for us.  But it is still the grandest RV trip we’ve planned.  While we are assured by recent blogs we’ve read that the road is good and services are available, we really don’t know anyone who has taken this trip recently.  Our auto and RV insurance will cover us in Canada but we must obtain a Canadian insurance card from our carriers.  Our cellphone and mobile internet will not work in Canada.  We hope to find WiFi along the way.  We are constantly reviewing our supplies.  Do we have too much?  Do we have enough?  Trying to anticipate each scenario.  We are even carrying a spare tire for the RV.  Road service may come to change a flat, but a replacement tire could be hundreds of miles away.  Also we hear windshield damage is common even on the new improved road since Summer is also road work season and flying rocks are not uncommon.  Visiting our great friends Dave and Nancy in Boise, we found they had a cover for the front of their Honda CRV.  It will fit our CRV and they loaned it to us for the trip.  They even loaned us their RV GPS.  Huge thanks!  Two less things to worry about.

Now we must decide whether to take the bikes to AK.  Will we use them?  We also have to leave some things with our son Jason in Seattle.  We’ll leave the herb plants that ride in the back seat of the tow car CRV.  Can’t take into Canada, or at least we know we could not bring them back into the US when we return.  Got to leave our personal defense pepper spray, not allowed into Canada.  Will leave a couple extra camp chairs, don’t need the extra weight.  Then we have to evaluate our pantry.  Given our plant-based diet choice, we will have to stock up on certain necessities.  But not over pack, again don’t need the extra weight.  The Okanagan valley of British Columbia should be abundant with produce and Anchorage will be a good re-supply stop down the road.

Like the pioneers of old, we find we have to leave some things along the way.  And we’ll surely pick up others as the need arises.  Our trip is nothing like the pioneers in their prairie schooners other than we carry all our stuff in our modern diesel powered motorhome.  They were excited about the future as we are now.  We don’t know exactly what we will find.  The stakes are not so high for us but still there is adventure ahead.  We are excited about the possibilities.

NPS Site, Baker City OR

Prairie schooner

Oregon trail across eastern Oregon

Fred (our RV) in middle at Moab

View from campsite

Camel rock

Shoshone Falls in Idaho

Snake River