July 24, 2010

St. Albert, Alberta to Dawson Creek, British Columbia

75o & Sunny,40 mile an hour wind

Day 63

This morning we made the decision to go on to Dawson Creek with our broken windshield.The insurance company won't be able to help us until Monday anyway.We packed up and got on the road again.

We gradually gained altitude.More forests were along our route today.We passed several large lumber mills.The lumber mills were not very pretty. The lumber trucks are commonplace here.

The wind has really picked up.It's racing along at about 40 mph.It rocks the RV a lot.It is not a comfortable feeling when there are no guardrails on the road.Hugh has really been fighting the steering wheel.The wind was so strong it pushed the drivers mirror out of position.So once again Hugh was driving half blind.Little did he know his battle was just beginning.

We were descending a very steep grade and we heard a flap-flap.As we came through a steep left hand turn toward a bridge that spanned a gorge the noise go louder.We turned toward the bridge and into the wind.I noticed, in one of our mirrors, that our main awning was coming undone.As we crossed the bridge I was sure we were going to transform into a 24,000 lb kite.I was frozen, not able to move.Hugh carried on like a trooper.We stopped as soon as we could to adjust and tighten the mirror.The awning was another matter.The awning had to be opened and re-rolled to tighten it up once again.This task was impossible in the wind.Every time Hugh tried, the awning would start to take flight.It was as if the awning were saying," Come on, I dare ya!"Hugh was finally able to get the awning tightened up again.The problem was that it would not stay.Even locked down the awning roller would start to unfurl in the strong wind at 60 mph.We needed to find a large building to get behind and take a closer look.We went 40 mph in a 64 mph zone for about an hour until we came to an exit with a hotel. We parked on the leeward side, out of the wind, and got out to see what could be done. Hugh rigged up a fix and we were on our way once more.I was paranoid about the awning and kept a vigil at the mirror until we finally arrived at Dawson Creek at 5:00pm. We had to relocate to a different RV park. The first park lost our reservation and could not accommodate us.We stayed at Northern Lights an RV Park that is basic, but nice.

The couple parked next to us was from our hometown of Syracuse NY.We sat and reminisced about our hometown and friends we had in common.What a small world it is!

In the evening we looked at the view from our RV Park of over Dawson Creek.It was beautiful!