Missoula, MT

Tuesday - It is definitely warmer than it has been the last couple of weeks. Today’s forecast is for a high of 85°F. This morning, we went to REI and Costco. We are looking for appropriate clothing for an upcoming trip. 

The Costco stop was to replace several food items that we weren’t allowed to bring into the U.S. from Canada. 

I also set up the JPC-12 antenna to check my Winlink email. I need to use a “form” with the check-in email that I will send out this evening. The form is just a method of delivering data in a pre-defined format. 

Wednesday - The Winlink email was sent last night about ten minutes after midnight Eastern Time using the RMS in eastern Oregon. After it was sent, I tried the Las Vegas RMS and easily established a connection. I'm amazed at how well 40m works at night, not well at all during the day.

I participated in the morning test session. The only Starlink issue is the number of WiFi access points. This is not unusual at most RV parks since just about every RV has an AP of some sort these days. Whether it Starlink or a cellular hotspot. Plus, the park itself has quite a few APs scattered around on poles. 

Today was another relaxing day visiting with friends without ridiculous temperatures or humidity. 

Thursday - I participated in the morning test session from behind the RV. It was a cool 66°F at 10am. The forecast for this afternoon is for 91°F. 

This morning after the test, I broke out the tools to tighten all the bolts on the tow bar. They aren’t torqued but just have locknuts so I just made sure that they were not loose. 

The sink drain is still leaking. Very little water but you can feel moisture above the trap. I think the P-trap may need replacing as the hand-tight coupler to the sink may be cracked from repeated tightening. It’s always something if you have an RV.

This afternoon, we went to the visitor center for the Missoula Smokejumpers. There was a nice, small museum but the tours were already done for the day.

Shelby, MT

Friday - A short travel day to just across the border. The border crossing at Coutts was really slow. The line of cars was long and only one lane (of three) was open for non-trucks. It was probably around 45 minutes. We are at a first-come first-serve campground in Shelby, MT, with 30amp electricity, scattered water spigots, and a dump station on the way out. It has been raining for most of the day but the forecast is for warmer temperatures this weekend. 

We will be here for a couple of days before heading south and west to Missoula. On the way, we filled the onboard propane tank with 32 liters which comes out to 8.5 gallons. I believe the maximum for the 12 gallon tank is about 9 gallons so we were almost empty. The needle on the built-in gauge was way below “E”. I think the last time we filled the tank was on our way out of Corvallis. 

Saturday - A quiet, non-travel day. We were originally planning to head east to a Harvest Host but decided to just stay here a second night. After all, we would be going through here again tomorrow on our way to Missoula. I had to adjust the air mix on the water heater last night as it wouldn’t stay lit. I’ve needed to adjust both the water heater and the generator several times on this trip. We are at 3300’ now and it was last adjusted when we were near sea level. I don’t think it should be that touchy.

We went into Shelby for a few groceries and lumbers putty. The sink drain is leaking so I am planning to just remove and reinstall it. I had messed with it a couple of days ago when trying to figure out why the sink wasn’t draining. 

Mossleigh, AB

Tuesday - We are here at Aspen Crossing RV Park near Mossleigh, AB, for one more night and will head south tomorrow for Montana. I've been going through the refrigerator and pantry to try and identify what needs to be tossed before crossing the border. There is a surprisingly long list of items that are restricted.

There is a lot of rain in the forecast for the rest of the week. I packed up the clam after drying it out. At the suggestion of friends, I inverted the clam to dry out the bottom parts. It worked pretty well. 

Wednesday - We decided to stay here for a couple more days since heavy rain is forcasted for most of today and tomorrow. The next place was a first-come, first-served campground, so no reservations. It's convenient to stay here for a couple more days.

The refrigerator/freezer/pantry clean out continues. Trying to use up what we have instead of getting more groceries and trying to find places to put them. Space is much more limited in the class C.

Last night at 10:01pm MDT, I sent my Winlink check-in on 40m using the RMS in Las Vegas, NV. The connection was pretty noisy but the message still sent. I initially tried the RMS in eastern Oregon but there was a lot of intermittent noise. Possibly from the storms.

Thursday - It dropped into the high 40s (°F) last night. Time to start heading south. 

I signed up for the morning test session but the potential candidate didn’t finish the paperwork nor pay the fee so no test. 

I packed the HF radio and antenna yesterday so I just used the telnet interface to check for a confirmation email. Very quick and easy but not really in the spirit of radio-email. 

We have been right at the edge of all the rain for most of the morning. And with the cooler temperatures, we have been going through the propane. We are under ¼ tank for the first time on the trip. I think that the Petro Canada station in Vulcan sells propane and that will be on our way south tomorrow morning. 

Mossleigh, AB

Saturday - The music festival and the crowds it brought are noisy. The group next to us in the rv park were going at it until after midnight. I think it’s a group of five or six RVs. I could hear the music from the festival stage from our site. It was loud enough to turn into noise for me. But that’s just me I’m sure it was just fine. 

We went to the tavern with friends for pizza. It was decent. The crust wasn’t too thick. 

Monday - The weekend had several RV repairs needing done. We thought the kitchen sink had a clog since the water wasn’t draining. It turned out that I had forgotten to open the gate valve for the grey tank. I had already disassembled parts of the kitchen so I need a larger channel lock style pliers to tighten the plumbing. 

The plastic flange the toilet mounts to broke. It turned out to be an easy temporary fix as the flange had two more mounts 90° away. So loosen the broken flange, turn 90° and screw into place. Permanent fix is a metal, two-piece flange. Readily available on Amazon.

We got more rain this evening. At least there wasn’t any hail! We had hail a few nights ago. Friends, who are leaving tomorrow, wanted to fill their truck with diesel, so we went to Vulcan. While we were there, we stopped at a hardware store to pick up the larger channel lock pliers. The plumbing drain pipes are now tightened.