Cranbrook, BC

Monday - We crossed the border into Canada today. It was a longer wait than “usual” but we were only asked a couple of questions. The road had a lot of twists and turns and tomorrow we cross the Canadian Rockies. Our destination is Aspen Crossing RV Park east of Calgary, AB. 

We are at a small RV park in Cranbrook and had dinner at an Indian restaurant near the park. It was pretty tasty food and a nice change. 

Coeur d’Alene

Sunday - Today was a travel day with some uncertainty due to fires in Oregon and Washington. We saw smoke but no flames. We went through Spokane around 12:30 and it wasn’t too crowded. Maybe because it is Sunday. 

We are at the fairgrounds RV park which has full hookups. When I fill the fresh water tank, I’ll measure it to see how much we used. The RV gauge panel says 1/3 fresh and a full black tank (it said only 1/3 yesterday). The grey tank sensors stopped working last Summer. 

The breaker for the 30amp outlet blew yesterday evening when I turned the converter back on. The converter charges the original AGM coach battery. It is powered through the inverter so it gets power through shore power, generator, or the lithium batteries. Anyway, I turned down the max shore power from 30amps to 25amps and reset the breaker. It tripped again. I turned it down to 22amps and it tripped. A bad breaker. Probably from being repeatedly overloaded. I then plugged the RV into the 50amp outlet using an adapter. No problem even after turning the max shore power back to 30amps.

Tomorrow, we have a modest travel day into southern British Columbia. 

Rufus Landing

Saturday - Today is a windy day and there are a lot of people here taking advantage of it. 

When we arrived here, there were maybe ten RVs here with no one really around us. Not the case now. It is pretty entertaining watching all the activity on the river. 

The gusts are supposedly over 40mph. There are a wide variety of floating toys out here from kayaks to these wind powered boards with underwater foils. All are very fast.

The batteries were at 65% this morning and I really don’t want to run the generator with all the people around. I turned off most thing except for the 12V chest fridge/freezer to recharge the batteries. 

By evening, we were at 89%. Enough to get through the night. A couple of videos showing some of the river activities. The last is a launch and landing. 

Rufus Landing, OR

Wednesday - Another Winlink Wednesday, though I usually send the message on Tuesday evening (0010EDT) as required by the "rules". The "rules" are only if you want to be counted and posted on their web page and map. We are still at the TT, but I'll start packing things up today and tomorrow. Friday is a travel day into the town of Hood River and then east on I-84 to Rufus Landing.

Friday - Today was a short travel day to Rufus Landing, a free camping location right on the banks of the Columbia River. This is the view from the RV. I suspect it may be kind of crowded tomorrow as it is a popular windsurfing location. I should get some good pictures tomorrow.

We will be here for a couple of days. It's more challenging to find places to stay on Friday and Saturday nights, especially if you are near populated areas such as Portland. We do have the generator running as it is 92°F here mid-afternoon. There is no one parked around us right now so it seemed to be an opportune time to run the generator.

By 5pm, the smoke started to come in. It’s still hot and it looks pretty grim.

By 8pm, it started to look better. Less smoky. And it started to cool off!