We finally got underway at about 9:30 – a mere 3 hours behind schedule. Joe headed up to Karen’s in the Winne, and I followed in my Blazer, so I could drop it off at Karen’s. We were using our Motorola radio’s to communicate, when Joe indicated "something broke". We once again had a significant exhaust leak. This occurred about Rt. 175 and the B/W parkway… mile 13.

Once we reached Karen’s the problem was quickly diagnosed, as the right-side exhaust collector gasket which we replaced 2 days prior, with a Lifetime Collector Gasket. After a quick trip to the auto-parts store, the bank, and McDonalds, we reassembled the exhaust with a new gasket, leaving the vacuum controlled manifold baffle disconnected, speculating it may have been the source of the blown gaskets.

We left Ellicott City about 12:30, now over 6 hours behind schedule. While still in Maryland we encountered a torrential downpour in which we discovered the second problem of our journey… a small leak in the front windshield. After the rain subsided we were able to make good time, heading through PA and into Ohio. Since we were running late we decided to eat Burger King at our last gas stop. By about 7:00pm we stopped at Milan RV Travel park about 60 miles from our planned goal of Toledo, OH. Not bad considering this morning’s setbacks.

The accommodations at Milan were quite nice although our pad wasn’t all that level… we had a bit of a lisp to the stern. Here we had our first experience with hooking up the RV, which was accomplished with little effort. We sorted through all the stuff we packed and made our mobile home livable for the evening. After a trip up to the office to upload the updated webpage and collect mail, we retired for the evening, hoping to get a early start in the morning to get us back on schedule.

We arose about 6:15 am and headed to the showers. After a quick breakfast we disconnected the RV, and got things back into travel mode. Prior to leaving the RV Park, we stopped at the dump station to relieve our holding tanks, and then headed to the gas pumps. By 8:15 we were back on the road.

About noon we stopped at a truck stop, gassed up, and quickly heated up some soup for lunch. After a few more hours driving we came to Chicago. We took in the skyline while sitting in traffic. About 45 minutes later we left the congestion of the city and continued on our journey.

About 4:30 we got to Madison… our intended destination for the evening. Since it was still early we decided to simply stop in town for some groceries, and head farther down the road. After a scenic tour of the downtown area we finally found a grocery store. Here Joe had to contact me via cell phone in the store to consult about purchasing chicken tenders for tonight’s dinner. We stowed our groceries and headed across the street to the gas station. Here I discovered the third RV related problem. We were leaking water on the starboard side. After a brief examination Joe determined the problem to be in the hot water heater plumbing. We made an attempt to find some replacement parts while in town with little luck. Fortunately the previous owner had installed a hot water heater bypass system, which we used to solve the problem temporarily.

We continued down the road about 40 miles and stopped in Dell’s Wisconsin, which seems too only be notable for its Indian Reservation Casino’s. Here we made camp at Yogi’s Jellystone RV resort. The park was nice, but very much geared toward families with young children, which made it a bit of a zoo. Once again we hooked up the RV, and switched from travel mode to living quarters. We baked the chicken fingers Joe found in the supermarket… they were tasty. We made a rather unsuccessful attempt at fixing our leaky plumbing, but conceded that we would need some new parts. After that Joe continued work on the web page while I worked out more details of our itinerary. We retired early considering the time change… with the hope of avoiding lines at showers in the morning.

Once again we arose early and headed to the showers. We had a leisurely breakfast and headed to the office to collect mail and upload the web page updates. Upon our return we examined the RV and speculated that some of our problem with our keel made be the rear leaf springs.

We buttoned up the RV and continued on down the road. I should note that each morning we had a shake down in the RV for the first 15 miles or so till the flat spots in our bias tires subsided. After some brief discussions we agreed to explore having a leaf spring added once we reached Sioux Falls, SD and possibly use our maintenance day planned in Great Falls, MT tomorrow instead.

The drive through Wisconsin and into Minnesota was quite scenic, speckled with small farms raising cattle and growing corn. It was a big difference from the extremely dry east cost farms back home. Here field corn was nice and green, and nearly 7.5 feet tall. About noon we stopped for gas, and made sandwiches. After our quick lunch/gas stop we continued on crossing into South Da Freak’n Cotta and arrived in Sioux Falls.

Here we found our first of many KOA’s. In addition, we found an extremely well stocked and knowledgeable RV dealer/shop right next to the campground. We picked up some parts to repair the hot water heater, and inquired about having a leaf spring added to the Winnebaigis. They referred us to Sioux Brake… unfortunately by this time Sioux Brake was closed so we would have to try them in the morning.

The KOA was very nice, we had a level pad, reasonable showers, and nice access to a data line in the office for the laptops. In fact, we decided to spend $10 for a KOA card, which entitled us to a 10% discount at any other KOA campground. Here we setup house, and rolled to motorcycle off the back for the first time, thinking that we would need it to cruise around town if we decided to have the RV repaired.

Once we were settled in I decided to go for a jog while Joe took some pictures of the campground for the website. For dinner we made some spaghetti. After that we helped the neighbor debug some problems with his rig (a nice late model 30+ foot Class A). We then began repairs on the hot water heater with our new parts. While we were waiting to see if our repairs fixed the leak we both typed away on our laptops, returning mail, and updating the web page. Unfortunately our wait revealed that the hot water heater still leaked… worse than before. On this note we retired planning to get up and call the shop first thing in the morning.

Got up about 6:30 took showers, ate cereal, and called Sioux Brake. They indicated that they could handle the job of adding a leaf spring today without a problem. We disconnected the rig, packed up, and after a brief stop at the dump station we headed to Sioux Brake… Joe on the motorcycle, and me leading in the Winnebaigis.

A short trip down the interstate took us to the shop where we consulted with Ken. Ken inspected the Winnebaigis and told us for between $250-$275 we could have an additional spring added, and we agreed. We quickly wolfed down some breakfast, and headed out on the motorcycle to checkout Sioux Falls, and kill time wile the Winnebaigis was getting a lift.

We headed through downtown Sioux Falls, stopping at a hardware store for additional supplies for our hot water heater plumbing. Next we stopped by the public library to spoof some Internet access. And, then found a shaded park bench where I spent 20 minutes on my cell phone booking our $890 ferry ride for our return from Alaska. After that we headed back to the shop to check on the repairs… things appeared to be proceeding nicely, so we headed to get some lunch at a Chinese restaurant… thinking that the opportunity for such a culinary choice may not present itself for the remainder of the trip.

After lunch we headed back to the shop and our repairs were complete. Two hundred eighty-three dollars and 3 hours got us some good ride height, and better support for our frame extension, which housed the motorcycle. Since it was just past noon, we decided that we should be able to still make our intended destination of Rapid City, SD only 327 miles down the road. So we loaded up the motorcycle, for the first time while on the road. We did pretty well… about 40 minutes… much better than the 6 hours it took on packing day. I should mention that we needed to stop about 10 miles down the road to make some minor adjustments to the tie downs.

The ride started out pretty rough, and for a while we though that perhaps having the springs added wasn’t such a great idea. Things in the Winnebaigis were starting to rattle apart. In fact, at one point the refrigerator door came flying open spewing much of the contents across the floor. Luckily after about 100 miles the springs seemed to break in and the Winnebaigis was handling better than it ever had.

The road here was again quite scenic. The farmland however switched to mostly hay fields with some cattle grassing here and there. I was surprised by the amount of cut hay rolled but just lying in the fields. Speed limits in this section were 70+ so we were able to make good time. About half way into the journey we crossed the Missouri River, yet another huge body of water... what a sight.

We called ahead and made reservations at the Mt Rushmore KOA for two nights… we opted for the full hookup (Electric, Water and Sewer) so we wouldn’t have to worry about filling our holding tanks while fixing our plumbing problems. Unfortunately Mt Rushmore is about 30 miles off the interstate past Rapid City on some mountainous roads. But after some minor navigational errors we did arrive, check-in and setup camp.

Here we opted to just have sandwiches for dinner, since we had a nice hot lunch. We unloaded the motorcycle, since we would need that in the morning to go site seeing around Mt Rushmore and Crazy horse. After this long day we simply decided to turn in early after some computer time.

We got up about 5:30 in hopes to beat the morning rush at the showers… okay I actually got out of bed about 5:45. We took showers in the nice private stalls, and came back to the rig for a light breakfast. We packed up our duffel bags and headed out on the motorcycle to Mt. Rushmore. We looked a bit geeky riding the Suzuki 500 with helmets amongst all the Harleys touring around and heading to the Sturges rally (SD has no helmet law… and we were by far the exception.)

We got to Mt Rushmore about 9:00 before it got very hot and before the crowds started arriving. The renovations were completed this year, and the park is beautiful. We walked down the hall of flags, gazed at the immense carving in the rock, and tried to take it all in. Joe took plenty of pictures and some footage with his digital video camera. (We both decided that we sucked at attempting to narrate the footage.) We then decided to walk around the deck walkway, which gives you some different views of the monument. Then we stopped by the artist’s workshop. There we looked through the displays about the sculptor, and how the rock was carved. After a brief stop at the gift shop, where we obtained the Winnebaigis’s mascot… a stuffed bald eagle, we headed back to the campground to grab some lunch and raingear since the skies looked a bit threatening. On the way back to camp we stopped by the side of the road to take a picture of a lazy mountain goat resting atop a cliff.

At camp we relaxed a bit and enjoyed some sandwiches. After that we headed back out on the cycle to the Crazy Horse Memorial. We packed our raingear, but the skies cleared and we never saw a drop. Once at the memorial we were in awe of how huge it was. Here you couldn’t get anywhere near as close Mt Rushmore, but the rock carving was still bigger. This memorial is still a work in progress, and when you look at the replicas of what is intended for the finished product you can’t help but wonder how it will ever be accomplished. We saw a brief slide show about the monument, and toured through the displays, many of which were native Indian’s selling their crafts.

Once we arrived back at camp we started some RV maintenance. Joe ripped all the weather striping off the front windshield to repair our leak. I clean all the old rubber out, and we put it back together with some new silicon… a rather long process… hopefully it will fix the problem. After that we began work on the hot water heater again. Once that was back together I prepared dinner consisting of grilled chicken and Rice’a’Roni. After dinner our inspection of the hot water heater revealed that we still had a small leak. We decided that we would have to get some brass fittings for it, since the plastic ones just weren’t cutting it. Before we went to bed we decided to load up the motorcycle with a little help from some friendly neighbors. After a long day of tourism and RV repairs we went to bed.

We got a little later start than usual this morning... sleeping in till about 7:30. Surprisingly there were no lines at the showers. After a cereal breakfast we disconnect the Winnebaigis. Then, a quick stop at the mail drop to send some snail mail, and we were on our way. (No need to dump since we had a sewer hookup) Today’s destination of Billings, MT lay 375 miles down the road.

We slowly worked our way through the mountainous roads leading from Mt. Rushmore back to Rapid City where we once again joined interstate 90. As we passed by the road leading to Sturges we noticed that most of the Harely’s were coming towards us rather than passing us by… the Sturge’s rally starts tomorrow. After a quick gas stop we arrived at the Wyoming boarder… our 9^th state line crossing. Wyoming was much the same as South Dakota… large fields of cut or ready to be cut hay, and cattle ranches. Also we began to notice an oil derrick here and there in the middle of the farmland.

We decided that since the day was going well we had time to make an unscheduled side trip to see Devil’s tower, about 28 miles off the interstate. This was well worth the trip. A huge cylindrical protrusion towering above all around could be seen over 12 miles away. This formation, probably most notable for it’s use in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind", is actually an ancient volcano. The tower is also noted for it’s climbing. These days many skilled rock climbers scale the tower each year using a technique called jamming. Unfortunately we didn’t have the time to walk around the base, but I’m sure that it would be worth the journey.

After yet another gas stop we headed north, crossing into Montana. Here started the Crow Indian Reservation, a huge area of land, which we traversed nearly the entire way to Billings, MT. Once in Billings it became obvious where the oil from the fields, we passed along the way, went. There were a number of refineries in town. Surprisingly Billings is a pretty big town, with several 15+ story buildings in the downtown area.

We set up camp at the Billing’s Metro KOA, just a short drive from the interstate. Since it was quite nice out and still pretty early Joe and I head for the pool for a quick swim before dinner. After we dried off we headed over to the pit BBQ stand for dinner, seeing no reason to cook if someone else was going to do it for us. After that we cleaned up the Winnebaigis interior a bit, then went for a stroll to the river running along the camp and through the park admiring all the late model RV’s that put ours to shame. After getting on the computer to return mail, and update the website we called it a night.

This morning we got up at our usual 6:30am time. After showers, I decided to cook a hot breakfast of eggs for a change, while Joe stuck to his usual bowl of Fruity Pebbles. After that we cleaned up disconnected and headed out for Great Falls, MT (no state line crossings today) It was a fairly uneventful trip up through Montana. We did however start to see the farmscape change from hay fields to huge commercial wheat fields as we approached Great Falls.

Once in Great Falls we had a lot to accomplish. Our itinerary planned for us to spend a day here for RV maintenance, but we hoped to avoid that by accomplishing everything today. Our first stop was... you guessed it... the gas station. I took this opportunity to find a phonebook and lookup some addresses for Laundromats and sporting good stores. After we gassed up we went across the street to the hardware store. Here we got brass fittings for the hot water heater, and other needed supplies, including an air horn to be used to ward off bears while backpacking. Then off to the truck wash bay (we just barely fit in) where the Winnebaigis got a much need bath.

From there we stopped by the local grocery store to stock up on some supplies and get some nice steaks for dinner. After that we combed through town looking for one of the Laundromats I had addresses for. After a brief while we found one and started 3 loads of wash. We unloaded the motorcycle so Joe could head off to the sporting goods store, GPS shopping, while I waited for our laundry to complete. Joe returned with a nice Garmin III, a cigarette lighter adapter for it, and two wool hats (we'll need those while backpacking in Denali). We also discovered that my cell phone ceased to work, and thanks to AT&T tech support, will remain broke for nearly the rest of our trip. Due to this, I talked AT&T into paying for all my credit card calls made while on our journey.

Once the laundry was complete, folded and packed back into the Winnebaigis, I headed to the local KOA and Joe followed on the motorcycle. This KOA was pretty typical of the ones thus far, and it was equipped with the most important item... a data line allowing us to get e-mail and upload the web page. At our site we met our neighbors, a family from Laurel, MD, who were excited to find someone esle from MD, out this way. On the other side we found the Winnebaigis' younger brother... a 1986 Winnebago Chieftan 22... thanks to its recent bath the Winnebaigis was looking a bit better (at least from the outside) than its younger brother.

After we converted the Winnie from travel mode to home, Joe headed into town on the motorcycle and I began what I hoped would be the final repair on the hot water heater using the recently acquired brass fittings. Once Joe returned, we grilled up the huge steaks we purchased at the grocery store, and Joe made a nice tossed salad. As per usual we had way too much food... but still a great meal, which we enjoyed at the picnic table under our awning. I cleaned up from dinner, and Joe headed up to the office to upload the web page. We checked on the hot water heater plumbing, and no leak so far, so we decided to head to bed.

Today we got up a bit later than usual. We planned to stop by the local Sears Automotive store to have our oil changed. After showers and breakfast we disconnected and headed out into town. Unfortunately when we arrived at Sears they told us that they didn't do oil changes... I was not really surprised, since I don't think the Winnebaigis could have fit in their bay doors.

Since, being Sunday, nothing else was open we loaded up the motorcycle in Sears parking lot and went off to find an industrial section where we could change the oil ourselves. After a brief drive we came to a gravel parking lot with some 18 wheelers, and we pulled in behind them. In about 40 minutes we changed our oil and were on our way.

Today we planned to cross into Canada and hopefully make it up to Calgary... this would put us nearly a day ahead of schedule, since we skipped our maintenance day in Great Falls. The road was nice interstate with large wheat fields, grassy prairie, and the occasional oil derrick. It was exceptionally windy today... perhaps it usually is. Keeping the Winnebaigis on the road in 50+ mph gusts was less than relaxing.

Soon we came to the Canadian border where we went through customs with little more than a wave. The Canadian scenery was much the same as in the states, lots of farm land and some oil derricks amongst the rolling wind swept terrain. We passed through a few small towns that consisted mostly of grain processing and storage buildings. We stopped for gas in one such town and had to begin converting liters to gallons and using Canadian currency... not too big a deal.

About 5:00pm we came to Calgary, a pretty big city. For some reason the highway didn't allow us to simply blow on through... you pretty much had to drive into the center of town. That was fine since we wanted to go to the KOA downtown, anyhow. We passed by Olympic Park on our way there... it looked to still be in pristine condition. The KOA was less than a mile away. Unfortunately they only had dry sites (no hookups) available, and no phone line for Internet access... we decided that was unacceptable and we would try somewhere else.

Not having any additional information about Calgary, we decided the best option was to just get back on the highway and billboard shop. Just north of town we came to Whispering Spruce Campground. Sites were cheap and they allowed us to use their fax line to get onto the Internet. Short of that you couldn't say much about this place other than it was pretty damp from the recent rain and rather mosquito ridden.

Once we hooked up we attempted to start our roof air, which made a rather loud clanking noise. Suspecting that the strong winds early in the day may have damaged the roof housing we opted to not use it for now, and check it in the morning. We cooked up some Hamburger Helper, ate, and did the dishes. Then we both had our usual computer time, and called it a night.

We got up about 8:00 this morning... later than usual. The showers here were about the worst we have seen so far... but still not too bad. After breakfast we crawled up on the roof to examine the problems with our air conditioner. Joe observed that the shroud's plastic was cracked around the bolting points pretty much allowing the cover to nearly flop with the wind... surprising that it managed to stay on this far. The movement of the cover caused the coil and fan shroud to bend back a bit causing the fan to hit it slightly... this was easily bent back into shape. We repaired the cover with… you guessed it... duct tape, and a bit of strap iron to reinforce the bolting points... good as new.

After cleaning up and disconnecting we were back on the road. The road up to Edmonton was good. In fact, I cooked grilled cheese sandwiches while Joe was driving... don't try this at home folks. Edmonton was a bit of a challenge, since once again the highway dumps you into town. Joe and I yelled at each other as I drove while he attempted to navigate with the US/Canada map... finally we made our big left turn onto Rt. 43 as we continued up the East Access route to Grand Prairie... our intended destination for the evening. The landscape consisted of a lot of rocky hillsides, not great for farming, but there were still cattle pastures. Luckily, either due to the landscape or the weather, the wind was not bad.

As we approached Grand Prairie, the landscape changed a bit, there were many large plots of farmland, and grassy fields. Just outside town we found a sign "Country Roads RV park 4 Miles straight ahead"... after a really long day driving (~470 Miles) this sounded good to us. We followed a dirt road for what seemed like far too long to find and RV park at the end of it... but soon we came to a sign. We pulled into... well... someone's farm... or so it seemed. Cautiously we got out of the RV... this didn't seem like and RV park... perhaps they were just going to put us up in the barn. A lady came to the door, and asked us to come in to register... a good sign. At a small coffee table, in the family room we paid our fare, and she instructed one of the kids (there were about 6) to get one of the older boys from outside to take us back to the park.

We followed a white truck on down past the tree line to... WOW... a really nice and relatively empty RV park. This turned out to be the nicest place we stayed so far. After we hooked up, we made some calls back home and then headed up to the farmhouse to bum a phone line to update the web page. Here we talked with Sig, the proprietor. He told us that they have been running the Park for about 2 years now... mostly catering to transient road works, who stay all summer. There were a few trailers that have been there since they opened. This past year they expanded and are starting to solicit more tourist business... like us. They have plans to add a small store, and RV wash in the next few years. Apparently this is what they intend to do for a living now, and they are renting out their farmland to others in the area. I'll tell you... if the road in ever gets paved... they will do a heck of a business... even so it looks like a pretty successful venture to Joe and I.

We heated up the leftover hamburger helper for dinner and finished off the salad. I put some finishing touches on our itinerary... which we were invalidating each day. Joe continued work on the website. After a couple hours we went to bed. Tomorrow we would start along the Alaska Highway once we reached Dawson's creek.

We got up pretty early this morning... and headed for the showers. The bathrooms were immaculate. The showers took "Loonies" (a one dollar Canadian coin) for 3 minutes... luckily we secured some loonies the night before. After some cereal we disconnected and drove the Winnebaigis up to the farmhouse to once again get online before leaving.

After our usual stop for gas we started back along Rt. 43 up to Dawson's Creek. This trip was pretty uneventful. Once we reached Dawson's Creek we stopped to take a picture of the Mile 0 sign. It wasn't until a few days later that we realized that we didn't get a picture of the official milepost 0 sight... we just got a picture of the city limits sign which did indicate that Dawson's Creek was considered mile 0 along the highway... Ohh Well.

Dawson's Creek is a pretty big town, so we decided to stop for groceries here and replenish our auto parts supply (i.e. Oil and such). After about a two hour layover here we started up the Alaskan Highway. The highway was much the same as it was below Dawson's Creek... excellent single lane paved road. We were able to make good time up to Fort Nelson a mere 177 miles up the road.

Once in Fort Nelson we stopped for gas. Gas was starting to get expensive up this way $0.73Can / liter ~ $1.91US / gallon. From there we headed to West End RV park... one of the 3 choices in town. West End was nothing spectacular, and they didn't have a phone line for Internet access. They did have free firewood... obvious scraps from a lumber processing plant... more on that later. Fort Nelson is actually where the engineers started building the Alaskan Highway, since when they arrived in Dawson's Creek a logging road already existed up to Fort Nelson.

Since it was somewhat early and still light out I decided to get the bike down and go for a ride. There was a sign to a nature trail leading out of the camp sight... seemed like a good prospect. I geared up and headed out on that trail... it was pretty nice... hoped a few logs. Unfortunately within about a half mile the trail dumped me onto a dirt road in the industrial section of town... so much for nature. I continued down the road till it met up with the Alaskan Highway. Here I rode along the 4-wheeler/snowmobile tracks along the road for about 2 miles. It started heading downhill pretty good, so I decided that I would turn around... no need to kill myself climbing back up. I decided to ride the road back, since it was uphill a bit and a good 4 miles back to our campsite.

While I was out biking Joe headed into town to check out the local culture, and see if he could find a bar... particularly one with a pool table. What Joe found was that not much happens in Fort Nelson after 5:00... and there was no obvious sign of a bar especially one with a pool table.

When I got back to camp, I was a bit cold from the ride, so I decided to make a fire with the free firewood. After about 30 minutes and a half bottle of propane (I was using a torch as a lighter) I had to give up trying to start the free firewood. I headed into the woods to find some dead trees, or anything not as soaking wet as the green pine they provided. Finally just as Joe got back I got a fire started... by this time I was pretty beat, and only enjoyed the warmth for about 45 minutes before heading into the Winnebaigis.

Inside we cooked up separate dinners... Joe wasn't interested in the Kraft Macaroni and Cheese I was making. After a pretty long day we quickly cleaned up and headed to bed. No need to work on the web page too much, since we didn't have any way to update it.

Today we awoke to a rather cold RV… Joe got up about 6:15 to plug in the ceramic heater, and quickly crawled back into the warmth of his bed. After about 40 minutes it started to warm up a bit, and we decided to brave the cold and head to the showers. Joe had some breakfast while I disconnected the rig. After that we were quickly under way… I had breakfast on the road.

We had a 330 mile stretch of the Alaskan highway ahead of us on our way to Watson Lake. (We hoped to continue our 2 day lead on our itinerary.) The highway was pretty good much like a typical two lane country highway. However, there were sections of pretty rough gravel where the road was under construction. Here they often used pilot cars to guide traffic one way through 3-5 miles stretches of road under construction. The road continued north-west ward through British Columbia and up into the Rocky Mountains.

Along the way we had the sights of a lifetime. The views in the first 100 miles were well worth the 3000+ miles we had come thus far. We were in awe of the beautiful yet rugged terrain that could be seen for miles around… the only sign of civilization being the highway itself. We must have taken 100+ photos and nearly 30 minutes of video footage in this section.

Some of the highlights included Stone Mountain, a fairly barren set of mountains amongst the vivid evergreens that covered the surrounding area. Folded Mountain, a huge formation of rock that buckled up as the North American continental shelf collided with the Pacific Ocean floor over 175 million years ago. And, Liard Hot Springs, a natural hot spring where there was a provincial park with pools for you to take a dip. The water was 100+ degrees but the strong stench of sulfur was enough to send us back to the Winnebaigis still dry. The sight of the day, however, was Muncho Lake, a 7-mile long patch of pristinely clean jade green water, whose beauty would be difficult to describe. The serenity you feel looking out along its glass like surface reflecting the mountains in the background would instantly relieve any amount of stress you are feeling.

The day was not without an RV repair. About 50 miles into today’s journey we noticed that our voltage meter was reading low, and our battery condition meter indicated that our battery was below 12 volts. After we turned off the GPS, stereo and all other 12-volt items, the battery condition seemed to improve, so we figured that we might have an alternator, or voltage regulator problem. We knew that we could get parts in Whitehorse in a day or so, but would we be able to nurse it that long? At Folded Mountain we diagnosed an intermittent miss on the passenger side as a faulty spark plug wire boot. The plug wire was arcing quite nicely against the exhaust manifold causing a significant miss. We also figured that this was quite likely the cause of the power drain, and that we didn’t have a problem with the charging system. After about 40 minutes and once again ripping apart our vast supply of tools we had a new boot on the wire, and were underway. Unfortunately after another 100 miles we noticed that we still had a bit of an arc, but not enough to cause a miss, so we had to repeat the repair process once again at camp.

After we crossed from British Columbia into the Yukon, we came to the town of Watson Lake at about 6:30 local time. Here we stopped by Fast Gas, gassed up and talked with some of the locals about the weather. They were telling us that it was unseasonably warm today at about 78 degrees, and that during the winter months they see temperatures as low as -40 regularly. Surprisingly they say they only receive 4-6 feet of snow during the year. We made camp right next store at the Downtown RV Park. Here we got a full service hookup for a mere 17 dollars Canadian (< $12 US) In addition they had a free self serve RV wash which I took advantage of… scrubbing down the grunge from the dusty sections of the highway.

Once at camp we made some phones call back home. We haven't had Internet access for over 36 hours now, leaving the website without updates and us without E-Mail. After finishing repairs on the RV I head for a nice shower and then vacuumed out the interior… a much-needed task. Joe heated up the leftover Manwhich for dinner, and we had our typical 1.5 hours of computer time before bed.

Last night when we inquired about a phone line for Internet access, they suggested that we try the local library. Figuring that was worth a shot, we had a relaxing morning while waiting for the library to open at 10:00am. I cooked up some pancakes and sausage for breakfast, while Joe headed up to the store to get some milk. After breakfast we cleaned up, relaxed and finally disconnected the rig to head down the road to the library. Much to our surprise the librarian knew exactly what we were looking for, and provided us with a phone line to dial out on. After about 40 minutes the web page was updated with 2 days worth of pictures and content.

From there we departed the small community of Watson Lake, and continued on down the Alaskan Highway toward Whitehorse (our intended destination) The scenery along the road was once again quite unbelievable. As we crossed from British Columbia into the Yukon the evergreen forest was visibly thicker. There were lots of signs of past forest fires where younger trees were taking up new ground near the charred remains of their ancestors. We stopped numerous times along the way to take pictures and video footage. We stopped at one river crossing... the water was so clear that we were actually able to see pike swimming below under the bridge.

About the half way point we stopped in Telsin, and for a small fee, we toured a Yukon wildlife museum. Here they had stuffed fish and animals placed in natural looking scenes displayed in large window boxes. After a stop at the near by gas station we where back on the road.

A short while later we noticed that our voltage meter was once again reading low. We stopped at a viewpoint, which happened to be the Continental Divide. Here we learned out the Continental Divide from the signs... pretty interesting. We also checked to see if our arcing sparkplug problem was back... it didn't appear to me. Therefore, we figured that we must have a problem with the alternator. Luckily Whitehorse was just about 50 more miles down the road, and we could make it there just before 5:00... so we could possibly get a new one tonight.

In about an hour we arrived in Whitehorse, the capitol of the Yukon. We prused through town in the RV looking for Auto Parts stores. We found an AC/Delco dealer, but he didn't have what we need in stock... so we continued searching. Joe then found a place that told us there were several that it could be, and that we should consider just getting a rebuild kit from the Napa down the road... that's what we decided to do in the morning.

We planned to be in Whitehorse for two days... it was a nice little town, and there was a lot to do and see, especially outdoors. Whitehorse has the only major airport in the Yukon, and does a good tourist business specializing in outdoor adventures (white water rafting, hiking, backpacking, fishing, and mountain biking). I could see myself coming back up here via plane at some point... we just didn't have the time to really enjoy much of what was offered.

We made camp at High Country RV Park. Here we unloaded the motorcycle and I cleaned up the bikes. We hoped that we would have our first day of outdoor fun tomorrow... riding our bikes into town along the bike path. Joe cooked up some Steak'ems... they were excellent! We cleaned up, updated web page information, and headed up to the laundry room, where they had a phone like for us to get on the Internet. After that we called it a night... we had a full day tomorrow (repairing our alternator, and enjoying the town of Whitehorse). I should mention that sunset in these parts is about 9:50pm, and it's light out till 10:45 or so... which can make it a bit difficult to get to sleep.

We got up and headed up to the washrooms. The doors had punch code door knobs like you would find in a computer room... both Joe and I found this a bit amusing in an RV park... but perhaps that accounted for the immaculately clean bathrooms. The code was 523 in case you're in the area and want to snag a free shower. Unfortunately it was a pretty dreary and rainy day today... it seemed that was going to spoil our plans for our bike ride.

After breakfast we started on the alternator. We did a couple of tests with our voltmeter, but neither of us we're confident enough about what we found to be sure it was the alternator. We did however figure that it could only have been the alternator, the voltage regulator (in the alternator) or the battery. After we ripped the alternator off, we headed into town to see if we could find a replacement. Since it was raining we geared up in rain jackets, gloves and helmets for the 3 mile ride to town... luckily the rain was pretty mild, and we didn't get all that wet.

At the first place we stopped I walked in and ask the guy behind the counter if they tested alternators... he looked at me weird and said "Umm... for cars" (I guess since I was holding a motorcycle helmet). After I pulled the alternator out of my backpack and set it on the counter he proceeded to tell me that they didn't have a machine to test them after all. Guess they only had a machine to test them, if I didn't actually have a use for it. In any case they didn't have the unit we needed, and they suggested that we try the Napa down the street.

The Napa not only had the alternator, they had rebuild kits that included the brushes and voltage regulator... they also had a service area where we could inquire about having ours tested. The service man said "if we left it he would get to it when he gets to it"... I mused whether or not that would be before winter, and we decided to just get the $10 rebuild kit as opposed to the $90 alternator.

Back at the RV I must say I was impressed with Joe's knowledge of alternators. He split the unit and installed the voltage regulator and brushes with ease. We then attempted to test it using a cordless impact wrench to spin it and a voltmeter to measure the voltage. The voltage only read 0.3 volts... speculating this may have been because the battery wasn't hooked to it, we installed it on the engine anyway. Again we tested, and we only measured 0.3 volts... and our gauge was still reading below normal... perhaps it is the battery we mused. Time to call "The World's Greatest Mechanic", my brother... Pete.

While Joe was on the phone with my brother, I asked Joe if he ever removed the pin he used to hold the brushes back while he was reassembling the unit... his eyes light up. Just in case however, we discussed other possibilities with Pete. Fortunately after we got back to the Winnebaigis and removed the pin, the alternator worked liked a champ.

Well that repair took a bit longer than we expected, but it still left us with some time to go into Whitehorse and be tourists. Besides we wanted to test-drive the Winnebaigis anyway. We stopped by the Klondike museum... a stern-wheel riverboat. We took a tour and learned about the ship's use in transporting goods along the Yukon river up to Dawson City during the Gold rush in the early 1900's. After that we headed downtown to the visitor information center and the post office. Then we cruised through Main Street and window-shopped a bit.

Soon we got back to the Winnebaigis and headed back into camp. Before we hooked back up, we decided to load up the motorcycle, and bikes. Were getting pretty good at it now... only took about 20 minutes this time... unfortunately we had a nice steady rain the whole time. Now it was laundry time, and since we were both pretty soaked we figured that we would take showers tonight while waiting for our laundry. The phone line was also right there, so we got the laptops to return E-Mail and update our web page. Once the laundry was complete and folded, I prepared some spaghetti with sausage meat for dinner.

We both agreed that it was a shame that we had such a rainy day... but if we were going to have rain, it was good that it was today rather than during the nice scenic drive the last two days. After we cleaned up from dinner we retired for the evening. Tomorrow we would leave the Alaska Highway and head up the Klondike Highway to the Gold Rush town of Dawson City. Upon crawling into my bunk I noticed that my bed was slightly damp... apparently the Winnebaigis had a leak in the stern roof... I stuffed a towel at the foot of the bed, and decided to deal with it in the morning.

I awoke to a fairly dry bed, but the towel was pretty soaked. The leak was pretty significant in the heavy rain over night. I rolled up the bed and placed our space heater up there to dry things out. Joe headed up on the roof to inspect the situation. Unfortunately the leak was in the area near the spare tire, but Joe thought he found the problem where the two pieces of molded plastic met. He gooped it up with silicon, but since it was still very damp, we weren't sure if that would solve the problem.

After stopping by the dump station, we got on the Klondike Highway pretty quickly since we took showers the night before. It was a pretty dreary day, which made the trip much less scenic than we had been used to. It did clear up a few times, and our surroundings weren't as spectacular as they were coming through the continental divide, but there were still enormous expanses of lush green forest. There were also miles and miles of recently charred forest from wildfires... perhaps last year's... since the saplings where just starting to sprout up again.

Along the way we heard an odd sound, which we speculated might have been a car passing us dragging a muffler. Soon though Joe realized what the problem was... our voltage was reading low again. In a few miles we pulled over to examine the situation. The belt for the alternator hopped off the bearing and wrapped around the cooling fan... it was still complete... so it must have just not been tight enough. Being as prepared as we were for this trip, we of course had an extra belt... and fixed this minor problem in about 15 minutes. We just needed to pickup another belt in town.

We passed through 2 very small towns... basically just a few buildings and a road house with gas... here gas was $0.83/liter well into the $2/gallon range... but the Winnebaigis needs its daily dose of fuel. We continued on up the road, which, for the most part, followed along the Yukon River Valley... the same path the stern wheelers took nearly a century ago. As we approached Dawson City there were huge piles of gravel lying everywhere along the road. We would later learn that these were the "tailings" from the dredging (mining) operations.

Dawson City was a small town with a few dirt roads running through it... they can't pave them due to problems with permafrost. For how remote the city is it was pretty well equipped. After we made camp at the only RV Park downtown... Gold Rush Campground, we called around looking to get a replacement fan belt to replenish our supply. The store had plenty in stock, and they told us they were about a mile away just over the bridge. That seemed close enough to walk... so we headed out. After heading down the road about 2.5 miles we still couldn't see the bridge... so we decided to turn around and just pick it up in the morning. (I think Canadian's just don't grasp the concept of miles since they measure everything in Kilometers) Walking back through town we stopped at the grocery store and stocked up on supplies. The general store was very well stocked, even with nice produce... it was a little pricey, but I guess that's to be expected.

Back at camp we reviewed the tourist information in the area and it seemed there was a lot to see. In addition, there was a nice 20 mile recreation trail outside town that I thought would make an excellent mountain bike ride. We decided to stay here an extra day using one of the days we were ahead of schedule.

Since we didn't have a phone line here... we let the web page stuff slide for a day. For dinner we grilled up some really nice NY Strip Steak that we picked up in Dawson's Creek. We had a nice dinner of garlic mashed potatoes, corn, salad and steak. After that huge meal we had a lot to clean up. It was still quite bright out at this hour (9:30), so we decided to head into town to find a saloon. What we found seemed to be the local hang out, and they had a pool table... right up Joe's alley. After about 45 minutes I left Joe behind and headed back to camp to get some sleep. Joe came in about 1.5 hours later.

This morning we got up about 8:00 and headed for the showers. After breakfast we disconnect the Winnebaigis and headed into town for a day of sight seeing. Our first stop was, of course, the Auto Parts store we attempted to walk to the night before. For the record it was 3.8 miles from the RV Park. Here we picked up an alternator belt, to replenish our supply, and some silicon to continue work on the leak in our stern.

From there we started down a dirt road that was surrounded in tailings on either side. Soon we came to Dredge #4, the device responsible for making all the tailings. This was a huge contraption setting on blocks, that was being restored by Parks Canada. In the early 1900 most of the stakes in the area were auctioned off to dredge companies who used these devices to sift trough the small creek beds in the area in search of gold. The dredge consisted of a huge conveyer of buckets, each weighing 4,000 pounds that dug into the creek bed to a depth of as much as 57' till it hit bedrock. The extraction was filtered through a trommel, which dropped anything smaller that about 1" into sleuth boxes. The remaining rock was spewed out the back on a smaller conveyer... these were the tailings. The sleuth boxes used running water and a precise angle to extract the gold.

We got to tour the dredge... its quite an impressive heap of timber and iron, especially considering its age. It is a bit amusing looking at the behemoth knowing that it was used to extract gold about the size of grains of sugar from the creek beds. The dredging has quite and ecological impact in this area... It is somewhat disgusting looking through the Dawson's City area with is miles and miles of tailings. But, as Joe pointed out, the ecological impact here isn't significantly different that what, strip mining, quarrying, or zinc factories have done, and in some cases are continuing to do in our home state of Pennsylvania.

From there we headed down the road a bit further to Discovery Claim. Here we saw someone find 3 small grains of gold while panning. We didn't bother panning ourselves, as it seemed far to tedious a task... kinda like picking crabs. From here we planned to head to Bear Creek, but the area didn't open till 3:00... so, to kill time, we headed back into town and got gas. After that we had a late lunch in front of the Bear Creek gate.

Bear Creek is the camp where the dredging company had its base of operations. Here they maintained the 12 dredges they had running at any given time, and processed the gold. We toured the machine shop. Here there was a number of traveling cranes and winching devices, black-smithing equipment, a bearing grinder, and other remnants of the industrial era. In addition we saw a building where they bottled their own acetylene and oxygen for welding. Then we toured the gold room... this area was in great conditions since Parks Canada bought this immediately after the company shutdown in 1966. In the gold room workers sifted through the contents of the sleuth boxes... a pains taking process done almost entirely by hand. Once they had ~900 ounces of gold they would melt it and make a gold bar. Even this wasn't pure... it still had traces of copper and silver in it.

Looking around Bear Creek its pretty impressive how self sufficient the community was. The machine shop was impressive, but factor in the era and how remote this area is, its downright amazing. I can't help but feel, that with all our communications devices and computers, we have lost some if the ingenuity and engineering talent that must have been possessed by the people of this era.

After leaving Bear Creek we headed out to the trail I wanted to mountain bike. The road up was a bit of a stretch for the Winnebaigis but we made it. We started to gear up and take the bikes down when Joe pointed out that it was going to rain. Well... it started to rain... I still was willing to head out, but Joe had no intention of beginning the journey in the rain. He said there was no point in getting soaking wet, muddy, and sick just for the sake of saying that we went Mt. Biking. I waited for about 45 minutes, and decided that I hadn't been on my bike yet this trip, and a little rain wasn't going to stop me. I told Joe to give me 10 minutes (in case it totally sucked and I wanted to give up) then he could head back to town (about 6 miles away). I headed out and made it about 1.4 miles up the hill. Perhaps if it wasn't so incredibly wet, or quite so steep it would have been more enjoyable. But, with both factors, it just didn't seem worth while... Besides I still had the 7 mile trip back to the RV Park. It was a pretty cold ride back into town. The rain was slowing, but the traffic along the Klondike Highway kicked up enough moisture it was tough to tell. Once back at the RV I grabbed a cup of hot chocolate, and headed for a nice warm shower. Then I started cleaning up my gear... quite the task.

We decided to head into town for dinner... figuring there was no point in cooking if someone else was going to do it for us. We made our way to the Downtown Hotel, and had a pretty nice dinner and a few local beers. From here we headed back to the RV and worked on the website a bit. After a long day of tourism, we retired for the evening.