Our Glorious Trip, Part 2

We ended up stopping again to camp at Meziadin Jct at 11pm (if I am reading the notes right). It was another quick set up, just the one tent again, and huddled closer to keep warm. Joey slept with us and Nate snuggled in with the big brothers to share heat. We were up at 6am, freezing, and Wes and I immediately grabbed a little one and got them into the heated van. Matt and Josh fumbled with the tent, having a hard time getting the thing back in the bag while Wes folded up the air mattress. EVERYONE was grumbling, cold, tired and irritated. We would have liked to sleep longer, but it was just to cold to do anything but climb back in the vehicles.

We got kind of lost, since the GPS took us through a tiny town to cross to another highway. We decided to stop so I could eat some MEAT for breakfast. We found this little out of the way restaurant called the Kitwanga Coffee Cup (they have a FB account!) and I had the best darn breakfast since my Dads! I enjoyed every bite while enjoying the view off of the porch and the kids played at the park across the field from us. They got to have their first view of grass hoppers, crickets and such. They had NO idea that grasshoppers flew and it freaked them out to go through the field to the park at first. (That and the fear of snakes I am sure). We stayed for a good hour or so, even having the owner (and only one there) make the kids hot ham and cheese sandwiches for lunch. It was a beautiful 83 degrees when we hit the road again.

On our way through Prince George (5:49), there were hitchhikers everywhere, and it began to storm. It was getting hard to see, and honestly, I was getting frightened at how dark it was getting with the rain blocking my view out the windshield. We ended up stopping at the only two buildings we found on the lonely road through Prince George. We pulled behind a grocery store, put Joey and Nate in the back of the van on top of the boxes (they called them 'bump beds'), Luke sprawled out in his dad's back seat, and the rest of us laid our seats down as far as we could and crashed. No complaints again tonight! These kids were pretty easy to travel with!! (And no accidents either, thank you very much)

7/29~ I woke with my legs so badly swollen that I could not move my toes. I guessed it was the seat cutting into my legs that night and figured it would go down once I got moving. It didn't. The lady that owned a small diner across the street (the only other building on that road) told us she had showers in her camp ground behind the store. She let us have the keys without asking for anything as payment, just took pity on us I guess, lol. We enjoyed a hot shower and fresh new clothes before we had to get on the road again. The swelling did not change, even with lots of water. We walked around Williams Lake, tossing stones and stretching our legs. We drove by a huge brush fire on Jackass Mountain, and we went through a tunnel (several actually) when we got to the top of Jackass Mountain. It was in the high 90's, and it was too hot to even step out of the vehicles. The altitude, and the swelling in my legs began to make me sick. I was so dizzy, and Wes was worried I would have to go to the hospital in another Country! We found a shaded rest stop in one of the curves of the mountain, the boys plugged in a movie in the van, and I fell asleep in the truck with my legs propped up on the dash. It was a little better an hour later...and on we went.
We were determined to get out of Canada!

We rode the Caribou Gold Rush Trail, and hit Cle Ellen, Washington and a Lynden KOA campground for the night. WHEW! It took us one day to get INTO Canada, and THREE to get OUT!

Our Glorious Trip, Part 3 coming soon...