The Destinator? (temporarily…)

Laramie, WY

We’ve talked about how a life on the road includes all the things that life usually does anywhere else. Well, another one of those things came up. We were over the Sierras and most of the way through Nevada when we got word that Sue’s parents were having some issues with her father’s care in Florida. Clearly the best way to help out was to be there.

Continue reading “The Destinator? (temporarily…)”

Auburn, CA

Doug, Sue, Sue, Pete

We last met up with Pete and Sue on the road two years ago in Salem, OR. They’re also RVers, so we’ve got a lot in common beyond Pete and I being related in some distant fashion (it’s not actually that obscure – his father and my mom’s father were 1st cousins). Also of interest is that Pete is the older brother of David, Pinky, and Katy.

Continue reading “Auburn, CA”

Skyline, revisited

Rebeka, Jayne, Monika, Augie

We mentioned in the previous post that we had rearranged our itinerary to include a stop near San Francisco, which we’d talk about later. That will be this post. There is also a post titled ‘Skyline‘ that I wrote during our trip two years ago that provides background that is relevant to this one.

In the Skyline post, I talked about my Aunt Ami and my Uncle Dick. A few weeks ago, as we were driving off the ferry to Nanaimo on Vancouver Island, the phone rang. Ami was calling to tell us that Dick had passed away.

Continue reading “Skyline, revisited”

Ninilchik – Salmonfest 2019

In August 1969, almost exactly fifty years ago, three days of music, peace & love in upstate New York defined a generation and became a legend against which every future music festival would be judged. For us, the Woodstock anniversary thus brings significance to our stay in the tiny Cook Inlet town of Ninilchik, site of the annual Salmonfest music festival – “three days of fish, love & music at the cosmic center of the salmonverse.”

Continue reading “Ninilchik – Salmonfest 2019”

Tok Rendezvous

Dana, Muffin, Sue, Doug

I got an email about a month ago from Dana, my old friend and college roommate. Among other news, in this email he mentioned a trip upon which he and Muffin were about to embark to BC and the Yukon. I wrote back that we’d just come up through there, had that day entered Alaska, and were planning on spending the next couple of months exploring there before heading back towards home through BC and the Yukon. There ensued a series of “Wait, what?!” emails back and forth and, to summarize, we figured out that we could arrange at the end of June to rendezvous in Tok, which is Alaska’s ultimate crossroads where the Alaska Highway meets and splits from roads in every possible direction.

Continue reading “Tok Rendezvous”

Jammin’ with Lucky Larry

Larry and Rasta

Last July we stopped on our way to Calgary for a visit in Linden, AB with my friend Larry and his wife Barb. Larry is a guitar-playing blues brother that I met through Blues Guitar Unleashed, as we’ve both been working our way through learning to play the blues. Well, we had a fine time and it seemed a great idea to see if we could stop by again as we head for Alaska. Answers: yes, we can stop by, and yes, it was great!

Continue reading “Jammin’ with Lucky Larry”

Jammin’ in Portage, MI

Doug & Tom

The more we travel, the more places there are that we have been to, and the more likely we are to cross a path we’ve followed before. Such was the case as we figured how we were going to get from St. Louis to Vermont. Suppose we went up to Michigan, then back into Canada and around the north side of Lake Erie? Well, looky here, that path might go right by Kalamazoo!

Continue reading “Jammin’ in Portage, MI”

Salmon Arm, BC: Smokin’ Roots & Blues Festival

That word Smokin’ in the title is an intentional double-entendre. Both potential interpretations are relevant and accurate.

We’d taken an excursion to Penticton for a visit, and part of our intention after that was to spend a little more time away from the national parks in the Canadian Rockies during the prime vacation period. Well, right between Penticton and Revelstoke is this place called Salmon Arm (which you can pronounce like “seminar,” except you add an M at the end) where they’ve been putting on a huge music festival for three days every August for, like, 28 years.

Continue reading “Salmon Arm, BC: Smokin’ Roots & Blues Festival”

Penticton, BC

Dream Cafe, Penticton BC

Barring something unforeseen, Penticton, BC is the farthest west we will venture on this trip. We’d actually intended to begin moving eastward again from Revelstoke, but as we were filling in the details we found out that Lisa Brokop and Paul Jefferson would be doing a show a few hours from there at right about the same time we were in the area. Lisa is a Canadian singer/songwriter now based in Nashville. Her husband, American singer/songwriter Paul Jefferson, is my cousin.

Continue reading “Penticton, BC”

The Northwest Territories

Northwest Territories license plate

We love Northwest Territories and have thoroughly enjoyed our travels here, and we hope that sentiment has come through in our 3 prior posts. In those, we’ve included observations and thoughts about diversity, friendly people, great music, interesting small towns, and a unique city. This post includes a few more of our thoughts about the Northwest Territories and a few noteworthy things that didn’t make it into any of the other three. We did a post kind of like a year ago in Utah that we called “the space between.” This is in that same spirit.

To start with, as it says on their license plate – the only one in the world shaped like a polar bear – Northwest Territories is spectacular!

Continue reading “The Northwest Territories”