Alaska RV Camping Journal- Day 20

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Alaska Recreational Vehicle Camping Journal

An RV camping trip to Alaska is a dream most RVers will never get to experience. We are fortunate to have been able to spend the time to take this amazing RV camping trip. Follow our daily RV camping travels as we cover over 6000 miles of the most incredible scenery in North America. We'll share a few pictures of the trip along the way, but pictures can not do justice to this beautiful landscape.

The Campers

Passengers on our RV camping trip were Brian, Margie, Helen (Brian's Mom is 87), Casey our 4 ½ year old Golden Retriever, and Sox, a 10 year old gray house cat with an attitude. Brian and Margie have been living full time in their 36' Class A motor home over 3 years, and boondock (remote dispersed camping) almost always. Mom has RV camping experience since she and Brian's Dad owned both a pickup camper, and Class C motor home.

Mileposts

You will notice that we often refer to the Mileposts book throughout the journal entries. We feel that if you drive to Alaska, you MUST have this book! Alaska, and Canada's British Columbia and Yukon are rich in History. Jack London wrote popular novels such as White Fang, and Call of the Wild, and the contemporary poet Robert Service helped make knowledge of life in the north country wilderness well known. The Mileposts book will help you learn about the history as you go, with descriptions of what happened in the past, as well as what to expect on the road ahead.

We recommend that you only use the most current issue of Mileposts as it contains the most up-to-date road and service availability information.

Road to Kenai & Old Friends!

Rain most of the night and drizzly into the remainder of the day. Won’t be going far as our destination is Kenai City.   We see another black bear along the roadside, and also stop at the dump station in the refuge to lighten our load! It does make you a little nervous to be out in the absolute wild where bears are roaming around freely in their own habitat. Always a good to get the big picture before you go wandering around!

Brief stop at Fred Meyers in Soldotna for $50 worth of fuel, before heading to Kenai. There are lots of RV’s in the parking lot as they offer overnight parking here.

We arrive at the Kenai Visitor Center and Brian calls his friend Bill who lives at Kenai. He and his wife Lin have lived there for 4 years and we are their first visitors! This says something about the tremendous distances involved here! He suggests we stay at the Kenai RV Park there in “town” and he’ll drive in to see us.

The Kenai RV Park does not get our 5 star approval rating, but since we seldom stay at such places maybe we are out of our league on commenting about it. For one thing the sign said “Senior and Travel Discounts”. Since Mom is 87 and we belong to both AARP and FMCA we were hopeful for some break on the price which was $30 per night. The guy working there claimed the owner was new and he hadn’t shown him how to give discounts, nor was he available to ask! Also only 1 washer and dryer in working order, the pay phone was out of order, and the cable TV was not working either. The pluses would be it was a quiet place to stay , and the laundry and restrooms were clean. They had a book exchange, new copies of the Milepost Magazine (which I desperately needed, since mine was falling apart from use!), and video tapes available at no charge.

Bill arrived to pick us up and was so excited driving in he ran over a planter the owners has just filled with pretty spring flowers! Oh, there’s another plus about the RV Park, they didn’t charge us for the planter!

We visited briefly at our place and then Bill took us over to the the Moose Lodge, where Bill and Lin are very active members. Mom and I had some excellent seafood chowder, but Brian is holding out for dinner and a steak! Bill then chauffeured us out to a place where we could look out across the Cook Inlet-was it ever beautiful!

Lin and Bill live north of town not far from the Captain Cook State Recreation Area, which looked to have some excellent RV camping opportunities. They share their 4 bedroom home with a big Cockatiel, a large white bird, and a huge green parrot too! Also they both have rooms of collectibles, but out favorite feature was a big, goofy, Golden Retriever “Buddy” that could have been Casey’s twin! This dog was curly and red, just like ours! The dogs had a blast running around the yard and we had a real good visit! When Lin came home from grocery shopping, we fooled her by letting Casey go to greet her instead of Buddy! She was fooled but not for long! It was a hoot!

We go out for dinner at a restaurant called “The Tree House”. Bill and Helen order the prime rib, and Mom specifically asks for the “end cut”. Lin and I have the Spaghetti Marinara, and Brian finally gets to order his sirloin steak. Portions in Alaska have proven to be quite large , but Mom’s “end cut” prime rib is the biggest we’ve ever seen-about the size of a huge beef roast! We are all very happy with our choices and enjoyed a very nice evening! We head home with Bill’s 1994 Nissan Pathfinder, he’s loaned it to us for our trip to Homer tomorrow!

Miles on Gozer 77064 -- Miles today 41.

Road Notes: 19 mile loop through Kenai NWR is a good gravel road, although quite washboard, but you need to watch for potholes and slow down to see the wildlife. Back on Highway 1 the road is good and traffic isn’t heavy until you approach Soldotna.

Tomorrow - The End of the Road - Homer

Yesterday - Bear Bait!