Day One…Travel is better left to Monday

If your holidays consist of travel by car, Monday is a day to consider as Day One.

We had all the good intentions of everyone that has vacation dreams dancing in their heads.  Get away early and beat the traffic!  And we tried…we really did.  The intent was to leave the house by 7:30 right after a quick breakie at home.  Tip one.  Pack as much in the car the night before as you possibly can leaving only the very last minute things for the morning.  That way you won’t have our experience of running around collecting things that should have been stored already.

Tip two.  If you even remotely consider getting gas for the car the day before, do so as soon as you think of it.  Procrastination has never helped anyone.  That should be the hint that our first order of buisness (after finally leaving the house at 8:00) was to get gas.  Wait in line, get the gas then decide that the car should look at least somewhat presentable (for whom I don’t know), so into the car wash we go.

Off to our daughter’s house to leave the dog.  Of course, grandma had not yet seen the yard with the newly laid sod so an inspection had to be done.  Kiss the grandbaby repeatedly then into the car.  Tip three.  See tip one.  Go BACK to the house to get jackets for the cruise to Alaska.  After all, Glacier Bay doesn’t get it’s name from its bikini clad natives.

So now by 9:00 we’re actually on our way.  West through Jasper and down to Clearwater.  And Monday is, in fact, a good travel day.  At least it was for us.  Very little traffic, not terribly hot, no rain (other than about 5 minutes in a stretch just outside of Valemont).

Did we make good time, given the easy ebb and flow of other vehicles?  Not really.  Stopped a number of times to stretch.  Stopped for a made-in-the-car sandwich for lunch.  Got to Clearwater just after 4:00 B.C. time.  Did we care?  Nope.  This is a vacation, not the Indy 500.

By the way…if you’re ever in Clearwater, we definitely recommend two places.  The first is our Bed & Breakfast (and we frequent these on any of our land excursions).  It is the Stoneshire Guest House.  And that is what it is.  We stayed in the upper portion of a bi-level house.  Two bedrooms, kitchen, full bathroom, living room, free Wi-Fi and breakfast served in the morning.  As B&Bs go, well worth the $130/night.

The second place is the Painted Turtle Restaurant which is in a rather unlikely location (the middle of an RV campground/resort).  However it has two things going for it.  The first is the fact that it directly overlooks the lake and has an outside porch that will make a fabulous spot to enjoy dining weather permitting.  The second is the food.  It is very good and not totally outrageous in price.  (Gas, however, is a different story @125.9/litre)

A long day but totally enjoyable.  Ending now with a glass of wine in hand and feet up on the couch.  We’ll be back here tomorrow…when we should be in Seattle.