Traveling Day
Well we were up at 4 am which seemed rather early after trying to find sleep. During the night everyone illegally shot off all of their fireworks they purchased legally until all hours of the night. Leave it to WI to have a law that allows you to purchase something you can not legally use.
Before leaving the house this year I made doubly sure the toilets were not running before locking the door. Did I mention in last years blog that our water bill was 10 times more water than ever before? I do not think it was the toilet running, it was the kids I hired to water the flowers who forgot to turn off the hose. Our water consumption would have filled two pools. This year we thought we covered all of the details which included getting the refrigerator clear of all perishable foods. On the way to the airport this year, we remembered left a nectarine sitting in the fruit bowl. Hmmmm, wonder what sort of mess that will look and smell like in fifteen more days. I bet it will not look or smell like a raisin.
The trip out of Milwaukee went very smooth. We had a nice flight into Dallas, where we had a tasty late breakfast and then were off to board the flight to Calgary. We were waiting to be called for boarding when they came across the announcements that our plane was not going anywhere and they were currently trying to locate a different plane for our flight. Hmmm, I am very thankful they decided to pull the plane before we all were on it and zooming down the run way. The Captan said the equivalent of a "cars check engine light" was on. So better to have that attended too. After a two hour delay we were finally boots off the ground and headed for Calgary.
Flying in over Calgary we were able to get a birds eye view of some of the flood damage. The Calgary Stampede starts today and the city is abuzz. Calgarians worked very hard to get the city drained, fixed and functional by today. It was only two weeks ago when much of the city was under flood waters. The city is built all along a river, so the flood damage was significant. From the reports on the radio they feel they made the transition well. There were still many informational announcements playing on the radio of where people should go if they needed medical assistance in regards to the flood disaster.
I will mention that the airport staff really got into the flavor of the stampede as they were all duded up in their best cowboy get ups, boots, hats and all. Ah heck, they were so excited we even received a stampede branding before leaving the airport, just like branding your cows! They were using branding irons fixed with stamp pads with the 2013 Calgary stampede insignia and red ink and stamping everyone hand.
As we were driving down to Glacier National Park the remains of the flood waters still stood. In one place we saw school buses parked in flooded areas with water up to their windows. Trees standing in what appears to be a lake, but clearly the lake is supposed to be a stream. The were lots of highway cones set up marking spots in the road where it had washed out.
On our drive we were still in the rolling foot hills when the cars in front of us all were slamming on their brakes and swerving to the right or left. We came up to a female moose, which had recently been hit and killed laying in the center of the road. As we pass that moose we look around and are wondering why the moose would be way, way, way out on the rolling foot hills. It is so open and full of hay and canola fields that I find it strange the moose would be there. We later found out that many animals were still discombobulated from the floods and are wandering all over the place.
As we are traveling down to Glacier, want to stop for groceries before crossing the border, as shopping options a extremely limited where we will be staying. We also have to make sure we get across the border before the Customs office closes for the night. Ah yes, traveling is full of adventure. Stay tuned.
We finally arrived at the cabin by Duck Lake, this will be our home for 8 days. This cabin was difficult to find. The directions are to turn left at the road that is approximately 3.2 miles from junction... (Here is where I mention our car odometer and speedometer is metric.) Then look for the brown shed from the phone company off to the left for a visual on where the road is. Yep you guessed it, we drove by and turned around .75 kilometers up the road past the brown shed and headed back to the no name road. Once we are on the road, we are to proceed across the cattle barrier and turn right at the sign that is marked West Duck Lake Road lot 1. The sign actually says Lake Road lot 1. Missing the Duck Lake part... The road we are traveling on is by far the worst gravel road we have ever traveled on. I read later in the week the little "comment book" the owner left next to the "read first binder" a husband and wife said they blew two tires while driving on that road... I'm wondering how they managed to get service way out in this remote location?
Well we did take the turn, taking a chance that we would not end up driving into someone else's property. Found the house well hidden back in the woods. After a very long day we were happy to get into the house, unpack, and ready ourselves for tomorrow morning's hike. We got our 4 liters of water all mixed up with Crystal Light and Vita-Lyte, coffee and oatmeal ready, and lunches squared away. Then, we saw the binder marked "Welcome, READ FIRST!" In the binder we found out that we should not drink the water but it is ok to shower and wash clothes with. They must be kidding, there was no mention of drinking water issues when we rented this house... By this time, I have already slugged down 20 oz of the tap water. Nice! Wonder what will happen with that? Getting the trots at the beginning of a hiking adventure would not go well...
We had to re-do the hiking water which I had already mixed up with lemonade and energy mix for tomorrow. Thankfully there was a 2 1/2 gallon jug of store bought water on the counter to use.
Oh yes, and since we noticed that there were mice traps on a shelf in the laundry room, we decided we had better secure all of our food. We stored our food under a big stock pot, in large bowls with plates over the tops as covers, and even put some in the microwave. It was always a surprise to open the microwave and see a bag of Cheetos in there. I'm just hoping the mouse in the house is as friendly as the mouse we had on our last visit to Glacier! Somehow this is not how I imagined the vacation starting.
Off to bed it is midnight. Today started at 4 am...
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