Category Archives: 2014 Antioch road trip

25 June Banff Tunnel Mountain Village III Campground

Posted on June 28, 2014 | Leave a comment

On the way out of Waterton, we drove through the Bison Paddock where we saw a solitary bison, a group of four bison, and a wolf. As we drove to Banff, we saw big horned sheep. We provisioned in Cranmore.IMG_6529 IMG_6510

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24 June Waterton National Park Crandall Mountain Campground

Posted on June 25, 2014

This gallery contains 3 photos.

We wanted a more forest-like setting as a camp, so we moved for one night to the near-by Crandall Mountain Campground with no hook-ups but set amongst the trees.  We saw a bear by the roadside and were visited by … Continue reading →

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23 June Waterton National Park Town Site Campground

Posted on June 25, 2014 | Leave a comment
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St Mary Lake, Glacier NP

On June 23 we traveled up the east side of Glacier Nal’l Park and crossed the Canadian border.  We headed to Waterton NP, the Canadian part of Glacier NP, which straddles the border & shares Waterton Lake.

The Canadian parks are more integrated into commercial & residential activities than their American counterparts.  Thus the town of Waterton is like any handsome small town with private houses and a busy commercial center, even though its in a National Park. We stayed at the in-town RV park with full hook-ups which was not particularly charming, but was close to everything.

Waterton Lake

Classic launch, being restored

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US-Canadian border, kept clear by Homeland Security.

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Canadian launch docked in the American end of Waterton Lake

We took the boat trip across Lake Waterton, crossing the US border again and landed back in an isolated outpost in Glacier NP before returning.  We also checked out the main lodge at the lake.

The next day we moved to the more remote campground with no hookups, but beautiful surroundings and deer wondering through.

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22 June Glacier National Park Two Medicine Campground

Posted on June 25, 2014 | Leave a comment

We decided to head back to the eastern side of Glacier NP, but stopped to take in some of the sights & a white water raft ride first.  So we drove up the “Going to the Sun” road as far as we could, since it was closed to through-traffic due to late snow storms.  (It had rained & snowed a lot a few days before we arrived.)

Lake McDonald

Lake McDonald

IMG_6403 IMG_6402 The white water rafting was great fun, but no pictures.  Then we got on the road to the eastern side of the park and Two Medicine lake.  This was a lot less crowded but much more scenic.

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Two Medicine Lake

Running Eagle Falls

Running Eagle Falls. Also called Trick Falls because there’s a second fall on the right lower side of the falls.

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21 June Glacier National Park, Fish Creek Campground

Posted on June 25, 2014 | Leave a comment
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Colorful Montana farmland

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Crossing the northern Montana Plains Crossing the northern Montana Plains

We got to Glacier NP late in the afternoon, having watched the Rocky Mountains loom larger as we crossed the northern Montana plains.  Our first choice of campgrounds was full, but we found space at the nearby Fish Camp (no hookups) which was very charmingly situated among the pines. Camping at Fish Creek, Glacier Nat'l Park,West side

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18-19 June Bismarck ND, Malta MT 20 June

Posted on June 21, 2014 | Leave a comment

Visit with friends  in Bismarck and get some exhaust system repairs. We had a great visit with Val and Gary and Molly had fun with Sophie and Alice, standard poodles.

"Nellie" being fixed in Bismark

“Nellie” being fixed in Bismarck

image image imageJessie & Val with Sophie, Alice & Molly Val & Gary's, Bismark ND

We drove US-2 across half of North Dakota and a third of Montana to get into Edgewater Inn & RV Park in Malta. The park is next to the Milk River and the railroad, which was quite busy. We live near the rail line in Mountain View so the train sounds don’t bother us. We met a couple bicycling from Maine to Oregon. Wow.

On Saturday the 21st we got on US-2 at 7:30 am to continue our journey to Glacier National Park. We hear they have had a lot of rain and now melt leading to floods. But we are out of “tornado alley.”

There are occasional historic posts along US-2 in Montana.

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18 June Heading to Bismarck ND through Tornado Alley

Posted on June 18, 2014 | Leave a comment

We got in late & stayed overnight in the back lot of a Camping World store in Rogers MN thinking they would be able to work on the exhaust pile, but at 8am service manager told us they couldn’t help us and he sent us to another RV dealer nearby and we sent off to find Pleasureland RV in Anoka. Theyi in turn send us to a muffler and brake shop in Elk River. They told us they could help us but not until the next day *but* our current configuration is perfectly safe. So we are off to Bismarck to arrive Wed 18 Jun as planned. Perhaps we will get the tailpipe improved in Bismarck.

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Camping in the back lot of a Camping World store

Making do

With a tornado watch in force until 9 pm and severe thunderstorms with baseball-sized hail possible, we headed to Bismarck ND. Got there with no problems.

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17 Jun Rogers Minnesota

Posted on June 18, 2014 | Leave a comment

On the way to St Cloud we encountered a breakdown. The tailpipe broke loose and lodged between the right rear dual tires around 3 pm. Phone calls ensued trying to get roadside assistance via Good Sam and warranty coverage. After numerous circular conversations, a truck mechanic arrived at 7 pm to cut the damaged part loose and fasten the remaining tailpipe to the underbody.

Break down! Near Minneapolis

We spent the night in the Rogers MN Camping World parking lot to be there at 8 am when service opened.

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15 June Byron Illinois, 16 June Forest City Iowa

Posted on June 17, 2014 | Leave a comment

We had a lovely visit with friends Meredith and Brad in Byron IL and then headed west for Iowa. Western Illinois really is scenic.  The town of Byron is dominated by the resident nuclear plant’s cooling tower that can be seen for miles.

Jessie, Brad & Meridith

Jessie, Brad & Meridith

Before we left Byron, Brad noticed that the tail-pile hanger strap was separated, which I thought that we could address at our next stop, the Winnebago factory.  We could not, as it turned out, and this had consequences on the following day, June 17.

Broken exhaust hanger...

We arrived at the Winnebago Visit Center in Forest City Iowa late and got set up just as a “severe” thunderstorm arrived. It was rocking and rolling with wind, rain, hail, thunder and lightning. We abandoned our plan to cook outdoors and stayed glued to the weather channel. Although we had a tornado warning (a step up from a tornado watch on the Red Cross Tornado app I got for the iPhone) fortunately no tornado, although one hit Mason City about 12 miles from Forest City.

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Tuesday morning we did the factory tour. It was interesting to see the scope and complexity of the mixed model production line. I’d like to get some information on the software that’s used to manage that. No photos in the factory but here’s one in the Visitor Center. It’s a 1967 model that was used for interstellar travel in Mel Brooks’ movie Space Balls.  Interestingly, the interior RV layout was about the same as our new model.

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13-14 June Hilton Garden Inn, Beavercreek OH and the Antioch Reunion

Posted on June 15, 2014 | Leave a comment

Since we did not have reservations at John Bryan Park for the weekend, we relocated to the Hilton in nearby Beavercreek.  In retrospect, this was neither a convenient location nor an improvement over staying in the Navion. IMG_6288

We had to check out the Yellow Springs street fair, which is HUGE and generally a lower price point than Northern California events. The village of Yellow Springs swells from 3500 inhabitants to more than 30,000!!

The reunion was a chance to catch up with some old friend and meet some new ones. Campus tour highlights were seeing the progress on the Art and Science Building (studios and labs side by side), the Wellness Center (formerly Curl Gym) with the much anticipated fabulous swimming pool, the farm (aww lambs!), and beautiful innovative green facilities arising from the years of benign and not so benign neglect.

The grand finale was the State of the College address by Mark Roosevelt at the Celebration Dinner. After a clever and hilarious video on the accreditation site visit (featuring confusion about Japanese, Javanese, and bad knees), a visit from Horace Mann (back from the dead as is the college), we were treated to the decision of the accreditation board that Antioch College had advanced to candidacy *and* had fast track status (2 years instead of 4).

Next year will be graduation for the first class of the new Antioch and the 50th anniversary of the Martin Luther King speech at Antioch. It will also be the critical point in the accreditation.

No pictures of the reunion events!

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