August Update 2021
Hi Everyone, well here is the August update for the Glampur’s, and I know I am a bit late. August will see us start to travel towards the West Coast of BC heading towards Nanaimo on Vancouver Island. This will be our big trip of the 2021 camping season. We will be on the road for 15 days, with our end destination being Tofino BC. We will leave Calgary on August 28th, traveling to Kamloops and the Lac Le Jeune Campground off of the Coquihalla Hwy just outside of Kamloops BC. We will spend one night here before heading to Hope BC and the Coquihalla Campground for two nights. On the way we will stop at the Othello tunnels. These tunnels were part of the Kettle Valley railway that ran from the lower mainland into the BC interior following the southern route. These tunnels were carved out of mountain stone to create amazing rail beds to allow the trains to travel through the mountainous terrain. If you get a chance to see these manmade wonders I would highly recommend the stop. I have been here several times over the years and the stop never gets tiring or boring. The parking lot for the tunnels is big rig friendly.
From Hope we will make our way to the ferry terminal in Horseshoe Bay and then on to the Island, landing at Departure Bay in Nanaimo. From there it will be a short trip to our destination, the Living Forest RV Park and Campground. Here, we will spend a week visiting with friends and family before moving on to Tofino and my daughter’s Birthday Party. Once in Tofino we will spend another week exploring the town and doing tours and staying at the Surf Grove Campground. Hopefully we can see some whales! Once our week is up it will be a quick trip back to Calgary stopping once in Nanaimo again at the Living Forest RV Park and Campground followed by a night’s stay at the Coquihalla Campground in Hope. Then there will be the big push back to Calgary.
July’s trip to St. Mary Reservoir was a total bust! Both Lorraine and I were disappointed with this campground. As we drove into the campground all looked fine, but the moment we had backed into our site and got out of the RV we were swarmed by mosquitos and black flies. Yuck! The entire time we were there we fought with the mosquitos and flies. It was very tiring swatting these pesky insects, even bug repellent did not work on them. The so called river through the campsite was more like a slough, with marshy banks and a lot more mosquitos. Even Finn was bothered by the massive amount of bugs at this campground. The campground was so uninspiring that I took very few photos, and Lorraine and I spent a lot of time in the RV due to the bugs.
Walking around we found that there was very little to do from an Adult perspective. No trails or hikes to speak of. In the end we decided to leave early and head back home as we were tired of the bugs and bored with the location. If you have kids this would be a great campground for them as there is no place for them to get in to trouble while they explore their wildhood and there is a nice playground for the kids. In fact many of the fellow campers in the campground were families or groups of families camping together. In the end we only gave this campground a 2 star rating, even though it has power and is big rig friendly.
As for the rest of August (were in the middle now) Life has been centered on home and RV prep. I have been in the process of dumping gear trying to trim my weight as I will have more passengers and more cargo to deal with then what is normal for just Lorraine and I. Also, I will not need most of our boondocking gear like the Solar panels or wood as we will have full hookups all the way along the trip and there is a provincial fire ban in BC, so no campfires. This weekend I will start to work through my pre-trip checklist and make sure I have everything ready in the RV for the next trip.
So far with the exception of St Mary Reservoir our summer has been nice and adventure filled. Camping has been fun and enjoyable with little worry or issues. We hope the same can be said for your summer season. Finally, Finny continues to improve health wise. He is almost off of the Prednisone medication, and he has also almost lost all of his weight gain while on the medication. He is now down to 60lbs or 27kg. Only a few more pounds to go and he will be back to his old self again. Finny has also enjoyed his summer learning to jump into the water from the banks of the Bow, and swimming has never been more fun for a dog! Though Finny is not happy with me having to go back to the office. He mopes all day and waits outside in the carport waiting for my return. Lorraine says she has never seen such a sad dog as Finny when I leave the house for work. Sigh…
Well everyone, that about covers it for now. There will be much more to write about and show in pics after this next trip.
Stay tuned…
Happy Trails,
The Glampurs.