Our May Long Weekend
I know May long is long past now and that I’m behind in my postings. Sorry, life has been busy! In any case let me tell you our story of May long weekend.
It all started on the Wednesday at 3am when we awoke and dragged our sleepy heads out of bed and grabbed a cup of coffee. Our thought was to be the first ones at the gate when they opened at 9am. So once we had a cup or two of coffee and our eyes did not feel droopy anymore, we began to diligently get ourselves and the RV ready for travel. The Dogs were not impressed that we had them up so early and poor Annie all he wanted to was go back to sleep. So in about an hour ½ we were ready to go and we put the dogs in the RV and slowly pulled out of the driveway. It was 5:30am.
The drive to Kananaskis Country was pretty uneventful. The RV worked perfectly and no tire issues! We arrived at the front gates of Peter Lougheed Provincial park around 7am, and the long winding road to the actual campground at Interlakes would take us about 20 – 25 min to navigate. Again the drive was pretty uneventful except that we did see some Deer and a Black Bear. As we drove up to the campground at Interlakes I could see through the trees that there were already RV’s within the Campground? I thought WTF? As we get to the gates of the campground we found them open (It’s 7:30am, now) so we drive in and take a loop through the campground looking for sites. Well we were amazed almost every site was taken or spoken for. We luckily found two sites left on the lake, one it was impossible for us to fit in, but the second one was a perfect fit!
We spent the rest of a Beautiful Day in the sun setting up our campsite with all of our gear. The first thing to put up was the dog run, so that Finny could come off the lease and we would not get in to trouble for disobeying the lease laws of the park. Once that was done and Finny was on the lead then the hard work began. Oh you may wonder what we did about Annie, Well Annie loved to come outside but he did not wonder off the campsite nor did he wonder very far or fast from the RV. So we let him roam free, besides I don’t think Annie could have dragged a leash or lead behind him.
Once camp was setup Lorraine and I sat back in the loungers and enjoyed the view with a glass of wine and a Cider for me. It was beautiful and warm, and we thought that If this was the long weekend we had it made. Ha! Were we wrong! It was shortly after dinner that we started to feel the temperature start to drop, and boy did it drop fast! Soon we noticed an all-enveloping white cloud come whisking over the mountain range and sink down to the lake. The wind picked up about now and boy did it blow hard! Then the rain came. Hard driving rain, the kind that soaks you in seconds if you are not in rain gear, which I was not. Well we frantically pulled in chairs and put up wind walls on our canopy. By the time I was done I was soaked and had frozen hands. Lorraine also suffered the same fate, it was crazy how quickly this winter storm front came in. In less than hour the temps went from 14c to -8c with driving rain, turning to freezing sleet, then to snow. Yeah Alberta!
For the next 36hrs the worst of the storm raged wind, snow, and ice pelted the windward side of the RV and iced up the whole side. The wind howled so hard that it seemed to push past our living room slide out seals and created quite a draft. Our furnace was running overtime just trying to keep the rig warm in this artic weather. That furnace ran non-stop for almost the rest of the trip. Boy was it wet and cold!
On the third day the storm turned to rain but warmed up considerably, I think around 4c to 5c. It was then that we ventured back out again and ran into the campground host Norman. Now Norman has been at this campground since 2005, doing the maintenance and daily operations of the campground. In the past Lorraine and I camped here a lot and got to know Norman. It was a pleasant surprise that he remembered us and our older RV after not visiting for the last four years. It was during our conversation that he let us know that the Government opened the campground a week ago, much to our chagrin. It was decided to open early, but not advertise it?!? Crazy! But word of mouth is powerful and the word got out that this campground was open for business. Norman said that campground was full by the third night it was open. Well we were just glad that we snagged as site. Norman was curious what time we showed up at, because the site we were on was actually occupied the night before. So he was surprised the previous tenants had left so early. That turned out to be fortuitous for us.
By Saturday The weather changed considerably. The temps again went up to 14c and the sun was back. Glorious! We basked in the sun and tried to dry out. That night mother nature treated us to a spectacular sunset, but alas this nice weather was to be short lived. That night the rains came back.
The rain lasted through to Monday and unfortunately we had to pack up wet. It certainly was a typical May Long Weekend here in the Rockies where anything weather wise can happen, regardless we had fun playing games in the RV, walking Finn around the campground, I even took him on a 5k hike through the week. So fun was had by all, and the RV worked perfectly! I guess all that hard pre trip prep I did on the RV once again paid off.
As we drove back to Calgary the bad weather followed us, and it rained the whole way, and was raining in the city when we arrived home. As we unpacked our neighbor came out to see how the trip was and informed us that the weather in Calgary was just as bad as in the mountains. We smiled and felt not too bad for enduring the mountain weather on a typical May Long weekend here in Calgary.
Below are a few pics I took while out hiking around with Finny. Enjoy.
Till next time,
Happy Trails,
The Glampurs
