Last Day of the Caravan (Thursday, September 03, 2009) Fifty-eight days and 4,696.1 miles ago the caravan officially began in Dawson Creek, BC; all but a couple of RVs met 8 days before in Great Falls, MT. It seems so long ago, yet the time has flown by, particularly since Fairbanks. We left early again this morning, stopping in Houston, BC, for a photo of the world’s longest fly rod. Made out of anodized aluminum, we kept thinking of Wayne and how he could use a long fly rod, and this one might be just right. It rained practically all day, and we had had enough of trying to turn around in tight places, so we drove straight in to Prince George, stopping at the Walmart for some necessary groceries. We made a stop at Costco’s where we purchased a Canon Digital camera for Kay as an anniversary present. Arriving at the South Park RV Park at 2 PM, we parked on a downward sloping site, hooked up, and read email. Members of the caravan carpooled to Cariboo Steak House in Prince George for our farewell dinner, after which several people gave short talks on their perceptions of the trip. Many thanks and praises were heaped on Les, Richard, and their wives for outstanding work in pulling off the “best” caravan of all times. I gave a short talk concerning trying to please everyone on everything, and praising Les for a miraculous job in accommodating everyone. We gave cards privately to Les and Jean, and Richard and Virginia, thanking them for the great time we had. Tomorrow morning, we leave the group for good and head out on our own.

Kay’s Take There was a guy at this campground who had set up a tent to carve wooden statues, etc. Many were displayed around the campground. They were beautiful. There was one long bench with salmon carved 3 dimensional jumping from the top as if the bench was the river and the fish were jumping up out of it. He had bears and eagles and even a beautiful elk. The dinner was a nice farewell and it was a good way to say goodbye to our caravan friends. I think everyone else was ready for our ‘journey’ to end and also sad too.

Our Recommendations for Prince George, BC Prince George is the largest city we’ve been in since Anchorage and the second largest since late June. It has just about everything in the way of shopping and dining. However, it rained the entire time we were there, so we did not explore the city or participate in any activities except for the farewell dinner.

Campground South Park RV Park is typical of Canadian and Alaskan parks, uneven gravel pads, with tight spaces. We were parked double in what should have been one pull through site, and did not have enough leveling blocks to raise the front end high enough. Electric, water, sewer, and wi-fi were provided.

Driving Statistics
Beginning Mileage: 16,479.6
Beginning Time: 7:00 AM Pacific DST
Ending Mileage: 16,711.1
Ending Time: 2:00 PM Pacific DST
TOTAL MILEAGE FOR THE DAY: 231.5
CUMULATIVE MILEAGE: 7,319.0