Category: Destinations

This is a geographical breakdown of places we have visited in our travels.

June 17, 2019 Ypres BE

We only moved about 50 kilometers today to the town of Ypres.  I picked this stop because I was interested in a Commonwealth War Ceremony they have there every night.  

Walking to town we came across this very healthy looking sheep who winked at Ton.

Ypres was right on the front lines during WWI and was pretty much fought over for the entire war.  In total there were over 1 million casualties in what was called the Ypres Salient (bulge) with over 850,000 combined casualties in a 3 month period in 1917.  Ypres was also the first use of poison gas on the western front.  The entire town was leveled during the course of the war.

After the war the Belgian government rebuilt the city including duplicating the Cotton  Hall and belfry as well as the Cathedral as they stood before the war.  Both buildings are impressive sites today.

The reconstructed Cotton Hall and Belfry rebuilt after WWI.  The original building was rubble after the war.

While French and Belgian troops fought extensively in this area for the allies, a large contingent of British and Commonwealth soldiers fought here.  After the war the Belgian government reconstructed the Menin Gate into the city as a war memorial to the Commonwealth and British soldiers who were killed in this area but whose bodies were never properly identified.   The monument has over 50,000 names on it from all over the British Empire.  There are soldiers from Canada, Australia, India, Burma, and South Africa as well as Great Britain on the memorial.

You can see the endless lists of names on the wall, thru the door is a similar wall with more names, over 50,000 in total.

As a tribute to these men who were lost; every night the Fire Brigade in Ypres has a ceremony called “The Last Post”.  At 8pm buglers from the Fire Brigade play the Last Post (the British version of Taps.) inside the Menin Gate.  Tonight we attended the ceremony and it is very moving.  As we were waiting we heard people from Canada, Australia, and Britain talking about the ceremony and why they were attending.  It is a fairly simple but moving ceremony as different groups bring wreaths to present at the Gate.  Tonight it was school groups in their uniforms presenting the wreaths.  We were very impressed that this ceremony is still being carried out over 100 years after the end of WWI.  

June 18 2019 Westvleteren BE

Today we moved a whole 15km to a nice aire on a farm in the village of Westvlateren. It is a very small village known for St Sixtus Abby and Brewery.  The setting is beautiful but unfortunately they just cut the hay in the field next to the aire and Ton who has been fighting allergies this entire trip is really suffering.

Our impromptu goal for the day St. Sixtus Abby.

As we have been traveling around Belgium we have kept hearing about this mythical beer from Westvleteren.  When we were in Amsterdam we ran into an Australian who proudly mentioned he had found some bottles of it for sale in Brussels and was happy to get 3 of them for only €19 each.  When we moved to Bruges we also heard about this beer from some other people.  Ton began doing her research and it turns out it is considered by some beer connoisseurs to be the best beer in the world, and it was very difficult to buy it as you had to make an appointment and you were limited to 48 bottles at a time.  The problem is that the phone to call to make an appointment receives over 80,000 calls per day so it is very hit or miss whether you can get an appointment.  The monks are very concerned as their beer has been growing in popularity about people gouging others. They closely control distribution to minimize people inflating prices, but it is still happening like our Australian friend in Brussels discovered.  At the brewery the bottles sell for €4.

Liquid Gold.

We were still not planning to visit the brewery until last night when we decided to spend the day in the vicinity of Poperinge which is the biggest Hops producing town in Belgium.  When I began to look for a place to stay around Poperinge it turns out there is an aire close to the Westvleteren Abby.  Ton did some more research and found out that the monks did allow one cafe to sell their beer over the counter in the village, so here we are.

Hops were the reason we began the trip today.

We started the day by going to Poperinge to visit the hop museum.  It was an interesting presentation on hop production in the region.  It focused mostly on the farming of the hops and was full of equipment and detailed descriptions of how hop farming techniques had changed in the area thru history.  At the end it had examples of every Belgian Beer currently in production by region.  

To celebrate the end of the hop harvest locals burn straw men in the field and drink a lot of beer.

The next stop was the Westvleteren Cafe which along with the Abby is pretty much the entire town.  The aire was supposed to be 1km from the Abby but that turned out to be as the crow flies, so after a half hour walk around the fields between us and the abby we arrived hot and ready for a cold beer.  It took a while to be served as we have not quite mastered the way of getting a Belgian servers attention, but we finally put in our order for one of each of the 3 beers they produce here.  The first is a blonde, the second is a dark beer with 8% alcohol, and the reported best beer in the world is the dark beer with 12% alcohol.  They were all excellent, but our conclusion was that the dark 12 was indeed the best.

Two very happy people.

As we were leaving we stopped in their gift shop to pick up a memory of the trip, and discovered we could buy a six pack of the dark 12.  So as I am typing this I am happily sipping on one of the best beers in the world.

June 19, 2019 Kortrijk BE

We woke up to a pretty serious thunderstorm.  It had been raining off and on all night with a few gusts of wind strong enough to rock François back and forth.  Our neighbor had to get up and secure his bicycles and table to prevent them from blowing away.

The wheat next to our parking place showing the effects of the rain and the wind.

The neighbors were Belgian and we spent some time talking to them last night.  Neither spoke English fluently but they both could communicate to us.  The first question was where we were from as it was clear to them we were not French.  After we got that sorted out, we began to talk about traveling.  The wife volunteered that this was her first time in this part of Belgium.  Since Belgium is quite small we were a little surprised so Ton asked her where she was from, “Bruges”.  We both laughed as Bruges is about 40 miles from where we are today and she was probably in her late 60’s.  She thought about it for a minute and laughed too, saying she has been to Spain, France, and Indonesia but not to Westvleteren until today.  She made me laugh again later when we were heading back to François, I told them “See you later”, she replied “See you later alligator”, giggled and followed it with “after a while crocodile”.  I got a real kick out of that which she appreciated.

The Duchesse de Bourgogne, the purpose of our day today.

Today was the biggest day of our beer tour of Germany and Belgium.  Tons’ favorite beer in the world is Duchesse de Bourgogne by Verhaeghe Brewery.  Ton had been on their website and they only offered public tours on Friday and that would not work for us.  We decided to send them an email explaining our problem and asking if they could accommodate us in any way.  We were thrilled when they agreed to give us a private tour of the brewery today.  

Katrien our tour guide for today.  Yes we did try all of the beers in front of her.

We arrived at the brewery and met our guide for the day Katrien.  She sat us down and began the tour with a tasting of two of their beers that they only sell locally.  After that we were off for a walk around the brewery.  The brewery is family run for 4 generations and has survived two world wars.  In the first world war the owner of the brewery refused to brew for the Germans so they confiscated all of his beer making equipment to melt down to make guns.

As Katrine said we could have a good party with the contents of one of these barrels.

Their beer is all pre-sold so they are in the process of a significant expansion of the brewery to double their output.  We were shown both the historical old buildings and the new modern buildings that will make up the expansion.  Katrien did a great job explaining the process, and talking us thru each of the beers.  It was a great time and we have a fresh bottle of Duchess de Bourgogne to drink before we leave.

The twin watch towers over the River Leie in Kotrijk.

We finished the day in an aire in the town of Kortrijk which is a major town in the region.  We did not see as much of it as we wanted as it was raining pretty hard when we first arrived with occasional flashes of lightning. It finally calmed down enough for us to take a quick walk thru the town.  It has two World Heritage Sites, their town belfry which along with all of the other belfries in Flanders are grouped as a world heritage site, and the Beguinage of Courtrai which is a well preserved 13th century womens community.  It was run like a nunnery but the women did not take any religious vows.  It was still active as a womens community until the 1960’s.  

The interior of the Beguinage with the Cathdral tower in the background.
Another view from inside the Beguinage, the building in the middle is from the 1600’s while the buildings surrounding it are from the 1300’s.

Flanders

Flanders is the part of Belgium that speaks a dialect of Dutch.  We spent most of our trip there with the highlight being Bruges.  There is a lot to see in Flanders besides Bruges and if not for being under a time crunch we would have spent a lot more time there.

June 15, 2019 Ghent BE

April 1, 2020 No Comments

Today we took the train into Ghent leaving François in Bruges.  Ghent is an easy 30 minute train ride from Bruges and we are parked

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June 11 2019 Maastricht NE

Today we departed Germany after 34 days.  Germany was an easy place to travel, we enjoyed the country.  It is a well organized and well run country.  Ton enjoyed a lot of cities particularly Bamberg, Mainau, Lubeck, and the northern romantic road cities of Dinkelsbuhl, Rothenburg, and Wurzburg.  I tended to lean a little more to the old East German cities of Lubeck, Schwerin, and Leipzig.  We drank a lot of beer and while we had many good ones, we also had a lot of mediocre beer which was disappointing.  The food is hearty and filling but not particularly interesting though we did gain an appreciation of sauerkraut.

Our short walk thru town was full of well tended homes like this one.

August 11, 2017 Watson Lake YT

Today we planned a long driving day.  There is not much between Ft. Nelson and Watson Lake except for Laird Hot Springs so we decided to take it in one long bound.  It is a pretty drive normally through the Northern Rockies, but our old nemesis the smoke returned for the day.  Visibility was extremely limited most of the day so we do not have  much in the way of pictures.

We also burned a budget busting amount of gas for the day.  Hopefully it will be less tomorrow.  It was a good day for critter sightings though.  We had a grizzly bear run across the road right in front of the truck.  It is remarkable how fast he was moving.  Later we saw a black bear standing on his hind legs next to the road.  In both cases it happened too fast to get pictures.  Later we passed a couple of herds of bison next to the road, and one herd crossing the road.  Also note the smoke in the background.  The smoke really is phenomenal.

We arrived in Watson Lake about 5pm and visited the sign post forest next to the visitor center.  Everyone who passes thru is encouraged to post a sign from their hometown. I think the current count was over 40,000.

Tonight we are in a Yukon territorial park for $12.  This will help offset the $140 in fuel today.

August 12, 2017 Whitehorse YT

We have moved to the capitol of the Yukon Territory Whitehorse.  It is a town of about 30,000 with all of the amenities of any large town in North America including a Walmart.    We took care of some maintenance stuff today the primary one was knocking all of the dead bugs and dust off of Scout.  A $10 investment in the local truck wash got us about 80% of the way there, Ton declared that good enough as we have some of the toughest travel coming up.

We also visited one of the local breweries, Yukon brewing company which we had visited seven years ago.  The beer was good and we particularly liked their lager.

Whitehorse is the hub of travel on the Alaska Highway and you see a great many different campers from giant luxury buses to homemade converted school buses.  There are quite a few European RV’s running around town also.  The visitors center is the hub of activity, as in addition to dispensing useful information it also offers good free internet.  I think we are going to take advantage of it tomorrow to try to post an update to the blog.

We have been doing some planning and after a down day tomorrow will be heading to Dawson City and then if the conditions are good on to Inuvik in the North West Territory.  We are also planning our first stay in a Wall Mart parking lot tomorrow to try to get us back on budget, and to check something else off our camping bucket list.

August 13, 2017 Whitehorse YT

Today was a day to relax and explore Whitehorse. After a sleep in we started out with laundry.  After that we headed over to the visitors center to use their free internet.  Ton checked on the status of things back in Oregon and let everyone know we were ok. Ron published the blog and did some research on the Demptser Highway.

After the research was done we walked along the waterfront and visited the SS Klondike.  The Klondike is the last paddle wheel steamer that ran on the Yukon River.  It was retired in 1955 but has been beautifully restored by Parks Canada.  On top of that due to it being the 150th anniversary of Canada all National Parks are free this year.

There was one more brewery in town so we had to check it out.  We tried a taster of all of their beers and they were quite good.

The last stop for the night was Walmart where we are sitting for the night.  The price is right and there are about 20 other campers including ones from Germany, Austria, and Romania, so free is a good price all around world.

August 14, 2017 Dawson City YT

After relaxing yesterday we had a fairly long drive from Whitehorse to Dawson City.  The road was better than we expected and we arrived in Dawson City about 3:30 pm. For the first time on the trip we experienced a little bit of rain, and the temperatures are cooler than normal for this part of the world.  The lows later in the week are forecast in the mid-30’s.

The first stop was the Northwest Territory Visitors Center to check on the status of the Dempster Highway.  We were told that the road was in fair to good shape and the weather was forecast to not have any real impact on the road.  So we are going to give it a shot tomorrow.  

We signed up for a walking tour of Dawson City put on by Parks Canada.  It was fun and well done with one of the rangers playing the role of an American heiress who visited Dawson during the gold boom.  After the tour we visited the Jack London Lounge to see a Sour toe drink made..  We decided on beer instead.  We will probably spend another night around here in a few days after we return from the Dempster.

The Yukon River is a big part of the Dawson City experience.

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August 15, 2017 Eagle Plains YT

Today we set out for the Arctic Circle on the Dempster Highway.  It is a spectacular drive even though the weather was not cooperating with us.  It was raining with quite a bit of cloud cover so a lot of the views were covered in clouds.  It was quite beautiful but not super photogenic so pictures were limited.  

The first 200km’s of the drive were pretty easy, but at the Ogilvie Summit we ran into about 80km’s of muddy rough road that was a test.  We made it through all of that and on a nice smooth pull into the Eagle Plains Campground we lost our rear tire and even more unluckily it was the sidewall so the tire was not repairable.  We must of caught a rock going up the hill.  At Eagle Plains there is a tire shop and we were able to find a used tire that is the right size to use to head back to civilization. 

A typical stretch of the Dempster.

It looks like Inuvik will have to wait until next time.  And though we had bad luck the first 350km’s of the Dempster are stunning and I will highly recommend them to anyone.

A picture of Scout about 11pm.  It never did get totally dark.  Note the mud along the bottom half of the truck.

August 16, 2017 Dawson City YT

Today was an adventure.  We decided that the Arctic Circle was only 30km North of us so we started the day heading there.  We also figured it would be a good test for the used tire we had mounted.  We made it with no real problem and have now driven across the arctic circle.

On the way south after about 15 km’s there was a loud bang and the used tire had blown.  Fortunately we were at a nice flat spot and on a long, dry, firm stretch of road.  But for the first time Ron was going to have to change a tire on Scout.  A sparsely traveled road 10 miles south of the arctic circle and 220 miles from the nearest paved road was not the ideal place to test our tire changing equipment.   Ron was regretting not doing a dry run before with the tire changing equipment.  Everything was going ok until it was time to position the bottle jack to lift the truck.  Because the tire had failed completely the rear axle was too low to put the heavy duty bottle jack Ron had bought under the axle.  But luckily two fellows who worked for the Yukon government came along and stopped to help.  They had a jack that would fit under the axle, but was only rated for two tons, which was not enough to lift the truck.  But it would lift the axle enough to get the heavy duty bottle jack under the axle, so success.  The tire was changed with the help of a third guy who worked at the Eagle Plains gas station who wandered by with a water truck.  I never did get the names of the two guys who had the jack that made the repair possible but I really appreciate them taking the 45 minutes it took for me to use their jack.  

The next stop was Eagle Plains to assess the situation, as we were back to the same problem as the night before, 365 kilometers from the nearest pavement and no spare.  We were forced to make the budget busting decision to buy a new spare tire that worked in a pinch, but we will be discarding when we get to civilization and can buy a matching tire for the one we lost.

After getting everything sorted in Eagle Plains we took off for Dawson City about noon and after a very cautious drive arrived  about 730pm.  A very long day.

A bush plane along the road. I am truly not sure where he landed. Possibly on the road.

August 17, 2017 Dawson City YT

We debated our next drive; do we do the Top of the World Highway which is a mixture of asphalt and gravel with our mismatched tires, or do the 750 mile detour back to Whitefish and drive the Alaska Highway.  Ultimately we decided on the 176 mile Top of the World figuring the road could not be any worst than yesterday and the mismatched tires held up yesterday.

The drive was really beautiful.  A great road running across ridges with super views on each side.  We crossed back into the US in the most northern most land border crossing.  They actually seemed happy to see us at customs, I think it was a slow day. 

After an uneventful drive, the first in a couple of days , we arrived in Tok.  We spent part of the afternoon knocking the large chunks of Dempster mud  off of Scout, kicking back and researching how to find Nitto Terra Grappler tires in Alaska.

September 4, 2017 Haines Junction YT

Today was planned primarily as a driving day.  We are headed to Haines Alaska, and there really is not much between us and there.  Along the way we ran into a German couple we had camped next to last night.  We were stuck waiting for a pilot car when we realized they were in front of us.  We followed them thru the border crossing back into Canada and ended up at the visitors center in Beaver Creek.  Ton and the wife Anna ran in to use the internet, while the husband Hubert and I tried to carry on a conversation about trucks and Volkswagens.  When we went in Ton, Anna and the two ladies at the visitors center were gushing over pictures of Anna’s two week old grandchild.

Today we covered only about 200 miles, but it took about 6 hard hours of driving.  There is one section of the road around Beaver Creek where the tundra has always wrecked havoc with the road.  The tundra melts because of the heat generated by the road, and engineers have tried multiple ways to stop it, so far unsuccessfully.  There has even been talk of going back to gravel for that section as it generates less heat and thus less frost heaves.

I want to end the day by praising the Yukon tourism board.  The visitor centers every where are just fantastic.  The people manning them are uniformly well informed and friendly.  The internet is always strong, and they recognize that travelers up here need a place to connect, so they have seating areas for internet users.  Because of this we stop in nearly every town’s visitors center.  The other thing that Yukon does well are their Territorial Parks.  They are not fancy but they are well laid out and clean, and best of all cost only $12 per night.

September 8, 2017 Watson Lake YT

Really very little to talk about today.  Drove about 300 miles thru pretty country.  This was the one major section that we doubled back on so we have already covered the road earlier.  Tomorrow we will begin heading south in earnest on the Cassier Highway.

Another mountain and lake view from the window of the truck.


September 9, 2017 Stanley BC

Ron always had fond memories of Hyder AK from our last trip to Alaska, so the plan was to drive the Cassier Highway to Hyder.  Hyder has this frontier town feeling which was very fun for Ron.  There is no US customs at the border in Hyder, and there is no police or fire, those services when needed are provided by Stanley British Columbia.  The Americans in Hyder can be paid in Canadian currency as there are no banks in Hyder and the nearest American banks are over 1000 road miles away.  

On our last trip we were held up for several hours at the junction of the Alaska and Cassier Highways due to a very large wildfire on the Cassier just south of the Alaska Highway.  When we were finally allowed thru it was in a convoy led by a fire vehicle, and we actually passed thru areas where we could still see flames near the road.  It was quite a memorable experience.

The remnants of the fire we passed thru seven years ago and a shot of the Cassier Highway.

This trip we had nothing that dramatic, but we could still see the effects of the fire from seven years ago for the first 50 or so miles.  Other than that the Cassier Highway was pretty uneventful but pretty.  We did see a black bear on the road but otherwise it was mostly covering a lot of miles.

I would like to say that Hyder lived up to the memories we had, but it did not.  It had a ghost town feel, we could not tell if it was because they had closed up for the season, or because the town was in real trouble.  We went down to the fish creek Forest Service observation deck, but there were no bears.  By now it was a long day so we went to the only open RV park near by and paid for a commercial campground.

Yukon Territory

The Yukon is a beautiful and remote place.  The 10 days we spent there were some of our favorites on the Alaska Highway.

August 7, 2017 Kelowna BC

We were discussing options last night about what to do next.  Our initial thought was to take it slow going north and spend another day in Washington before spending a couple of days traveling around the Okanagan Valley in BC looking at wineries.  But the smoke and heat was getting to us. The air quality was categorized as unhealthy in Wenatchee, and unhealthy in Kelowna so we made the decision to just try to get north of the smoke.  Below is an example of the smoke obscuring the views.

Today turned into a travel day with the priority being getting in some miles.  It was an uneventful drive north except we came upon a very severe accident that stopped us for about 40 minutes, and then after entering BC we came upon another accident where the truck involved had caught fire and burned totally.

We decided to wimp out and stay in a place with power so we can run our AC.  Between the smoke and the high heat we decided to put comfort over cost.  Luckily we called ahead to find a place as it is a holiday in Canada today, and even more lucky the place we called had just had a cancellation and we got their last spot for the night.  It is a very nice campground above Kelowna on a working farm called Orchard Hill RV.  We highly recommend it.

August 8, 2017 Williams Lake BC

Another lazy start to the day.  The original plan was to head towards a Provincial Park to spend the night and take in some sights, but as we were heading north out of Kelowna the smoke from the fires continued to get worst.  Ton finally said that maybe we should just get to Alaska and come back and see British Columbia after the fires were out.  It made a lot of sense as the intensity of the smoke is hard to describe.  

We rerouted ourselves towards Dawson Creek on the most direct route which took as thru Kamloops.  Kamloops had the most intense smoke we had seen so far on the trip, with visibility down to a mile or less in some places.  As we pulled into Kamloops there was a sign showing that Route 97 was closed due to fire activity.  As you can guess Route 97 is the direct route to Dawson Creek from Kamloops so we needed to reroute.  We ended up on a 80 mile detour around the fire to rejoin route 97.

The impact of the fire is massive.  Tonight we are staying on the grounds of the Williams Lake Stampede(Canadian for Rodeo).  Sharing the grounds with us are about 10 fire engines from various towns in BC and Alberta.  A helicopter with a water bucket just flew buy, and in the mall in town is a large Red Cross evacuation center staffed with about 20 people.  Talking to a local this is the biggest heat wave BC has had since the late 50’s and the most fires in one season since 1961.  Right now they have fire crews from all over Canada, the US, New Zealand, Australia, Mexico, and Chile.  It really is something traveling thru the middle of a natural disaster.

So despite our best intentions of taking it slow we are back in the miles per day race until we get north of the fires.

August 9, 2017 Dawson Creek BC

We woke up to a very smoky morning.  We thought we may have been thru the worst of the smoke when we went to bed, but sometime during the night smoke blew in and it was as bad as we had seen yesterday.  

We planned a long day driving today to get out of the smoke.  We had targeted a town called Chedwyn, but as we pulled in the two parks in town were packed.  It seems Chedwyn and Dawson Creek are having an oil boom with all of the good and bad that comes with it.  Both towns were noticeably bigger than 5 years ago, and the quiet RV parks that were thrilled to see tourists are now very full with oil workers.  Chedwyn was offering temporary parking in a parking lot in town.  We decided to push on to Dawson City.  As we pulled in it looked like the same problem.  We checked in with the visitors center and they said it was rodeo week and they recommended we head up the highway.  

The good news is that we are well out of the smoke and we have blue sky for tomorrows drive.  Now we can try to slow down, even thought the next town is about 300 miles away.  Also today we reached the official beginning of the Alaska Highway.

The beginning of the Alaska Highway with a Safeway Grocery in the background featuring Liquor and Cold Beer!

August 10, 2017 Ft. Nelson BC

Today was a driving day.  There is not much to see between Dawson Creek and Fort Nelson so we got up and headed up the road.  We made a short diversion to the last of the WW2 era wooden bridges.  It is no longer on the main road and is being preserved by Canada as a historic site.  Ron liked it but Ton was not too impressed.

The big change since our last trip is a natural gas boom in the area.  There is much more traffic on the road from Dawson Creek to Ft. St. John and a little beyond.  It reminds us a little of the Bakken area of North Dakota where Ron just finished up working.  

The other change is an overall improvement in the quality of the road.  It is much better than we both remember, even though there are some rough patches on it.

We arrived in Fort Nelson around 2:30 pm and stayed in the same RV park we stayed at on the last trip.  As usual in these small towns we went to the visitors center, and were told enthusiastically that there was a program on the history of Ft. Nelson in 20 minutes.  The air conditioning was good and the staff looked so happy to have someone that we stayed and were the only attendees.  It was well done and interesting so we were glad we stayed.

A great collection of “stuff”.

Across the street is a  museum that we think is a must see if you make the trip.  It is full of interesting stuff and vehicles.  We had stopped on our last trip to Alaska and had fond memories.   The staff is very proud and glad to answer questions.  If you have a chance check it out.