Our house in Ester closed today. Thirty years. We’re now renting it from the new owners until May 30.

Then it’s one more trip down the Alaska Highway.

Before we left Airdrie for Kalispell, a little game of Last Tag from the Great White North.

Looking west toward Glacier National Park on Highway 2 heading toward Kalispell.

We find the house–henceforth to be known as The Shire–to be intact and waiting.

An interior. Either that carpet goes or I do.

The fireplace. Two stories of local stone.

View from the rear. It’s an earth house.

And a view from the yard.

Odometer reads 2,405. No more driving.

Tomorrow, we move the contents of the UHaul into the house.

Odometer is at 1,847. Nothing else to report after a full day of interstate-like drving from Grand Prairie to Airdrie. Made good time, arrived early.

Airdrie has many chain restaurants and motels.

Oh–we did pass under the world’s second longest wood train trestle earlier today. The thrill was fleeting.

Should be in Kalispell by mid-afternoon tomorrow.

The Toad River Lodge has a collection of 8,447 hats (to date) which they staple onto just about every surface in the restaurant. No single photo could do it justice.

Left the northern Canadian Rockies behind at midday and ventured onto the endless prairies of Alberta.

Odometer now stands at 1542 miles.

What I’ve learned:

The Northern Canadian Rockies are as wild and beautiful a place as anywhere on earth, including Alaska.

Fort Nelson, BC used to the the disposable chopstick capital of the world due to its vast poplar forests and the fact that apparently no one else wanted to be.

Gas costs roughly 63% more in remote segments of the Alaska highway than it does in large communities.

The Alaska Highway is made up almost entirely of remote segments consisting of many miles and few gas stations, so you have to purchase gas whenever you can.

Especially if you are driving a 14′ UHaul that gets 9 mpg.

Hoping for lenticularity, early morning on the road to Whitehorse.

Local fauna, somewhere between Watson Lake and Lake Muncho, BC.

Lake Muncho. Beautiful jade green water. Somewhere under the ice.

Beautiful weather
Dreadful road
Good for viewing
Bad for load
Lord I’m 500 miles from my home.

Lord I’m one
Lord I’m two
Lord I’m three lord I’m four
Lord I’m 500 miles from my home.

Or 1800 miles, depending on how you look at it.

First load to Kalispell. We shall return.

It’s getting real now.