Stuck at the Bottom of a Canadian Hill

Stuck at the Bottom of a Canadian Hill - Part 2

We returned to the car and sat at the bottom of the hill looking up. It seemed we were a rather long way from the top. We started creeping up the hill in first and second gear only to have our tires start slipping. We backed up and had a running start. We went higher but not all the way to the top. Change in strategy, get Jo-Ce and myself out of the car and pushing while Gen eases the car up the hill. After a great deal of tire spinning which threw up a massive cloud of dust, Jo-Ce and I provided the power to get the car to the top. Gen kept going until she reached a level spot.

The next challenge was a switchback with a mix of rock and terrible gravel. I took a run, honking I charged around the switchback only to find myself stuck halfway up the next hill. At this point people started to pass us, they would roll down their window and ask if we were okay. I kept saying “Well, we may need a push”. At the end of it we had seven people, who were consumed in a cloud of dust, after pushing our car up the hill. Many thanks were given, and we were back on the road slightly worried about the beating our tires just took.

We now had to start driving, we visited Port Renfrew. The entrance to Port Renfrew is a rather significant downhill. As we were travelling around a curve, our trailer door which had not been fully locked popped open, the door is dragging along the ground and some of the cans we had stacked near the door went spilling out into the concrete barrier. This is Jo-Ce’s first full day on the trip; what a start! We cleaned up and carried on, nothing terribly worse for wear; one or two cans even survived the collision with the barrier.

We had seen the south-west of the island and now we were heading north to Tofino. The drive takes a rather serious long cut by going across the island to Nanaimo, north, then back across the island to Pacific Rim National Park. We made most of the drive and settled in a church campground in Port Alberni, well set up for the next day’s drive to Tofino.

Comments

A Desert Forest

Saturday, May 28th – Joshua Tree National Park - North to Joshua Tree National Park - South, California– Day 107 Our campsite was a large open dirt area with some scrub around the outside. In the dark we had managed to park beside the pile of horse poo and shaving. Horses were allowed in this site. Gen stepped in the middle of a pile. The Joshua Tree National Park visitor centre was a five-minute drive away. The town of Joshua Tree was packed with college age millennials communing with nature. There was a market with kombucha, organic greens and a few small tortoises. It was all very pleasant but very busy. The laundromat was at the edge of the market, I charged the devices and did the laundry. Gen bought some produce from a guy loading a truck. I even snuck in to buy some watermelon kombucha. The drive into the park was ten minutes followed by a ten-minute line to show our pass. A quick stop to fill up our water bottles and we were into the park. Th...

A Desert Forest - Part 4

We finally decided to move to our last destination before the sun set. The Arch Rock Nature trail was next. We reached the parking lot and saw the rocks in the distance, we were debating what we wanted to do. We just started moving and once we did, we found ourselves racing down the trail to the rocks. The kids wanted to play monster and once they started running, everyone else was running as well. We had another poo-mergency with no restroom in sight, the evidence is buried in the desert. There was more climbing on the rocks. We took pictures of the sun setting and took a quick look at the Arch rock before starting back to the car. Gen was behind the wheel, an hour later we were leaving the park’s south entrance. We stopped at the Ranger station to freshen up in the bathroom and fill our water bottles before heading to our campsite. Luckily, the site was the overflow campsite for the park so was minutes from the outside of the park....

Canyonlands is Another Planet - Pt 3

Thursday, May 12th – Moab, Utah – Day 91 Our day was shortening already, our next hike, the Grand View Overlook was closed due to a search and rescue operation. Apparently, falls and accidents happen quite a bit at National Parks; Gen looked up the top ten most dangerous parks and Canyonlands wasn’t there (it was number 12). We got a recommendation to hike the White Rim Overlook trail, a 0.9-mile easy hike. The kids were running out of energy. They made it most of the way and then decided to stop to climb a rock. Gen and I continued the short distance to the canyon edge to see the sights. Canyon after canyon after canyon was what we saw. We stopped to sit and marvel at the scenery as the shadows started to lengthen. On our drive back, we saw the sun set and we stopped at the visitor centre one more time to see the view from just across the road. I couldn’t get enough canyons; I was in love ...

Simnett Travels

Search This Blog