June 11, 2023
6/5- We all woke up at 4 am this morning and said our good-byes to our daughter Hana who is heading back to Houston. It has been a fun week and we are sad to see her go but we have many more adventures ahead of us and we were looking forward to leaving the West Coast and start to heading across the northern part of the United States. Once Frank got back from dropping Hana at the airport we got ready to head out for Burlington, Washington, our jumping off place to head Eastward. Of course best laid plans don’t always go the way you think they will. As we were driving through the craziness of Seattle, Washington a warning light came up on the dash of the RV saying Check Engine, Low DEF. We knew we had a full tank of DEF and there was no way it was low. DEF stands for Diesel Exhaust Fluid and the RV has to have it to run. https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/def-diesel-engine-exhaust-fluid-urea-scr-egr/
Our biggest two concerns with the DEF light on was, first that many people on our RV boards have had the DEF sensor go out and it is hard to find and expensive to replace. Second if you didn’t have DEF, or your vehicle thinks you didn’t have DEF, it will start to throttle down the engine’s power. With low DEF the RV could end up only able to travel at 5 mph and then need to be towed which is a big expense with a big vehicle. Because of these concerns we just wanted to get to our campground, which was about 40 miles away, so we could find someone to fix it. We said our prayers and kept our fingers crossed and just kept on driving. Fortunately the engine did not throttle down and we were able to get to our campsite in Burlington. Once we got there we immediately started calling Freightliner places to see if someone could get us in to look at the problem.
We found that everyone had a backlog of jobs and no one could give us a day or time they could fit us in. One place told us we could bring our RV over and put it in line and they might be able to get to it sometime in the next week. That meant dry camping for multiple days in a yard full of big trucks coming in and out. At this point we were both exhausted and stressed out and so we decided to take a break and head to bed and worry about what to do tomorrow.
6/6- We spent the morning calling more places without any luck and finally decided we needed a break so we loaded into the Jeep and headed up to visit the North Cascade National Park. I was exhausted since I hadn’t slept well the night before from worrying and so while Frank drove I napped a bit. I awoke to a loud noise and seeing the windshield of our Jeep have a big hole in the middle. Apparently a truck on the other side of the road kicked a huge rock toward us which hit our windshield and cracked our window. We knew we now had another thing to get fixed before we could head on.
We pulled over at Skagit River and checked out the damaged before wandering around and enjoying the beautiful scenery there. https://www.rivers.gov/rivers/skagit.php . When the Salmon are running it’s an area for Eagle watching as hundreds of hungry Eagles come to fish for their dinner. Unfortunately we didn’t see any Eagles that day. Instead we checked out the distant mountains and the river. Later we even saw rafters traveling down the river.
After hanging out at the river a bit we decided we could either go back to the RV and spend the day making more phone calls, this time trying to find someone to repair the Jeep, or we could go on and enjoy the day. Since this time of our lives is about the adventures we are having we decided not to waste the day and head on up the road to make some more memories. We figured it would take our mind off our challenges and we could always make calls later on.
The North Cascade National Park is amazing. It has so many jagged mountains covered with over 300 glaciers. https://www.nps.gov/noca/index.htm .We stopped by the Ranger’s Station to get suggestions of things to see if we only had one day to explore. We told her on the way up we had spotted a dirt road marked to Thorton Lakes. She told us it was a rough road but we should be able to make it in our Jeep. It sound like a perfect adventure to improve a bad day. But first we got suggestions for a couple nearby trails to hike.
The first trail we headed to was The Trail of the Cedars. We crossed over a suspension bridge where there was a sign stating that “my dad built this bridge” and honoring Charles Wesley Compton.
The Trail of The Cedars was a beautiful walk with signs throughout describing what we were seeing. It was a hot day and it was nice to hike in a shady area with lots of big trees. https://www.hikinginglacier.com/trail-of-the-cedars.htm . The river ran alongside of the trail and we were able to see the Newhalem Power House which has been generating electricity since 1918 for the city of Seattle. The most disappointing thing for us about the North Cascade National Park was the amount of huge transmission towers and power lines cutting across the scenery. After visiting the Power House we now understood why there were so many but still where not happy to see all of them.
Then we headed over to the Ladder Creek Falls which was behind the powerhouse for the Gorge dam. https://www.wta.org/go-hiking/hikes/ladder-creek-falls . There we crossed another suspension bridge and enjoyed the views and waterfalls. We wished we were able to be there at night to see the light display that has been running since the 1930’s. The display uses different colors to light up the falls and surrounding gardens and music is played to go along with the lights.
Now it was time to do some dirt-roading before heading back to the RV. Exploring the road to Thornton Lake was a blast. The road went up about 5 miles to a walking trail that was another 10 mile hike to the lake. We were hoping that we would at least be able to see the lakes in the distance from the road, but once we got up there we found the lakes were just too far away to see. But that didn’t take the enjoyment of our drive anyway. The road was pretty steep with us often going up at an 11% grade. As we traveled 5 miles up the road we went up from about 500 feet above sea level to 2,500 feet above sea level. The 5 mile drive up took us about 45 minutes and along the way we saw beautiful scenery and multiple waterfalls. At one point our car map no longer had any idea where we were or if we were on or off the road. Once we reached the top it was time to head back down which only took us about 30 minutes.
Once we got back to the RV we started calling glass places to see if anyone could get our windshield replaced. The places we talked to said it would take them a week to two weeks to get the glass for the Jeep since we had Gorilla Glass as no one had it in stock. So we headed to bed pretty discouraged between the RV and the Jeep.
6/7- Today started off as another frustrating day. We stayed at the campground and I worked on the laundry and we both made lots of calls to glass shops and Freightliner and Cummins shops. While I was doing my wash I was talking to one of the workers at the campgrounds about our problems and she said that the Freightliner shop in the next town down used to advertise with them and that we should call them and mention the campground to see if they could fit us in. Frank gave them a call and they told us to bring it in the next day and they would try to fit us in and if they didn’t get it done in one day they had a place we could stay and power we could hook up too. The worker also told me about a glass place in the town up the road who did a lot of Jeep glass repairs and so I gave them a call. They told us they could the get the Gorilla glass overnight and put it in tomorrow. We were thrilled especially since the glass in the Jeep had gotten worse overnight and we really could not do much more driving around without it being repaired. It only good part of today was an enjoyable dinner out at Mi Mexico Restaurant.
6/8- We got up early this morning and dropped the RV off at the Mount Vernon Freightliner. Since they were going to be working on the RV Teddi had to come with us, so we loaded him in the Jeep and headed up the road to Bellingham to Louis Glass. While they worked on our Jeep we walked to a nearby Coffee Shop where we hung out a while. Teddi got to hang out with us and enjoyed lick-up some whip cream. He did really well on his leash and hanging out with us and no one seemed to mind having him there. Then we walked back to the glass shop where Teddi was popular with everyone there.
Once they were done the Jeep was as good as new but we still had time to kill before heading back to Freightliner, so Teddi got to go several other places with us. We stopped at Petco to see if they had a pet stroller because he is heavy to carry around and we wanted to find something to push him around in. They didn’t have any so we ran a few other errands at Kohl’s and Home Depot and he was happy riding in the store carts. We then decided to head over to Wal-Mart and see if we could find an inexpensive baby stroller that would work for him. We picked one up and by then it was time to head back to check on the RV.
When we got back we were disappointed to find they hadn’t been able to even look at the RV all day. They showed us where we could park and we plugged-in for the night. It was a little noisy in their lot early in the evening with trucks coming in and going out, but later on it quieted down and we were able to fall asleep and get a good night’s rest.
6/9- At 6:15 am this morning there was a knock on our RV door and the tech was ready to take the RV in and check it out. So Frank and I ran around like crazy getting dressed and closing up the RV so it could be moved. We managed to have it ready in 15 minutes and Frank, Teddi and I headed out for another day while they worked on the RV.
We started off the morning taking a drive that had been recommended up Chuckanut Road. https://americafromtheroad.com/chuckanut-drive-scenic-byway/ . The road is the only place where the Cascade Mountains touch the sea. It is only about 22 miles long but was a beautiful ride with trees, cliffs, rocks and seashore.
The road took us up to Bellingham and we headed over to the mall to do some shopping and let Teddi try out his stroller. Most of the stores in the mall were closed, but Teddi enjoyed the ride around Target in his stroller.
We had heard about Heritage Flight Museum in Burlington so we headed over there to tour it. The museum was started by Bill Anders who flew in Apollo 8 around the moon and took the iconic picture of the earth from space. https://heritageflight.org/about/maj-gen-bill-anders/?doing_wp_cron=1686583577.4559969902038574218750 . The museum was full of displays. The first was dedicated to 1968, the year of Apollo 8’s flight and then on to Bill’s life and space mission and finally into two different hangers which held varies planes. Teddi rode around in his stroller and saw the sights with us.
We stopped and ate lunch at Burgermaster, a drive-in restaurant that has been around since the 1950’s. Then we checked in with Freightliner and found out that the particle sensor was the problem not the DEF sensor. It was a repair that was under warranty with Cummins so it didn’t cost us anything for them to replace it. While they were waiting for the part to be delivered we were able to hang around in the RV. Then when they were ready to take it back in and install the new part we headed once more for a couple hours. We went to get the oil changed in the Jeep and did a few other errands and by then it was time to pick up our RV and head back to our original campground in Burlington for the night.
6/10- We had been wanting to take the ferry to Victoria and spend the day there. We know that Anacortes had a ferry that normally ran to Victoria so we got online to plan a trip there and found out that for now that ferry was not running. So after checking out other places ferries from Anacortes went we decided to head to Lopez Island for the day and booked a noon departure time. https://www.visitsanjuans.com/washington-state-ferries . Traveling on the ferry itself was an amazing experience. You can walk on or bring your vehicle, if you choose to bring your vehicle you arrive about an hour early and line up in an assigned lane so you can drive on once the ferry arrives.
Once on board you can leave your car and head upstairs to the passenger area. Once up there you can order lunch, enjoy a seat at a table or in the lounge area or step out in the viewing area. The weather had turned cool and cloudy in Anacortes but we try to spend as much time as possible outside viewing the scenery. The ferry ride was a half hour long and just before we arrived at Lopez Island they announced that all drivers needed to head back to the vehicles. Loading off the ferry was as efficient and quick as loading on had been.
We decided to drive completely around Lopez Island. It is only 29 square miles and driving around the island only took about a half hour https://lopezisland.com/map-of-lopez/ . We stopped along the way to take pictures and visited the small Lopez Village. Then it was time to head back for the 5 pm ferry. While waiting to load our ferry we were able to watch another ferry arrive and depart for other islands.
On our way back we heard a yell from deck observation area that an Orca whale had been spotted. We hurried out there but it was gone and we were disappointed we didn’t get to see it. Still we had, had a wonderful day.
6/11- We spent today make plans and deciding where we were going to head to next. When we left Portland, Oregon we had planned to immediately head East but we had changed our minds and decided that we wanted to head back up to Canada again. We planned to stay in Tsawassen near the ferry to Victoria. Then we would get the opportunity to spend a day over in Victoria. We made our reservations for the next week and just hung out in the campground. It had been a pretty exhausting week and it was nice to have a day to do nothing much.
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