Round the World Tour 2011 - Conclusion

Hi All

Well I'm afraid all good things must come to an end. After visiting Utah I skedaddled for

Odessa, West Texas where I picked up the trailer and headed east. After a gruelling 5 days and

4 nights sleeping in the trailer and staying at “Walmart's” each night, I arrived home Tuesday March 15^th. Now for the statistics:

Miles Travelled: 20,640 km / 12,384 miles (including 3 oil changes)

Miles Home from Odessa:     3,846km / 2,307 miles

Number of Days:                   67 (minus 11 days where Wendy & I flew home and I flew back)

Number of States Visited:      23 unique ( 33 if counting the repeats ) (there are exactly 50)

Now Words of Wisdom for Future Travellers

   Satellite Radio: - we had satellite radio in our van the entire trip. It's very good and there's a very good selection of music and talk shows etc. However there are certain things everyone should know. First it's expensive. I bought a unit on sale in Canada for $75 which included 1/2 price for 6 months on activation. Activation for 1 year (they didn't offer 6 months) cost $160!!! Or $75 + $160 = $235 !!! with all taxes.

   Only works in your car or van. Want it in your house? That requires another kit (about $120).

The existing radio will “plug into” the new kit (similar to an iPod docking station).

   Satellite Radio and the Weather – one of the main reasons for buying a satellite radio is to get the weather conveniently 24 hours / day. When I went to activate the weather channel, the radio (there's a video display) displayed an 800 number. I was in the US at the time. I called the number and they had no record of my radio or it's serial number. Turns out it's a Canadian radio so you call a Canadian 800 number which was supplied. They happily programmed my radio BUT NOW I GET CANADIAN WEATHER 24 / 7!! Ottawa weather is nice to have but not when you're in Texas!

Before you ask NO YOU CAN NOT GET AMERICAN WEATHER!!! So you want American Weather? YOU MUST BUY AN AMERICAN RADIO and you MUST activate it in the US. Talk about USELESS !!! Anyways we got American Weather using CNN, FOX and other stations but it's not the same. Why not use some of the not-programmed numbers on the radio for the other country? Well as of this writing, that has not been done. But apart from the weather, all the other stations (about 140 of them) work just fine. So to sum up: Beware of the HIDDEN COSTS! In my case it was a Christmas present to my wife so I was buying it anyways.

Cellphones: - we used NET10 cellphones. We paid $30 which includes the phone, 300 minutes and is good for 60 days. The phone display indicates how many minutes / days are left. A top up card costs

$30 and is good for another 60 days / 300 minutes. When you activate the top up, the minutes / days combine so you don't loose minutes. There are also other (more expensive) packages. Call anywhere in the US for $0.10 /minute (including Hawaii & Alaska). Call Canada & Mexico for $0.15 / minute. NO ROAMING CHARGES. Available at all Walmart & Target stores. Texting is also available.

This worked great! www.net10.com

Getting Cash – I have a Scotiabank account and they are affiliated with Bank of America in the US.

Bank of America has something like 22,000 outlets in the US (which to me means no transaction fees).

Having said that YOU WILL NEVER find a Bank of America outlet when you need it. Other Banks charge $3 to $5 for a transaction. The ATM's in corner stores are the best ($3). Was never denied access to my bank account anywhere. However when I got home my bank charged me a flat $3 fee for each transaction on top of the ATM fees. I guess that's just the cost of travelling! An alternative would be to

look up a nearby Bank of America branch online. Checkout which banks are affiliated with your bank.

Gas Fill ups with Credit Cards – in the US you must PAY FIRST before filling up. If you use a credit card, 75% of the time they require a Zip code. So you have to deposit your credit card with the Cashier before they'll let you pump gas. Annoying but not the end of the World!

Audio CD's – the Restaurant / General Store chain “Cracker Barrel” sells Audio CD's. Bring the CD back within 7 days and get all your money back (usually over $30 each) except $3.49. 14 days = $7 and so on. This chain is country wide and they have maps showing all locations. Great for those long drives.

Free Camping – you can stay at most Walmart Superstores overnight. Just park far away from the

entrances. Only at Superstores because they are open 24 hours and more important are PATROLLED 24 hours. First check with Customer Service.

Paying Bills from Afar – I used Canada Post's service called ePost. It worked very well. Easy to sign

up with. Just make sure the bills get paid before you start depending on it. It's a good idea to start say three months before your trip. I'm never going back to bills in the mail again. You even get reminders on your e-mail. http://www.epost.ca/

The Weather – Don't Travel by Car in January, February or Early March! - when we first started planning our trip. We went on the Weather Channel and other sites to get an idea what kind of weather we could expect. Of course all the sites could tell us was the Average Weather in any given month in any given State. We didn't get Average Weather. We got Extreme once in fifty years Cold Weather!

Speaking to someone in South Carolina, they told us the winters are now colder than normal and the summers hotter.

Where can you Comfortably Expect “Warm” (over 70 degrees Fahrenheit) Weather – four areas:             1). Orlando and south in Florida, 2). Corpus Christi in Texas, 3). Arizona and 4). Los Angeles, California and south. Even these areas get “below” normal temperatures for a few days each winter.

Sorry the Words of Wisdom goes on and on. But it's VERY IMPORTANT. YOU are not in Canada

as soon as you “jump on that plane” or “cross that border”. I apologize for all the spelling mistakes especially in the early days of the Blog. Although a lot of fun, there was a definite “learning curve”.

Next time (once I learn how) there will be a map which would help followers immensely.

So there you have it. Our Looooooooong Trip has come to an end. We hope you enjoyed reading it as much as we have enjoyed writing it! It was a lot of fun AND we got to see a lot of new places and a lot of new faces! Wendy's leg is in a cast of course but that will come off the end of this month and she will be as good as new. Her big complaint about the trip (aside from her foot) was I cram too much into a trip. I think she's on to something there!

Our trips are Legendary !

Take care and we'll talk to you on our next trip!

Wendy & Ian Walker

Greetings from Utah !

Hi All

     Today we'll tackle Utah. The first picture shows the Bonneville Salt Flats / Speedway. As you first enter Utah from the west on Interstate 80, the first turnoff literally on the border with Nevada is the Exit for the Speedway. The Salt Flats are approximately 20 miles across at this point. Wider if you travel North to South. This is where many of the land speed records were carried out in years past.

    The second photo is a general view approaching Salt Lake City. Again that pesky snow has been following me everywhere I go.

     The third photo shows the Great Salt Lake. This is a huge lake that covers 1700 square miles approximately in the centre of Utah and east of Salt Lake City. The maximum depth of the lake is 35 feet and it is 3 to 5 times saltier then the Pacific Ocean. No fish live in the lake. Only Brine Shrimp and Brine Flies which birds and other wildlife live on.

     The fourth and fifth photos are taken in Southern Utah showing Zion National Park. This Park, located in the southwest corner of Utah is somewhat off the beaten path but is well worth a visit. It is approximately 229 square miles of sculptured canyons and soaring cliffs.

     The last two photos numbers six and seven show Glen Canyon Dam and gorge along the Colorado River on the Utah / Arizona border. This dam is located to the east of the Grand Canyon and created Lake Powell behind it. Like the Hoover Dam, it is used for electricity and irrigation throughout the southwestern States.

Take care and talk to you next time.

Greetings from Nevada !

Hi All

Today we'll take a look at a different side of Nevada.

The first picture shows Walker Lake (no I didn't name it – though it's a very good name!) This was

taken in Central Nevada. A lake in the desert is a “big deal” as it very rarely happens. Usually it's

only a mirage.

The next two pictures show the pretty little town of Virginia City. Formerly the capital of the

Nevada Gold Rush of the 1870's. Now of course the “gold” comes from the tourists. This is a very

mountainous area with severe grades. In fact to get to Virginia City, there are two roads, one for tourists and one for trucks or RV 's (and NO I didn't take the trailer up there).

Of course no photo portrayal of Nevada would be complete without an image of Reno, Nevada and here it is.

The original plan had been to drive to Sacramento, California and then cross the Sierra Nevada Mountains to Reno, Nevada. However Mother Nature had “other”ideas. When I got to Sacramento,

there were weather warnings out for the Sierra Nevada. They would allow you to cross, but only with “Chains” on. As I told one Police Officer, Canada hasn't used chains since the 1940's ANYWHERE.

However the onus is on you to get safely across the mountains not the other way round. That's quite different from the thinking back home. So not having chains and not wishing to buy any for what would normally be a three hour trip, I drove the long way around through Las Vegas. I had images of breaking down in the mountains and freezing to death. Not a pretty thought.

Talk to you soon!

Greetings from the Hoover Dam !

Hi All

Continuing our trip back to Las Vegas, we got off the local Interstate (here known as Interstate 40)

and took the secondary road – Highway 66. Before the Interstate network was built, this was one of the only ways to cross the country. Of late, Highway 66 has become quite historic and many books, movies and TV series have been produced about it.

Our first picture shows a mile marker along Highway 66 in this case near Seligman, Arizona. Our next stop was the Hoover Dam. This was a massive project to dam the Colorado River. It was constructed between 1930 and 1935 during the depression and is 726 feet high built entirely of concrete.

The second photo shows the dam and part of Lake Mead which was created by the dam. In the background is the new bridge which was recently built to alleviate a traffic bottleneck over the dam.

The third photo shows the downstream side of the dam with the hydroelectric infrastructure. Hoover Dam produces over 1.3 million kilowatts of electricity. It provides all the electricity for Las Vegas and a large portion of Los Angeles in California. Notice the distinctive high water mark along the rock above the river.

The final photo shows part of Lake Mead which was formed when the dam was built. It has many uses including the marina we have here. The lake is over 110 miles long and irrigates more than 1 million acres throughout the U.S. and Mexico. It is known as the Lake Mead National Recreation Area and is managed by the National Park Service.

Talk to you next time.

Greetings from the Grand Canyon !

Hi All

   Finally made it to the Grand Canyon. During the week I spent with JoAnn & Randy Braidwood

in Las Vegas, we took three days and drove to Williams, Arizona. Here we boarded a train on the Grand Canyon Railway which took us to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon.

   The first picture shows the 9 car train at the South Rim. The second picture shows the Grand Canyon at Hopi Point. If you look to the centre left, you can see some rapids on the Colorado River (very muddy this time of year). This is the river which carved out the Grand Canyon after many thousands of years. The remaining pictures of the Grand Canyon speak for themselves however the very last picture shows the Bright Angel Hiking Trail. It is possible using this trail to reach the North Rim of the Canyon after a extremely rigorous crossing. The Grand Canyon ranges from 10 miles at it's narrowest to 18 miles at it's widest point.

   The Grand Canyon Railway offers year round trips to the Canyon allowing visitors approximately

four hours to view the Canyon before returning to Williams. In addition to the train they offer a Hotel, a Restaurant and a Campground for Recreational Vehicles. In summer they also use a steam locomotive

for travelling to the Canyon. It is also possible to drive to the Canyon and stay in a hotel or to camp. However if travelling to the Canyon by car or motorhome, book your reservations early.

Talk to You Next Time!

Greetings from Las Vegas !

Hi All,

Spent a week in the city of “Opulence” Las Vegas.

It's a huge city of about 800,000 people but it's very spread

out. I'm here visiting with my wife's best friend and her husband

JoAnn & Randy Braidwood. We've been getting along famously

as the Casino's slowly bleed away our “pocketbooks”!

The first picture shows yours truly under that most famous of

signs. Followed by a shot of the Casino Bellagio. Every night the

Casino puts on a beautiful “water show” with lights and sound and

it is quite spectacular. Then we see the Casino Paris with a “copy”

of the Eiffel Tower and finally there's a shot of the Casino Mandalay Bay.

Many of the Casinos have outdoor shows like the Bellagio and it's all free!

Just show up at the right time. Each Casino has a different theme.

Everyone should see Vegas at least once!

Talk to Ya next time!

Greetings From Arizona & California !

Hi All

Not much text today as the photos can do all the talking.

I passed through Arizona on the way to California. The first three photos are

typical Arizona landscape. No Grand Canyon? Patience everyone! The fourth picture is entering California on Interstate 10 with snow capped peaks in the distance. The remaining

pictures are along the Pacific Coast showing the Pacific Highway Number 1 from Morro Bay near San

Luis Obispo to the beach at Carmel by the Sea. Very beautiful drive but very isolated. Only about four small towns in 150 miles. Unfortunately the day was quite dreary and wet. Oh well you don't get to pick the weather. But as my wife keeps telling me: “ I've Been There !”

Talk to you soon!