Welcome to Our 2023 Trip

Meet Sam, our newest addition to the family.

Welcome to our travels!  It’s been five years since we visited Alaska. In 2019, we journeyed to Australia. Then the pandemic hit, and the Canadian border was closed. We are excited to be on our way north once again. 

We’re also breaking in our new traveling companion, Sam. Six years after losing our beloved Roxanne, we decided to open our hearts to another Golden. Samantha is not quite two years old and still a handful. Goldens are slow to mature, and Sam seems to be stretching the limits, but she’s ours. Hope springs eternal that she will soon settle from crazy dog to obedient. Hopefully this trip will be a positive for all. 

Summer came early to Texas. We broke 100 degrees in early June.  Normally those temperatures are not seen until July. As a result, we have been pushing hard to reach cooler climes. It has already been a journey. It has taken six days for us to reach the Canadian border.

We steered through the Fish Creek wild horses and Steen Mountain wild horse areas. But wild horses are elusive and take time to find. We decided to just mark their territories and move on, saving them for a later date. At least we did find five wild burros during our search. 

Wild burro near Fish Creek, Nevada

We have also felt like we were traveling through the plagues of Eqypt.  We drove through a Blood-red Mormon cricket invasion in Nevada. The road was so thick with the insects crawling over one another that you could actually hear their carcasses hit the undercarriage of the truck.  Our tire treads were full of their squished bodies… pretty disgusting. Some parts of the road were so thick with crickets that some drivers have reported hydroplaning on them. To give you an idea of how bad the invasion is, Nevada’s DOT has actually used snow plows to clear them from the road. (See a news report link at the bottom of the post.)

Blood-red Mormon Cricket

Then we ran into a grasshopper invasion in southern Oregon. We would run through waves of grasshoppers jumping, flying, and hopping across the road.  Sadly, many are still stuck in the truck's grill.

 

On we traveled. By the third morning, I was looking for my sweatshirt to ward off the chill… always a good sign. 

Sam is still adjusting to our travel schedule. And the time change!  She begins to whimper about five a.m., which is seven at home.  Hopefully she’ll get the idea soon. It’s comical to watch her in the truck as we drive long days. Like a toddler, she flops from one position to the next, with heavy sighs and lots of drama. We try to hike with her in the evenings or camp near water so she can swim. She seems to be getting the hang of it. 

I’ve been concerned about crossing into Canada after their long border closure. I am happy to report, however, that it was as easy as in the past… a few pertinent questions, and we were on our merry way. It’s so good to be back in this beautiful land. 

We invite you, once again, to join us on our adventure. Life is good, we are blessed, and can’t wait to see what happens next! 

NOTE:  To learn more about the cricket invasion, here's a link to one of the news feeds:   https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/nevada/articles/2023-06-20/blood-red-crickets-invade-nevada-town-residents-fight-back-with-brooms-leaf-blowers-snow-plows