May 4th 2013 - Trip Recap and some picture Art

Today was a day for cleaning and resting and checking the springs out on the trailer, as I was getting a weird squeaking noise, which went away as I pulled in here at the Tok RV Village. The place is barely open, they have about 8 sites plowed and access to the electric and cable TV. the office has yet to be open, they have envelopes for paying. The showers are open with nice hot water, so a good warm shower was the order of the day.

I spent the better part of this morning cleaning up a mess from yesterday. It seems I forgot to latch the fridge or the rough road from yesterday jarred the lock open and a ketchup bottle launched itself out and the friggin lid broke and sprayed ketchup all over, looked like a murder scene! So everything all scrubbed clean, including the floor and I am out of paper towels!!

Checked the springs on the trailer and both springs and shackles look fine. So will see if the squeak returns when I leave and if so, pull a wheel and check the bearings and grease them.

One class C RV left early this morning and then returned as I was checking the springs, they said visibility was bad and the roads were getting pretty slick with the light fine snow that has been falling all day and the wind is blowing pretty hard.

After the cleanup and a warm shower, I messed with a couple of yesterdays photos and did a conversion in Photoshop to resemble an oil painting, I thought they lent themselves well to the technique.

Here they are!







Not sure how far I will get tomorrow, may stop around Fairbanks and hit a store for some supplies, but HAVE to stop at the North Pole and arrange for letters from Santa for my grand nieces and nephew! The trailer is warm and toasty and with cable TV, just watched the Rangers Hockey game and now the Kentucky Derby, I have a nice rib-eye steak out thawing and will have some potatoes and a veggie! All is well....

Almost forgot the Trip Recap!

Since leaving Kingman Arizona on April 9th I have traveled approx 4620.4 miles (which includes some running around) and used 349.72 gallons of fuel, costing $1,574.90 lowest gas price was $3.329 and the highest was in Canada and without currency conversion was $6.107 for an average of $4.46 per gallon for the trip. I averaged 9.96 MPG with my best leg at 12.99 MPG. I have for the most part tried to limit my travel to about 300-350 miles per day. My longest day was 732 miles on day 1. Several days near 400 miles.


Stay Tuned for the next leg of my journey!



Capt. Jim - "The Gypsy"

Traveling and photographing the Southwest