Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Best Laid Plans

Yesterday’s post was sort of a setup for today. 

As I mentioned, I prepare detailed itineraries for our extended summer trips, and this year started out being no exception – then things started falling apart.

I had the entire trip mapped out by December – highlights were a return to Glacier National Park (this time with a couple days on the Canadian side at Waterton NP) then on to the Hell’s Canyon area of Idaho and Oregon before heading to the Oregon coast. 

The first snag came when our traveling buddies, the Sheltons, had a scheduling conflict.  He is a member of the Viet Nam Helicopter Pilots Association, and their annual convention was coming up while I had originally planned to be on the road.  I moved everything back a week, but it turns out that other issues may keep them from going anyway.

When I did get around to confirming reservations last week I learned that all three Oregon State Parks where we had planned to stay were booked solid through the middle of September. I went to plan B, and started booking private campgrounds near the parks, only to find that nothing was available at our first Oregon stop until the day after we had planned to arrive.

We had an overnight stay in Reno on the way home and planned to stay at the RV park owned by Bordertown Casino.  The guy at the park told me that he had a site available, but we would be arriving during Hot August Nights which is apparently a major event.  We could have the campsite for one night, but would have to pay a four-night minimum at the inflated special event rate.  Needless to say, I passed on his generous offer and rerouted through Carson City, instead.

Trip planning is now complete, and we have confirmed reservations for every stop, but this has been the most difficult trip I’ve ever planned. 

If we were totally self-contained (we don’t have a generator or an expensive system of solar panels and a big bank of batteries) I would be tempted to join the ranks of those who never make reservations and “Boondock” in parking lots wherever they end up each evening.

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