Monday, July 18, 2011 (Travel to Kokanee Creek Provincial Park, Nelson, BC)

I woke up extra early this morning...no idea why but just couldn’t sleep any longer so was up at about 5:30.  As I opened the blinds, it didn’t look too bad out...until I opened the ones that face northwest!  I was greeted with heavy dark clouds hanging over the mountains...oh, oh...that looks like a storm! 

And what a storm it was...complete with lightning, thunder and a major downpour...great...our travel day.  But it actually passed over fairly quickly and by the time we were ready to go out and hitch up the truck, the major downpour had passed on. 

After stopping over at the sani-dump, we said our goodbyes to Mel (the campground Manager) and were on our way...it was about 9:40 a.m.  We were on our way east on highway 31A towards Kaslo. 

We stopped at The Kaslo River Trail just as you enter Kaslo and went for a little walk down to the river...

We initially were going to check out the municipal campground there but a couple of fellows from across the road came out while we were hitching up.  They suggested that we try Woodbury RV & Marina which was just south of Kaslo...so that’s what we decided to do.

Unfortunately, Woodbury RV wasn’t a great choice.  We pulled in there and went into the “resort office”.  The lady said that there wasn’t much available...they are a membership resort but she gave us 2 sites to take a look at.  I guess “membership resort” really means a lot of people who keep their RV’s here permanently...because that is what the majority of it was.  We both thought it was also kind of dumpy and after looking at the sites decided that they really were too narrow for our liking anyways...so we decided to carry onto our plan B...Kokanee Creek Provincial Park. 

When we pulled into the Park, there was a gatehouse at the entrance...obviously this is a larger, more popular park.  There are 2 campgrounds...the main one which is totally reservable and Redfish Campground just a little further down the highway.  It is smaller with only about 20 non-reservable sites.  She said they were all full right now...and being as big as we are, our best bet would be in the overflow section by the day-use area.

So after going to the sani-dump area and filling up with fresh water, we headed to the over-flow camping section.  And what a very strange camping arrangement that is...they are just “pull over” spots along the road...marked by site numbers on each picnic table.  Some are longer for RVs, others (mainly the centre loop) are smaller with room to park by the table and a grassy area for tents. 

We picked what we thought would be the best for us...at the end of the first loop so we wouldn’t have anyone behind us.  We got parked...ensuring we were far enough off the road to get our sliders out but not too close to the table.  When we put the sliders out, we had less than 3 inches from the slider to the table. 

By this time it was 1:30 and we were hungry so the first thing I did was make sandwiches for lunch.  While I did that, Steve was puttering around outside getting our chairs out and putting the awning out. 

After lunch, I unpacked the inside while Steve set up the satellite dish...he wasn’t too hopeful for a signal due to some big trees that were in the way.  But was pleasantly surprised when he managed to get a good strong signal...although for some reason, he is unable to get most of the HD stations.

Afterwards, we went for a bike ride around the campground. Although not super sunny, it was quite warm...high 20s C /low 80s F and high humidity...especially inside the trailer, so the breeze as we rode around was very welcome.  After going down each road in the campground, we determined that there were quite a few sites that we would be able to fit into...mind you, some sites could use a good tree pruning and most were heavily shaded. The roads were also much narrower with low hanging tree branches, than at McDonald Creek. The overflow isn’t that bad after all and allows us full sunshine for solar power and we have satellite reception.

We made a stop at the Visitors Centre and took a look and then after a ride down to the boat launch, we headed back to our trailer.  We are surprised at the number of other campers that have joined us in the overflow section...one indication that the campground isn’t big enough this time of year!

The trailer was finally cooling down as we sat watching TV with all the windows open and fantastic fans going...whew, thank goodness.  The weather is suppose to be nice tomorrow and then take a real dive for next couple of days, so we thought we should drive back up to Kaslo tomorrow and explore that area.