On to Marblemount, WA

After the visit to the Big Bottom Festival, James and I decided to just head north.

I had already been in contact with the insurance adjuster guy via email and he wasn’t too enthused about driving from Tacoma clear over to Randle so he and I came up with a plan. Since I wanted to head up north anyway, to escape the heat, (it is August in this timeline), I did some searching online and decided that heading west from Randle over to I-5, stopping in Tacoma to meet with the insurance guy, and then heading up through Seattle, turning east off the freeway would make for an interesting trip. And the best part was we could do this in one day. My goal was to escape the heat by heading north and staying in the Cascades and either I had to backtrack the way I’d come, or find a new destination. And I found googleing a few RV parks in the forested Cascades north of Tacoma and Seattle that would be cooler and should be nice places to stay. Here’s a link to a map showing both Randle and Marblemount which I decided was going to be my destination. Oh, and Tacoma and Seattle are on it too. Map of Randle to Marblemount…

Only a 4 hour drive from where I was to Marblemount which should give plenty of wiggle room for traffic and meeting the insurance guy. I also did a search and found a couple three RV parks along the freeway on the route where we could stay if it took us too long. But those looked embedded in urban areas, I wanted to be in more rural areas. Less population density. Hopefully I’d be able to bypass those freeway parks.

But first, we wanted to take a night or two after the festival, rest, shower, shave at a RV park with services, and decided to backtrack a few miles from the Big Bottom festival area to Packwood, Washington. There’s a big ol’ RV park near there with all the amenities so we could take showers and go out. Ended up staying there for 2 nights.

Quite a bit of room and nice long spaces for us modern Class A’s towing a car. Had all the services like 50 amp. Wifi wasn’t great, but worked. Packwood is just a mile from the park and we found another older park right in the downtown area. Might be more interesting place to say if staying longer in the area ‘cus you could walk to downtown or ride your bike around town (one of my favorite things to do).

The park we stayed at was Packwood RV Park. Their web page say they’re in Downtown Packwood but that’s simply not true. They’re around a mile maybe two away. Here’s a few more pictures of the park.

After we’d showered and shaved, headed into Packwood for a look around and dinner. Found this fairly new Pizza joint, Cruisers Pizza, that looked interesting so stopped in. Smelled great, and the pizza looked great. EXPENSIVE. Came to $45 after tip for this pizza shown. Had 1 beer apiece, but wow.

After a couple days in Packwood, it was time to meet up with the insurance guy in Tacoma, and then head on to Marblemount. A portion of the drive was along side the Cowlitz river. It’s only a 4 hour drive so that gives plenty of wiggle room meeting the guy, and battling traffic. The meet up with the insurance guy was pretty simple as we met at a Walmart just off the freeway and the GPS did all the routing. Easy.

After the meet up with the guy in Tacoma, we headed on north. I’m in my RV, James is following in his truck. And my GPS screws up and misdirects me. It was trying to take me over to the less traveled freeway that parallels I-5 and at this time of day when we passed through, would have less traffic. But it sent me into a hospital parking lot for some reason. It was the right way to go for a car, but difficult for a big RV. And it turned out that I’d inadvertently turned off the ‘this is a bus’ setting so that’s how that happened. James got pissed at following me as I wound around that tight area, he called (phone was working here) and he headed back to I-5 planned on meet up further north. I asked a guy walking the street how to get to the other freeway and headed that way. Found it within 5 minutes. Just a short hangup easily corrected. Soon we were in, then through Seattle. Lucky the weather was good and the traffic light…at least on the freeway I was on.

So eventually I was through Seattle, joined up with I-5 again, and headed for the WA-530 highway turnoff. I expected that after I made that turn onto 530 that the diesel prices would jump. So I stopped at a truck stop. And ended up paying a full 10 cents more per gallon then the little station right after I turned onto 530. DOH!

Headed on east and then north in this rural farm like area. Finally settled at Glacier Peak Resort & Winery in Rockport, WA since it was around 3:30 pm. Turned out that James’ dog Hunter really liked it there because he went nuts when he spied the pet rabbits that had the run of the place. James had a hell of a time allowing him to have some fun, but not letting him get off the leash. Spent two nights there and I know I took pictures but I can’t find them. Maybe they got deleted somehow.

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After those two nights, we drove a little east of there and stopped at Marblemount, WA to hang out for an hour or two until check in time at the Alpine RV Park. Really small town, not much more than a wide spot in the road. BUT…seems like it’s a hot spot for people to escape the heat of the city. There’s several expensive restaurants, a couple well stocked convenience stores, a couple gas stations. Oh, and a library. It’s only 8 miles from Rockport so I delayed my departure from the Rockport RV park until check out time.

And here is where I ended up staying for a month. Alpine RV Park. James packed up and left 2 days after I got here, headed back home, and I stayed and enjoyed the cool weather. But, the Wifi sucked when I first got here.

They allowed me to move closer to the building where their modem was and it turned out that the modem was the only source for wifi. Their external antenna wasn’t connected.

This shot (below) from the front on my RV shows the building where the modem was…and it was behind that door there in the middle of the facing wall, not the door where the ‘Men’ sign is, on the other wall. That was a tiny room that had the electrical and computer setup. The rest of the building on this side was part of the bathroom, and the further part was the laundry room. Access from the other end of the building. The modem signal was still very weak, but at least I could get online. But I soon went over and talked the gal who is the campground host into letting me improve the situation. See, she’s the one everyone was complaining to about the weak wifi. Many campers do all their business online these days so a poor wifi is annoying as hell.

So since the modem was cloistered behind that wall, without an external antenna, it was sheer luck that any of the campers got wifi. Eventually, I convinced the park manager to allow me to improve it, and improve it I did. Easy using one of my own setups with an external antenna I put just outside where the modem was. The N style AP I had and installed on the wall right outside the computer modem room really reached deep into the park and soon most of the campers were on that much improved signal.

The improvement was so great that soon the park’s owner was asking for my help for the part of the RV park way in the back. Which I gave. First thing I suggested was to connect and than move the extension antenna he had in the attic to a different place to reach further into the park. After he did that, it wasn’t long before they had whole park Wifi that worked pretty well. I even sold the manager that extra Wifi piece of equipment I had that had worked so well just outside the door of the computer room so she could have her own special channel directly wired to the modem with no other users on it…after I’d gotten the external antenna working well AND improved the modems signal.

Here’s a shot of the other side of the building. I had the owner move the attic antenna from that 2nd story crawl space which was over the apartment on the right, to the attic at the end of the left side of the building mounted right behind the vent. That attic vent faced the rest of the RV park, where the transient spaces and all the other long term spaces are so had him mount the antenna there. Funny how he seemed ready to do that job but the ISP tech had told him it wouldn’t do any good? Huh? That’s just wrong.

Once I’d proved that the extension antenna worked far better behind that vent, didn’t take long to convince the owner that mounting it outside on the gable end of the apartment up higher another 6-8 feet would work even better so he did that just before I left. That was to cover the people on the other side of the building and for all the tent campers on this side PLUS still covering a majority of the park way in the back. Height and exposure is what makes wifi work best. 

All simple stuff for me, but it takes some diplomacy to get owners to let me work on their systems. After proving I know what I’m doing, they gave me several free nights, 5 I think, as payment for my work and a discounted weekly rate after the free portion wore off. That was fine with me. The owner was convinced by the ISP that he needed new equipment that he’d have to pay for, but even though I told him the tech didn’t know a damn thing, he ordered it anyway. While it was on it’s way, I had gotten the system up and working correctly, he had moved the exterior antenna (that was inside an interior space) to the better place to cover more of the park, and then the new parts arrived. After reading all the specs, I knew that the stuff wouldn’t make any difference. So I didn’t install it for them. Recommended he return it. But the owner kept the stuff anyway, and paid for it. Gah!

But, it is a nice little park off the beaten path and I enjoyed my stay here. Here’s some shots of the environs…when we first got here, I was parked way down there at the end of this road right next to that turn to the left. Couldn’t get wifi at all there other then being able to see the SSID. Couldn’t use it though. Now, of course, visitors should be able to receive wifi at that spot.

Way in the back on the right side was a gentleman who had been complaining about the wifi for years apparently. I was able to provide some good wifi back there for about a week before he died. Poor guy. I asked the manager how they figured out he was dead, apparently he had a hospice worker that checked on him daily so it was likely expected. A week after his death, the RV was gone so he had family nearby I guess.

Here’s that area of the park (below) that wasn’t getting any signal before I worked on the system. Those RV’s way in the back couldn’t use it at all. Those people back there were permanent residents too with several manufactured homes in a small area so they couldn’t just pick up and move somewhere else for wifi. Owner, owners grown kids, friends of the family.

This area to the left in this picture is where they get a bunch of tent campers and I guess they were always complaining about the wifi too during tent camping season. My tests showed it much improved in that area.

They have this trail in the back of the park which iwas kind of fun. There was a sign about mountain lions. Or maybe bears.

Makes a big loop. There’s some rusted out hulks of cars back in here.
I see from their current web site that the improved Wifi caused them to bump their rates. It was $30/night for retirees now it’s $35/night. $220/week. Jeese. It’s not that good of a park. I was only paying $22.50/night which isn’t bad for a weekly rate. And back in August 2018 it was $180/week. If I hadn’t gotten those discounts and free nights though, I wouldn’t have stayed as long as I did.

Well, that’s it for now. Next time I’ll show some of the town and the mountains when I headed for Soap Lake, Washington.

Thanks for reading!