Frankentrailer and the Site for Sore Eyes

A few years back, Audrey's uncle Harry told us he'd found a salvageable tent trailer in Lethbridge for under $1000, and her folks were wiling to pick it up for us, sight unseen, and take it back to their place in High River. When we finally got around to seeing it, we discovered that the concept of salvageability is entirely subjective, and worried we might have bitten off more than we could chew.

It was a 1977 Sportcraft, manufactured in Lethbridge Alberta. Inside it was fairly dirty, having sat unused for 15-20 years, but nothing insurmountable, and we were willing to put in the sweat equity to clean and fix the interior if it meant we could spend our future camping trips sleeping up off the ground. The roof had taken a lot of hail damage as well, but we knew there was a sealant that could sort that out.

The fact that it took a twelve-pound sledgehammer to close it though, that was daunting, but still not a deal breaker. The fact that the wiring had a short, which meant intermittent running lights and the possibility that turn signals and brake lights might not be visible to other drivers, that put me on edge a little bit.

We managed to get it over to Audrey's brother Garrett though, who graciously reinforced a bit of the structure and rewired it for us so now everything works. At last we have a trailer that will win no beauty contests but can (theoretically) keep the rain off our heads.

I still find driving with a trailer to be an intimidating experience though. I am terrified I'm going to have a brain fart one day and try to take it through Peter's Drive-In in Red Deer, incurring the wrath of hundreds of drivers as I try to extricate myself. I have to remind myself of the added length at every intersection and with every lane-change, and I still cannot navigate while backing up worth a damn.

This week was our first camping trip since 2014, and our first ever with Frankentrailer, so we set out with a combination of anticipation and apprehension. The drive to Radium takes a little under 7 hours, but I worried about backing into our site the entire way. Imagine my joy then, when we arrived and discovered that our site was actually a pull through, with no backing up required!

Frankentrailer is light enough that the girls and I can muscle it from the street to our patio at the end of summer (although it is not easy by any stretch), so that was how I had planned to get it into position if there were any difficulties. As it was, we took advantage of the lightness to spin the trailer 180 degrees so that our door would face the campsite instead of the road.

In fairly short order, we had a comfy looking little outpost all set up, including the Chillax hammock we'd gotten from Costco months earlier, and which I cannot say enough good things about.

The site itself (E-10 in Redstreak, if you are curious) had a lot going for it: we were right next to the washrooms and showers (too close for Audrey but just fine for the girls and I), and also adjacent to the water we would use for cooking a cleaning. We had a decent amount of trees (critical for hammock deployment) and a lot of level ground to spread out on if we needed too.

It is very close to the village of Radium Hot Springs, but is about 300 metres higher, so you get very little in the way of noise or traffic.Sadly, we couldn't use the firepit due to the campfire ban, and the ground was incredibly dusty, even after an evening of decent rain. Still, a very good campsite, all in all.

Sadly, our proximity to the water also meant that mealtimes would usually see 2-3 wasps buzzing about, but we even those interactions were non-dramatic and inconsequential. We purchased a wasp trap with an intense-sounding warning on the packaging ("No drink wasp!"), but only set it out twice, and captured none, sadly.

Like most federal campgrounds, Redstreak has a few amenities such as an amphitheater and some hiking trails, including one that goes straight down to the famous hot springs themselves. One we took has an elevation gain of about 250m, but does give you a tremendous view of the Columbia Valley, as well as other photo opportunities along the way.

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Redstreak is an especially good place to camp if you enjoy wildlife, as we often saw the ubiquitous Big Horn Sheep grazing at various places in and around our loop, as well as a group (flock?) of wild turkeys that meandered through our site early on the morning we left.

The next time you get shut out at Jasper, give some thought to the Redstreak campground at Radium; I'm pretty confident Frankentrailer will return there some day.