Day 1 - Leaving home for our Alaskan Adventure
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| Hooked up and ready to roll! |
Along the highway we rolled. Abbottsford, BC was our first stop after the wonderful (NOT) treatment from a Canadian Customs Agent (See details below). Our stomach reminded us that John and I skipped breakfast waiting until 10:00am or so but the actual breakfast time ended up being 1:30pm., brunch time I would say. Abbottsford greeted us with a Strawberry statue.
As we rolled, several lawn chairs seemed to appear in the hills just waiting for Paul Bunyan.
I counted seven tunnels as we continued and each tunnel has it's own special name. Tunnels that keeps us safe from falling rocks mostly.
You can't help but notice the Fraser River. It reminds me of our mighty Mississippi river, forging around curves, over boulders, whirlpooling as if it had arms that reached to the other side.
Swirling and curling , sort of like when you flush the toilet, just which way does the water run, clockwise or counter clockwise. In our home it runs counter clockwise but in the basement or rec room it runs clockwise. So take a look when you flush. Did not see any barges or ships yet but we are not through.
By 3:30pm we are thinking about stopping. Seems like a long day and John's butt is tired from sitting so long. My butt has been getting up and down for whatever but I would like to stop too. Frank and Anna have been following most of the time. Anna is on her job, snapping pictures here, there and everywhere. Her collection is growing and GROWING. There is no stopping camera bug Anna. It must be women's intuition but when we stopped for gas, guess what was directly across the street? A Jade Jewelry shop. You know the girls went looking! No treasures could be found so we retreated back to the RV.
For those who have inquiring minds, we drove approximately 300 miles today. Tomorrow will be a much longer day. Our incident at the Border caused us great delay and stress.
Our first RV park was at Brookside RV Park in Cache Creek, BC. Nikki and John, new owners since August 2012, were warm and friendly. It is a Good Sam park so we received our 10% discount, plus there are two restaurants in Cache Creek that honor campers at Brookside and give you another 10% discount on your meal. What a deal.
Oscar, our resident canine, is doing marvelous. Anna and Oscar are fine tuning who's the boss, and I won't be the
judge whether it's the two or four legs who is winning.
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| Oscar having a mid-day snack |
The Adventure at the Border
Leaving home at 8 a.m. we headed north on I-5 for the Canadian
border. After exchanging some US $ for CA $ at the duty free store, we
proceeded to the border crossing at Lynden. The CBSA agent asked the usual “20
questions”: where are you from, where are you going, how long are you staying,
do you have over $10,000, etc., etc., etc. After passing her quiz, and since she
didn’t ask, I volunteered that I had a weapons permit to transport my .357 S&W
Clint Eastwood special through Canada. This got her attention and she
immediately directed me to pull the coach over to the parking area and go inside
for further processing.
Conne and I went inside with our paperwork, including driver’s
license and passports and gave them to the agent - and that’s when the
adventure began.
CBSA: Why are you bringing a hand gun to Canada?
ME: It’s for protection from wildlife in Alaska.
CBSA: You are not allowed to bring a hand gun to Canada.
ME: I checked with the Canadian Embassy, the RCMP and the
CFC and was instructed to fill out a request to transport a restricted firearm
through Canada and also fill out a form 909 but not sign it until I got to the
border.
CBSA: So why do you need to bring a hand gun to Canada?
ME: It’s for protection from wildlife in Alaska.
CBSA: Why didn’t you mail it to Alaska?
ME: I don’t know anyone in Alaska to mail it to.
CBSA: You should have taken it to a dealer and have them
send it to a dealer in Alaska.
ME: I didn’t know that is what I should have done. I was just
following the instructions I got from the RCMP and the CFC.
CBSA: I don’t care what they said, I am the final authority
on whether or not this application gets approved/disapproved.
Meanwhile, Conne sees a “Welcome to Canada” sign outside
that she wants to take a picture of, so she gets up and heads for the door, but
the CBSA tells her “Sit down, you can’t go anywhere, I haven’t cleared you
through customs.”
CBSA: Where are you staying in Canada?
ME: We haven’t chosen any places in particular, it depends
on how far we travel each day.
CBSA: I need to know every place you will be staying, is
that clear?
ME: Not exactly, but I can show you the route we plan to
travel and some of the places where we might be stopping. (At this point, my
brother and I start tracing the route and picking RV parks at random along the
route, just to satisfy her ego).
CBSA: You can’t take a weapon into any of the provincial
parks/campgrounds.
ME: Not a problem, since we have not planned to stay at any
of them.
CBSA: Where is your weapon?
ME: It’s locked in the storage compartment on the passenger
side of the RV.
CBSA: Where is the ammunition?
ME: It’s in the overhead storage compartment over the driver’s
seat. Would you like for me to show you?
CBSA: NO! Give me the keys and you go sit down
.
Meanwhile, my brother has the same situation as I – he has a
38 Super - but another CBSA agent waves him over, takes his papers, stamps them
“cleared”, collects $25 and sends him on his way. My agent returns and huddles for
several minutes with other agents who have been watching this fiasco. She comes
over to me, hands me my stamped my papers and tells me I can go.
I wanted to ask her what she wanted me to do with the list
of places where I was stopping that my brother and I had started to compile, but my
better judgment told me to get the hell out of there before she changed her
mind.
I can hardly wait for Day 2!
