You know you’re in Canada when the Hardware and Automotive stove called Canada Tire has this section:
Canada Tire is my new favorite store, it’s like Ace Hardware + Walmart + Napa auto parts. I was able to buy an inch-pound torque wrench for my paramotor as well as 4 gallons of DEF for the truck. I’m glad we stocked up before we left the US, as many stores are out of stock, and without it, the truck won’t go faster than 5 miles per hour.
Heading West, Trish was reading some tourist information and found out that there’s a world famous (or at least regionally notable) mountain biking park in Burns Lake, BC. The trail map shows an extensive network of trails:
This is just a portion of the skills park at one of two sites:
We rode a number of trails in the bike park half of the complex:
It turns out that the park includes free RV parking, so we decided to stay here for the night. See the trip map for details.
The door clasp that holds the RV’s door open is too short because we have a mezuzah mounted to the door frame and the door collides with the mezuzah before it is fully open. The solution was to buy a length of toilet fresh water supply pipe, cut the door clasp in half, and shove the two halves into either end of the pipe. This allowed me to extend the class by about 10 inches:
Leaving the Walmart at Williams Lake, we stopped to fill up on diesel. I had to triple check the pump since in the US diesel is always the green handle, but here it’s yellow, and green is for unleaded:
At a bit under $6 per gallon, it’s no surprise that our first gas station visit in Canada set a new record for the most expensive yet:
On the way out of town, we stopped at the local tourist center. We picked up many pounds of brochures. The center had this car on display, they look like they’re ready for fun:
The theatre showing a regional promotional video was quite authentic:
You could also pretend to be having outdoor adventures:
M loves fishing:
We did laundry today, so we got off to a late start. We drove about 3 hours north to Prince George, British Columbia, where we are overnighting at the Walmart here. This is the last town we will see before we head west on the Cassiar Highway and reach Yellowknife in the Yukon. See the trip map for details.
The signage in the Walmart lot said “3 hour parking”. We had called ahead yesterday and been given permission to overnight, but I was still nervous (what Trish calls my “everyone is out to get us” syndrome) so we drove away a bit after 8am. We parked a couple blocks away and the kids did homeschool with Trish while I went in search of cell service.
AT&T’s Canadian rates are outrageous, so I walked to the nearest Roger store, which happened to be across the street from a Telus store. I had to note store locations before we crossed the border, as we had no cell coverage once we crossed over.
In the end, I signed up with Telus. My phone is still in the two-year contract period with AT&T, so they wouldn’t unlock the phone to work with another carrier’s SIM card, so we used Tricia’s phone, which is out of contract. For $30 we get 1GB of data, usable over the next 30 days. Inbound calls are 50 cents a minute, but by adding a $5 texting plan for the month, that rate drops to 15 cents a minute.
Our Google Voice numbers, which we have to dodge AT&T’s texting charges, won’t forward for free to the Canadian cell phone number, so I signed up for a $10 a month hosted FreePBX. I registered a couple US DIDs with the PBX, set up rules to forward inbound calls received by the DIDs to the Canadian cell number, then set up Google Voice to forward to the US DIDs. So it went from this:
Google Voice –> US cell phone
…to this:
Google Voice –> US DID –> FreePBX –> Canadian cell phone
This gets around the Google Voice limitation of free forwarding only to US numbers. Since Google Voice is forwarding to a US DID, Google Voice is happy.
On the outbound call side, it costs 65 cents a minute, down from one dollar a minute thanks to the addition of the $5 texting plan. Using FreePBX, I turn a 65 cent per minute outbound call into a 15 cent a minute inbound call by enabling callback on the PBX.
Of course, all of this is in case I can’t use the data connection on the phone to make a VoIP call using a softphone client on my phone, which makes the call effectively free.
To avoid data charges, I set this all up in the Telus store using their free WiFi.
Continuing North, we stopped at the Walmart and Home Depot of Squamish, BC to cobble together an antenna cowling for the WiFi Antenna which was damaged by low hanging branches yesterday. It is considerably more vulnerable atop a 13 foot high 5th wheel than it was atop a 10 foot high travel trailer.
As Home Depots go, this one was quite stately. I think the mountains and the Canadian flag lend a certain gravitas, don’t you?
Rather than take Route 1, we took the shorter but less traveled route 99 through the coast range. The drive was amazing, which majestic mountains plunging into Lions Bay. Heading inland, climbing to 4,000 feet, we drove through the clouds, the road reduced to insignificance as it wound between steep mountain faces towering thousands of feet above. Bridges over storm fed streams were one lane, wood decked affairs. We glimpsed several hanging waterfalls and passed the resorts of Whistler and finally descended several 13% grades to pass by the modest mountainside town of Lillooet. There weren’t any good pullouts for photography, but the drive was spectacular, the ignored smaller sibling of the drive through Banff and the Canadian Rockies.
Meeting up with Route 1 a bit North of the town of Cache Creek, we continued North through the towns of 100 Mile House and Lac la Hache to arrive at the Walmart of Williams Lake, BC for the night. We arrived at 11:30pm, about 45 minutes after twilight surrendered to night. We will be in the Land of the Midnight Sun soon! See the trip map for details.
This morning we played with Zander a bit before we left. Here he is pondering the implications of a mobile lifestyle:
Bubbles with B:
Trish took many more photographs of our visit, hopefully they will soon appear on Tricia’s blog.
Continuing North, we passed the stately Capitol dome in Olympia and then skirted the SeaTac metro area to the East, stopping briefly in Mercer Island to stock up on what might be our last opportunity to purchase kosher meat for the next couple of months.
Online sources showed a 45 minute delay at the two I-5 border crossings, so we headed due North to cross at Lynden, Washington, which had a 20 minute delay:
Crossing with our passport cards went fine, but handing in our firearm transit form resulted in an extra 30 minute search of the RV while we had to wait in the customs office. I would think they would want to more carefully search those who do not declare their firearms, but I’m sure they know what they’re doing.
Welcome to Canada, land of six-dollar diesel!
After a brief stop in Vancouver in which we inadvertently did a bit of damage to the WiFi Antenna with some low trees, we continued on to the Walmart of North Vancouver to overnight, arriving a bit after midnight. See the trip map for details.
This morning we drove North from the Walmart in Chehalis to visit Liz and Jason and their kids near Tumwater, Washington. They live a bit South of the Olympia Regional Airport, and there’s an airshow scheduled for this weekend, so I thrilled when I heard the drone of four massive engines and called everyone out of the house in time to see Fifi, the only flyable B-29 in the world, fly over at about 200 feet. It was amazing!
The kids took advantage of their new dry erase wall. Ironically, the wall built to separate their bedrooms was used for the first time to create a cooperative mural:
The shower knobs are very easy to turn, and this morning clothing fell off the upper edge of the shower door and turned on the water, soaking our dirty laundry which we keep in the shower. Adding these shock cords should solve the problem:
The kids had a great time playing with Zander, Liz and Jason’s oldest child:
On Sunday, we will be heading North to cross the border into Canada. Good Shabbos from near Tumwater, Washington! See the trip map for today’s drive.
Facebook
Instagram
Email