Induction to the world of RV-ing.

I had been up quite late blogging and responding to emails, also madly downloading iTunes movies for our 2 weeks in the RV. Watching movies, huddled in the Kombi, motel, or a hire van has become a bit of a tradition for us since the children were younger, so it's quite nostalgic. I still have fond memories of the TV series Spooks (France), "How I met your mother" (Kakadu), "Big brother" original series (Daintree)… hmm yes really.. I can feel your judgement from here! Anyway I was up late, and we had to get up early to prepare for departure and pickup of the vehicle.

I don't know how four people with only aeroplane luggage can completely fill an apartment, occupying every nook and cranny, but we certainly did, and packing took a while. 

Our taxi arrived on time. Our driver AJ was originally silent, but soon we were chatting away. He was a Sikh from Punjab state and had lived here for over 20 years. Surprisingly (not), he loved cricket, and soon we were laughing about Australian accents. He was very familiar with the nasal accent of Ritchie Benaud, amongst other Aussie commentators. AJ (real name Amartje Singh) had just nipped over the US border last night to buy tiles for his bathroom renovation and once a week he and his wife would make a dash to Washington State for groceries.

We arrived at the RV hire place and promptly opened our wallets. Money haemorrhaged into their till as we discovered "hidden" charges. I discovered for instance that the reason our hire deal was such a bargain was that it included no kilometres. This was going to be a disappointing holiday as their car park wasn't that scenic. 

After some contemplation we agreed to the extra 31c per km. Our planned trip was 2500km. We thought blankets might be handy at night, and chairs to sit outside the vehicles. They happily took our piles of cash and soon we were ensconced in a viewing room watching a movie. This was no Clint Eastwood production, but it did acquaint us with the vehicle.

Here it is.. our home for the next 2 weeks. 

It's big. 

I was very reluctant to actually start driving, so was quite happy as we fussed around organising our gear in the car park. Finally the time had come to set off. I turned the key and we were off. This vehicle is "10 feet wide" (Canada is in metric but the company and the vehicle are from the US and the speedometer is in mph). That's a wide vehicle and the mirrors really stick out. Roadside signs and cyclists etc are really at risk, and basically on a two lane highway, mirror to mirror is from one line to the other.

It wasn't long until we needed petrol

Graham had tipped that "Save on Foods" was a good place to shop. So shop we did! 

Another $400 quickly disappeared into the Canadian economy and we stocked up with a very full trolley's worth of food. I should briefly mention the trolley system. You deposit a coin, and if you have a degree in engineering your trolley detaches from the others. We didn't and it didn't. Even a local was baffled. Eventually a lady arrived to return a free trolley and we paid her a quarter to take it. When we finished shopping we did the same for another woman. I have strong suspicions that there's only one free trolley which is just passed around and the other 467 are just for show.

 We had a change of plans today. Because we are still in June, the locals are not yet on holiday so we decided that we should head straight to the Rockies before the holiday invasion hits. This meant heading East on Highway One… Trans Canada Highway. It took some time before I was relaxed enough to sing like Gene Pitney though.. this was stressful. We needed "gas" as we had arrived at the hire place before we were supposed to, so it had not been filled up. 

Another $200 poorer, we were on the open road, chasing the setting sun (not really.. that was poetic license.. it was overcast)

For those interested, Bronze (unleaded standard) costs CAD $142 per litre in Delta, BC. The petrol gets cheaper, the further you go from the cities- exactly the opposite situation to home. I suspect that's because Canada has lots of oil centrally and the cities are coastal, but I haven't done the research on their oil field locations yet. 

I have never spent this much on petrol before!

Not much to report on with the travelling. Here are some shots from the journey. W set up our GoPro camera on the dash which was a huge success. 

The traffic was dense enough for first time RV-ers. I was just getting
use to driving on the right hand side of the road!

Finally the open road.

We will be shooting some pretty cool movies when we have got the knack of this.

Off to find a toilet.

After the toilet

Showing W where the toilet is

Where is that toilet?

Heading towards the mountains

Nearing Kelowna as sunset approaches

Cyclist just out of range of our side mirror!

At sunset we finally arrived in Kelowna and pocketed ourselves in site number 522 (this park is pretty huge). It was advertised as WiFi, but it wasn't free. Perhaps because of the wallet leak earlier we elected not to pay, but managed to get some reception and get emails.

Our home for the night

Adjusting the GoPro results in some flattering shots!

Unless you pose for them. 

All hooked up.


Goodnight.