That's what I'm driving now

taking pictures for trucking and RV magazines.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

Prairie Privinces to Ontario

As I said: at the time we planned this trip we knew it's not going to be a walk in the park. Lethbridge - Regina 1 day, the next day Regina - Kenora and we are in Ontario. Campground in Kenora is full but we got lucky: a local policeman gave us directions to Wal Mart and we spent the night there with a few other RV-s. I went for a walk in the morning to find a sign: no overnight parking but nobody bothered us. Weather was really ugly, cool at night, rainstorm, haven't seen the sun for 2 days now. We needed a dump so drove to the local campground just to find out: if you just want to dump is 15$. No thanks. We also needed fresh water, tank is almost empty, happy to see a gas station. Friendly young guy is telling me: since the city started metering water all the outside hoses have been capped, sorry but he can't help. At the east end of town a nice RV park, I pulled in and asked at the office if I could get some water?
How much do I need?
20 gallon would do it for now.
20 bucks and she didn't say please.
We said thank you and good by, hope to never see you again.
Only a few miles and we are in Dryden; the first sign shows: Free RV Dump provided by the City 500 m on right; also fresh water fill, thanks Dryden, it is nice to find help thousands of miles from home.


Entering Saskatchewan. Here you really can see that the Earth is round.


Kings of The Road in Saskatchewan. Truckers here are pulling 2X53' trailers, that's a real Road Train.


Lunch in Saskatchewan; life is good. After we left this parking we had nothing but ugly weather for days.


Entering Manitoba


It was the first time I drove in Ontario. There is a lake every 5 minutes, I love it, the scenery is beautiful.


We are fast, already 3 hours ahead of our "home time".

Saturday, July 16, 2011

June 5

If you have only 3 weeks to go to Ontario and back from Vancouver Island then you know you have to drive like a trucker. We even had to push it a bit harder because we wanted to spend some time there and see some sights as well. Hurry was the reason for not having so many pictures and yes, sometimes we drove late in the evening, so it wasn't a leisurely RV trip. If it was I would have given myself a month just to get there and you should too. Back to the trip: Haines Pt. at 30 bucks/night is a bit to much for my taste but if you fish it's well worth it. Next morning we left around 9 am.


In a hurry or not we had to stop at Christina Lake and take a few pictures


In the southeast part of BC....


...the lake is a jewel in the mountains.


The world largest truck in Sparwood, BC. Easy to stop because it's at the visitor center. Just to have a sense of it's size: look at the adult at the front right corner of the rig.


Late afternoon we crossed the Alberta border at Crowsnest Pass; a beautiful part of the cowboy country. We spent the night at the Wal Mart in Lethbridge.

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

June 04 The Takeoff

We have been planning this trip for a very long time and just before we left everything was all of a sudden in jeopardy. The place where I worked the last 9 years has been sold, the new owner told us in a meeting: nothing to worry about, everything is going to be the same. The next couple of hours they’ve been talking about what we have to do different. Only 2 months later I’m driving to the Hospital to pick up my wife when I got a call from the “Big Guy”: You know your job is cut soon but I’m making you an offer: you buy one of my trucks and can stay as an owner operator. I said I have to think about it and it was the perfect timing to call me, I’m at the hospital if I get a heart attack I don’t have to go too far. We decided to go to Ontario anyway we are doing to deal with it after we are back. It was kind of a family reunion and an 84 year old lady is waiting for us in Windsor; how could you tell her we are not coming. So we left on the 4th of June, missed the first boat to leave the island out of Nanaimo and had to wait 2 hrs for the next one, beautiful day, smooth sailing and we were on the Trans Canada in Vancouver by 3:00 pm. We are not crossing the border so we wanted to fill up the fridge at the International Sausage House in Burnaby. It’s not even 5 minutes from the freeway and well worth the trip; they even have a deli with hot ribs, pork chops and a lot of those hard to resist goodies. It was so good we had an early dinner right there in the parking lot. An hour later and about 60 $ lighter we were back on the highway and still had enough time to drive to Osoyoos. Haines Pt. is my wife’s favourite fishing spot and in my opinion one of the best campsites in BC. Do you know any other camping in the middle of the lake? It was almost 10: pm when we got there but she still grabbed the rods and went fishing. No fish but a very good peaceful night.


Long line up at the ferry, we had to wait for the next sailing. The motorhome left in the picture came all the way from Germany.


Smooth sailing on a beautiful day.


The view of a little boat from the big boat.


People were enjoying the sunny day and the view.......


.......of Vancouver and Mt. Baker in the background.


We made it to Osoyoos, one of the best campgrounds in BC. You camp right in the middle of the lake.
 
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