West Coast Experience

---

We arrived back at our farm at 8:34 this evening after driving from Revelstoke, BC. My attempt to blog this morning was unsuccessful, don't know why I could view but not make a new entry.

The night before last we stayed at Larrabee ( not Larramy as I said a couple of times earlier in our trip) State Campground - even got our same camp0site as before, with water tap and garbage across the trail and washrooms very close. This time I put 50 cents in the shower instead of 25 and had a hot shower! Yesterday morning I took a 10 minute walk to the "beach" which is actually a piece of rocky coastline, but kind of a neat walk through large ceders, ferns, split ceder railings along the path, etc. I even picked a cupful of wild blackberries for breakfast - they are quite sweet when thoroughly ripe, but the thorns are quite grabby!

We found our border crossing about 11AM and the lineup was short. Having confessed to having most of a box of wine, we learned that you cannot share, you have to count the full amount of the box, and you are only allowed 1.5 litres each - but she let us off, possibly because we had so little other stuff to declare. We were back at the autobody in Chilliwack by noon, picked up Dianne's car with no problems, reloaded everything into it in the parking lot at the gas station down the street, and returned our Dodge Journey to Hertz. OK, I missed my turn but Dianne blew her horn and I eventually got there!
From there is was a short drive to Canadian Tire, where we invested in a roll of "Gorilla tape" and then over to the Dollar store next door for some patching material (oven trays) we didn't need in the end. The tape worked great on the banged up door,. never even started to come off in the wind and rain we drove through all afternoon. We made it to Revelstoke about 7:30, and given the weather decided to stay at Peaks Lodge ($69 for a room with hard bed, thin walls, and no phone or internet access, but it was clean). We drove 4 km into town for a great fish and chip dinner at a fast food place, and were in bed by 9 or shortly after. Dianne says I went to sleep quickly and was unresponsive to her poking! I w3as awake in the night for quite a while but managed a decent amount of sleep bu 6:45. That's when I tried to use the computer in the lobby, but though I eventually got gmail to work, I could not connect to Facebook and Travelblog would not give me a window to post a new entry.

Dianne was up shortly after 8PM and after a quick stop in town for the A&W "bacon & eggers" and another for gas, we were on the road about 8:40. We drove in rain on and off, but again the trip was uneventful. We found our way around Calgary via Cochrane and Airdrie after stopping at Lake Louise and buying an Alberta map! Another pit stop in Drumheller for gas, bathrooms, a burger and a jug of milk. We crossed into Saskatchewan about 7: 15 this evening.

All in all its been a good trip. I was even right on one occasion today, which makes twice on our trip! The Gorilla tape is still holding and Dianne is getting good at climbing into the passenger seat from the driver's seat. We saw a lot of new countryside, made some wonderful new friends, and except for my car accident had an enjoyable two weeks. Now we have a day to relax at the farm before heading back to Melfort on Monday.

---