On the Road Again

On the Road Again

Monday 03 Sept 2007

Well, we are on the 12H00 ferry, heading for Surrey and a family ‘combined grandchildren’s birthday supper’.

Hope we have not forgotten anything really important.

Remembered at the last second that the hot tub still needed to be drained! Set the hose up and left the water running out. Maybe Angus will disconnect the hose, sponge out the dregs and put the cabinet door back in place?

Denise is asleep in the back, and I’m about to start updating the Trip Plan (in MS Streets & Trips). No network(s) on the ferry, so unable to any lookup for info or research.

Arrived at J & M’s and B & B arrived a little later for the Party! Food, cake, presents for Jake, Cleo and Gavin (1 week earlier).

Spent the night at B & B’s.

Tuesday 04 Sept 2007

Spent the morning babysitting Cleo and Eden, then dropped them off at their daycare for the afternoon. Went to Guildford Mall and did some minor shopping, plus lunch at the foodcourt. Picked up Kira from school and went back to the house. BBQ supper.

Wednesday 05 Sept 2007

On the #1 toward Hope and beyond!

Through Manning Park, lunch at Princeton (A&W), then headed for Penticton. Half of the roadsigns show Penticton and Osoyoos to be exactly the same distance away, the others differ by 1 or 2 Km! Wonder who keeps moving these towns around?

Into Penticton early afternoon, and go looking for the place where you can get on the canal. Found the launch site, then back to Canadian Tire to pump up the plastic raft. Air system is out of commission. No hose!! They send someone to fix it, but it still does not produce air! After trying (unsuccessfully) to inflate the raft with the car tire pump (which is designed for small volume/high pressure rather than large volume/low pressure), WE BLOW IT UP BY HAND! (actually, by MOUTH)!

We take a couple of beers and ciders (plus our travel mugs to pour them into, so it looks like we are drinking coffee), plus Denise takes shoes, shirt & shorts (to walk back for the van) and we launch intrepidly off onto the canal, which is flowing fairly fast at this point. Denise shifts position on the raft and it is nearly ‘into’ the canal rather than ‘onto’! The water is quite chilly! We try to stay in the same place from then on, with no rapid moves.

We float ‘Gently Down The River’ for some while (about 2-1/2 hours it turns out), gradually moving slower and slower as the canal widens and deepens. The afternoon turns from beautifully sunny and warm to cloudy, colder and getting darker as we travel even yet slower! Our arms become oars as we attempt to assist nature in getting us to the end of this trip, but it is still well past 5H30 when we eventually float up to the stairs at the Skaha Lake end of the canal.

There is no ‘return bus’ waiting, because the official operators of the ‘float’ have shut down for Winter the previous day. Denise had intended to walk back to get the Roadtrek, since we were told by our offspring (Justin and Angus) that the distance was about 1-1/2 Km. They must have been on a different river, because we have floated about 6 MILES!! It is also late and getting dark.

Luckily, there are 2 other couples that have floated down ahead of us, and one of their group has walked to the nearby RV Camp and called a taxi! Denise cadges a lift back with them (only room for 1) to get the van and I read my book and have the last beer while waiting for her to get back.

At the RV park where we stayed for $10/night 2 years ago they demand $35 for an ‘unserviced site’ and $45 for a ‘serviced site’! We head on toward Osyoos, stopping on the roadside for a sandwich supper, get into Osoyoos about 21H00 and park for the night at the back of the Husky Truck/Car Stop.

Thursday 06 Sept 2007

Up at 07H00 and have breakfast at the Husky ‘restaurant’. Big helpings and good food, but far from ‘fine dining’. Fill the gas tank, clean the windscreen (having killed a few thousand bugs the previous evening), and back on the road at about 08H30.

Osoyoos is a pretty nice little place, but even at this time of day and this late in the year it is already hot and muggy. We stop at the top of the hill on the road out of town and take a picture back down the valley.

Just passed through Kettle Creek, but a quick search for an open network turns up nada. Will post this lot once I find one.

We roll into Nelson (Marijuana Capital of the World) about 12H00, park, have a sandwich and then walk around. We locate the ‘Still Eagle’ shop, which proudly claims to be “BC’s 1st Hemp Shop, and they dig around to find a ‘L, Black, Men’s Hoodlamb’, a coat which Angus has petitioned for, which seems to be sold only by various Hemp Shops. They locate the only one they have, an XL, and we take it. If too big for Angus, I’ll keep it myself! (Although Angus is now considerably taller than me, and just about as wide).
We look in a couple of other establishments, but after an ice-cream we wander back to the van and head on for Salmo (yes, no ‘n’), which is on the road to Creston. Entering Salmo we see a sign saying ‘Overnight Camp’ (with Sani-Dump), so we pull in to take a look. It is a very quiet municipal park, next to a stream, with washrooms and ‘unserviced sites’ for RVs and tenting. Apparently ‘Gloria’ comes around every evening and collects $15 per vehicle. We decide to stay the night, although it is only about 15H00.