Arriving in Canada

 Moving Day. 

As I was packing up to leave for Canada, Deb stopped to invite me to go with her to the new quilt shop, which I did. I am on this quest to collect fabric from each state and province I visit on my travels in the hope of piecing together a memory quilt.  Surprisingly, I am finding it more difficult to find unique/state specific fabric and quilt shops the farther I go east; I would have thought that the people in the mid-west and east would do more quilting than in the west; sadly that has not been the case.  I am told that the people who had the shops and did the quilting are older and retiring, and they are not being replaced by a younger generation. It makes me wonder if quilting will become a lost art.  Anyway, I have not been successful in locating fabric that is unique to each state; I have even tried the state bird and flower (am always surprised that people don’t know their state bird and flower) and in most cases I am not finding that fabric either.

Anyway, the trip to the fabric store was a nice break, but by the time I was ready to leave the Essex Junction Fair Grounds, the line for the dump was an hour long.

I finally got on the road about 1pm. I needed to buy gas before the border, but couldn’t find DEF. There are no truck stops in Vermont. I see there is a Flying J outside Quebec City, so hopefully they can fix me up.

The line at the border was only about ½ hour.  The Border Guard didn’t ask me any of the questions I was expecting (nothing about what food I was carrying) and didn’t inspect inside my rig.  I wonder if going back will be as painless?

I was nervous about driving in Canada for the first time, but did not have any problems and found the campground without incident.  Some of the roads were a little rough and narrow, but I had experienced some of that in the US as well.  All of the traffic signs are in French, but it wasn’t too difficult to understand what they meant.

I like this sign … If the lights are flashing on the sign below, it means although the light ahead is green now, it will be red when you get there.  A very handy sign ….

Here are some of my favorite Canadian signs so far …..

Snowmobiles and Off-road vehicles entering the highway in 230 meters

Canada is so Eco friendly, this is in lieu of seat covers

This is actually 56 mph

Open

Exit

Interestingly, when I crossed the border, the GPS in my coach changed everything to the metric system, including the distance to the next turn and the speed.  Not as handy as I would have liked.  However, the GPS in my Jeep kept everything in US measurement for the distance to the next turn and the speed limits are in mph.  Better.

Upon arriving at the campground things got a little more challenging.  No one in the office spoke English and the campground rules and instructions are also in French.  I found my site, but all the sites are so narrow and close together, and my coach being the largest thing in the park and my site having a tree at the opening, it was a little hairy backing in.  Two gentlemen from other sites, neither one spoke English, came out to direct me into the site.  They did an excellent job …. I just hope I can get back out on Saturday! It was nice to have the help. The family next door is actually sitting under my closet slide …. That’s how close together we are.  Nice for them, my coach is blocking all the afternoon sun – I got a thumbs-up for that!

While I was setting up camp, a boy about 7 years old, from the camper on the other side of my site, came over on his bike to watch every move I made.  He did not speak English and didn’t want to try to converse … just watch.  He did call to my attention to water dripping under the coach in the front (condensation from the A/C).  I have not seen him since that time, so I must not be doing anything interesting.

That evening I walked around the campground looking for anyone who spoke English so they could help me with the rules I wasn’t able to decipher. Everyone seemed reserved and not overly friendly; I finally found an elderly couple that are seasonal for the summer and between the two of us we worked it out. The gentleman turned out to be a retired police officer and his wife a retired school bus driver.  They live in Montreal, but spend the winter in Florida.  They rent a condo in Allentown, outside of Miami.

 I could figure out most of the rules, as they are pretty much the same from one campground to another …. Animals, number of people per site, trash, noise, fires, etc. The rule that posed the challenge was the one regarding the front entrance gate.  If you are not in the park between 11pm and 8am, you’re sleeping somewhere else.  No gate keys or codes are given.

There are a couple of games being played by the adults …. The horseshoe pits are at an incline; I have only seen them flat, so that is different.  They also play a game with small metal balls.  It resembles bowling, except there are no pins.  The object is to get closer to the tiny red ball than any of the other players; you can knock them out of your way if need be.  It causes quite a bit of excitement among the players and observers.

I am also noticing the women’s manner of dress.  There doesn’t seem to be any self-consciousness about covering up parts of the body better left to the imagination.  I’m not talking about indecent exposure; I’m talking about very overweight people in bikinis, etc. LOL  I have seen this everywhere I go.