Canada...here we come

On Tuesday, July 3rd, we left Bangor by 8:30, a little earlier than we typically head out because we had a longer drive than usual ahead of us plus we would be crossing into Canada today.

The further we traveled north on I-95, the less and less people we saw.  Nothing but trees and interstate and an occasional car.  (Isn’t anybody going to Canada besides us?)

About 75 miles out from Bangor, we saw this mountain range to the west.  We pulled off at a lookout to get a picture of Mt. Katahdin, the highest summit in Maine.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t see the summit because it was covered up by the clouds.

Mt. Katahdin is a part of Baxter State Park which is about 40 - 50 miles west of I-95.  This picture was taken from a scenic overlook off I-95.

Mt. Katahdin was quite spectacular to look at.  (I like the reflections of the clouds in the lake.)

It’s funny.  Most of the time, I don’t see things like the clouds in the lake until I am looking at the pictures to put them on the blog.  It’s kind of fun because I get to go back on the trip and see the things I missed when we were actually there.

We got off at Houlton, Maine, to fill up with diesel because we weren’t sure how soon we would find another truck stop. 

Just a few miles down the road, we reached the Canadian border.  We pulled up in the motorhome.  The Canadian border patrol agent asks for our passports, where we were born, what kind of work are we doing, where are we going, how long are we going to be here, etc., etc., etc.  And then we got to have a search on the motorhome.  Wonderful!  :)  We had to stand in front of the motorhome while two agents went through the motorhome with black gloves on.  I guess we looked like we were trying to smuggle citrus fruit across the border.  (We were told at Pumpkin Patch that you could not cross the border with any kind of citrus fruit.) 

“We confess!  There are five Clementine oranges in the refrigerator that we forgot to eat this morning at breakfast!  You can have them if you want!” 

In reality, the border patrol agents were very nice.  They did do a search of the motorhome but it was not a problem and didn’t take very long.  And we got to keep the oranges.

We got back in the motorhome and headed through New Brunswick on TCW-2 (also known as Trans-Canadian Highway 2).  We wanted to make it to Moncton, New Brunswick, which was about halfway between Bangor, Maine, and where we would catch the ferry to Newfoundland in North Sydney, Nova Scotia. 

What is so different about New Brunswick as compared to even Maine which is right next door is the wide openness of the land.  It was not flat like Kansas.  It was hilly but with long sloping terrain.

We began seeing a new sign, one you never seen in the south: 

“Moose Crossing”  We did not see any moose on this trip but we (particularly Chuck) sure were looking for them.  We noticed along TCW-2 very tall fences that ran parallel to both sides of the highway.  We found out later that these fences had been installed in an effort to try to keep moose off the interstate.

We arrived at Stonehurst Golf Course and RV Park about 6:30 pm ADT (Atlantic Daylight Savings Time).  The weather was very nice that first evening and we sat outside for a while even though the mosquitoes were starting to be annoying.

We met this very nice couple from New Brunswick (Steven and Kathy) who were camped at Stonehurst for a month.  Steven is a truck driver and Kathy works in the school system as a student assistant.  Steven and Kathy were a “wicked” nice couple.  If we had been staying longer, we would have enjoyed getting to know them better.

On Wednesday, we spent a couple of hours checking at local cell phone stores to see if we could purchase a prepaid cell phone in the event our Verizon Canadian plan didn’t work and to see if we could find cheaper mobile broadband coverage than what I would be able to get through Verizon.  I can get mobile broadband anywhere in Canada there is Verizon coverage but at a cost of $25 per 100 megabytes.  We are currently getting 5 gigabytes for $50 a month.  So 5 GB in Canada would cost ($25 x 100 x 10 x 5) or $1,250.  Ouch! 

We thought we had it figured out at Bell Aliant.  But when we started to pay for the mobile broadband coverage, their system would not accept our credit card because it was “international.”  We said what if we pay Canadian cash?  They didn’t accept cash.  After the sales agent’s working very hard to try to make it work, we finally figured out that only Canadians could buy the service.

It’s funny.  Mom and Dad and I made it just fine when we drove out west in a station wagon pulling a pop-up camper for 3 summers straight with no cell phones and only a Woodall's 3 inch thick campground directory.  And here I was worried about not having a cell phone or internet 24-7.  Pretty ridiculous, isn’t it.  We gave it our best shot and then I decided I wasn’t going to worry about it anymore.

Next, we drove to Nova Scotia.  Yes, Nova Scotia, which was only about 40 miles away. 

We wanted to go to the welcome center where we could pick up a map and information about campgrounds and tourist attractions.  Right before we reached the visitor center, there was a wind farm on the right.

The lady in the visitor’s center was very helpful and gave us a map and information book for Newfoundland and Labrador as well Nova Scotia.  After we left the visitor’s center, we drove back to Moncton, and decided to eat out for dinner at Vito’s Pizzeria.  We split a pizza that was very delicious.  The crust was very buttery.  The restaurant was about 40 years old and our waitress had worked there 31 of those years.

After we drove back home, we spent another couple of hours that evening visiting with Steven and Cathy.  We enjoyed it so much we didn’t even noticed the few mosquito bites we were getting (until 2 days later when we started scratching).  :)