Oh Canada!

My first "official" travel post!

I am in Canada - allegedly here to assist Sarah with the final push to complete packing/disposing of everything to facilitate their move to Sweden. I think I'm here to play with Mattias (or "Prince" as he seems to think his name is). Yesterday I brought with me a little "digger" truck. I didn't know when I purchased it that it comes complete with sound effects and sound/lights turns out to be much more fun to operate than merely pushing the truck around on the floor. Grandma has other "treats" to dole out during the week so I'm pretty sure we will have a good time.

For those contemplating a drive north from Seattle to visit Vancouver for next year's Olympics I have a couple of tips: 1) Start now. I really can't stress this enough. While I only had a 3 minute wait in the main line (I could have used my Nexus pass and zipped through in a mere minute but with the construction it's a little confusing on how to even access the Nexus line. Without a co-pilot I figured the lines were short enough to wait the additional 2 minutes.) The entire border is obviously going to be lovely...if it ever gets done and right now the projected completion date is sometime in March 2010. Unfortunately, the Olympics (and therefore the major traffic increase) will be over by then (or still waiting at the border). 2) USE YOUR CRUISE CONTROL! I cannot emphasize this enough. In a 1/2 mile stretch I saw at least 6 cars pulled over by police in all manner of vehicles (my favorite was either the mini-van that looked like it was being driven by a soccer mom or the car that looked kind of like a clunker - nobody would suspect either of those as being patrol cars!) 3) Bring something (legal) to occupy your time in line - books (if you've always wanted to read War & Peace this is probably the time) or board (bored?) games (get to know your fellow "wait"ers).

Once you get to Vancouver you'll realize that it has such a familiar feel to it. That's because (just like home) every other road is undergoing major reconstruction/revision. Allow plenty of time to travel within the city and if you figure out the traffic light system, please share! It's enough to cause a seizure - flashing red/green/yellow lights and pedestrians attempting a life & death version of frogger. I would recommend driving with at least one "spotter" to keep you from hitting them!

More later!

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