Nanaimo to Calgary

Monday, September 8, 2014

Warm OverCast
Mileage 522073 km
Last night we stayed at Bonnie's wonderful home

Awesomeness: Bonnie's home is so well decorated in tones of grey, black and accented with red, olive green and turquoise. Love it!

Bonnie made us a wonderful breakfast of hash browns, veggies and eggs. She is a wonderful cook. This was not our only great meal at her home.  

Saturday night Bonnie made us pasta with prawns, cherry tomatoes, asiago cheese, diced peppers and onions. Plus awesome sides of grilled veggies, asparagus being one of them. Sunday morning we had watermelon with a veggie omelette and a healthy, grainy toast. That evening Bonnie fed us a curried veggie rice.

Her curry sauce was a curry, mango V&H brand sauce. Then she cooked prawns with garlic, mmmm! She made a salad with papaya and pear and the dressing was made of honey and worschteshire sauce.

Not only is she a great cook but she has a well appointed home which she kindly allowed us to stay at for two nights before heading off on our journey eastward.

Yesterday Bonnie drove us two up to Qualicum Beach. We looked in many little shops. We found one in particular that really piqued our interest. Many little signs with catchy sayings. It was inspirational.

We found gardens still in bloom including rose gardens. We saw a little, grey bunny that appeared oblivious to the adulation he was receiving from his audience of admirers. The main event was an art fair in Parksville near the Tynamara Lodge. Artist sat up under marque tents. It was a very warm or should I say hot day.

There was live music and wonderful art. Oliver the owl was even participated from the Wild Life Recovery Centre in Coombs.

After sucking up are the inspiration we could handle she drove us to her home.

We met the guys who had been to East Wellington, Gabriola (lunch at The Skoll), then back to Nanaimo loading up our UHaul trailer for our trip east. We watch a Quentin Tertino movie, Dejango (pretty violent).

It was hard to say good bye to Larry and Bonnie. We do not know when we will see them again. They have been invited to join us in Mexico once we have more of a firm plan for what we are doing.

We went to our storage place - Allied Storage in Nanaimo. We got our snow tires, yes it is snowing in Calgary already. The movers sealed up the last of two, wooden, palette containers of personal belonging.

Ken and I were very cognizant that we should watch our waistlines after those wonderfully, delicious meals. We got in the big ferry line-up for the 3:10 ferry. We were at the Departure Bay terminal in time for the twelve fifty ferry but it was already an overflow. Ugh, ferries! We made good use of the time, however, by finding a great little trail from the terminal up to Brooks Landing Mall.

It was a groomed trail with board walks, a babbling brook, tall trees and ferns in bogs. The trail starts by walking outside the terminal along the road where traffic exits the ferry, west along the beach then following the sign at the brook going south, west up to Brooks Landing. The trail would be almost impossible to access at high tide. We saw many hikers with their pooches. That was our first time doing the entire trail.

We met our friend Mikey at his home near Yukon and 19th in Vancouver. It was close to Cambie to wonder out for a beverage and supper.

Tuesday, September 9, 2014
Cool Sunny
Mileage 522137 km
Last night we stayed at Michael Corbin's home
Awesomeness: See note about his home in Today's Adventure


Mikey lives in a 1920s era home with wood trim that is one inch cove and one inch quarter round, and six inch wide baseboard made out of fir. His room is at the top level of the house with a little entrance door that is about two thirds the size of a regular door. In fact, the doors are in the style of what ours were in our home on College Avenue in Regina, SK. This huge, old home had been divided into suites many, many years ago. The melamine in Mikey's kitchen has to be from the 1950's or older.

Out his front window are two huge figs trees which produce fruit every summer. He can reach out his window to grab himself some figs. Out back in the garden area Michael has a garden project happening. He is growing beets, peppers, tomatoes and herbs in a very little caged-in area. He sells his garden project in a few different forms to people with little land or space to garden in.

We chose to go out from breakfast as Michael lives just a block or so off Cambie Street. We walked to a favorite breakfast spot of his, a Dutch pancake house. I did not take a picture but I had basted eggs on dry rusk breads with hollandaise sauce on top. I was also served hash-browns and weirdly enough a salad. It was a very nice change to be able to walk to a nice restaurant for breakfast. Generally, we found the pricing for food and booze in the area to be high.




Mikey is wonderful to chat with as friends often are. It was hard to say good bye as we have seen each other often this spring since we have been back from Mexico.

Off we went Abbotsford to Toews Sewing Centre. Wow, wish I knew where Toews was sooner, I'd have visited every time I went to Abbotsford. I went as they were having a giant sale to liquidate stock from Janome dealers that had closed their doors in Alberta or Saskatchewan. I wanted to look at the Janome Jem as a machine I could take with me in the van. It is light weight and has some of the features I am looking for in a machine for free motion quilting. I investigated further and fell in love with the Janome DC 7060. It had an extension table included, along with a needle threader, needle up/needle down, sewing speed regulator, sewing without the foot pedal, thread cutting option and knee lift. It has many more features but those are the main ones I wanted. I just have to find this one used at a great price cause it is perfect for me. Got to love it!



Ken did not want to waste his time looking at sewing machines LOL. He went and washed the van. Pepe's looking good.


Once we left Abbotsford we were in for the long haul. Passed Hope and over the Coquihala. We were considering just the Number 1 through Kelowna because we are hauling a 5' X 8' UHaul trailer which makes our average speed 55 mph or less. Our van, Pepe was a real trooper and trudged on pulling his heavy load.

Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Cold OverCast
Mileage 522 610 km
Last night we stayed at the parking lot of Walmart in Salmo
Awesomeness: We actually found a place to camp and did not have to pay. We were tired and just wanted to sleep.

We were advised by a note under our windshield wiper that parking overnight in Salmon Arm's Walmart is not allowed. Huh! Guess we won't do that again! The Rest Area we were planning to sleep at near Chase, BC was not marked so we missed it.

There was construction on the roadway in order to twin the highway at some later date. I was looking for that Rest area, too, because we had stayed there many years ago with our Doberman, Luke and our Airedale, Fergus. They slept outside in their kennels and we slept inside in the back of our grey Nissan.

In the morning we noticed a considerable drop in temperature from the coast. It is overcast, too. The Rocky Mountains are dulled by the cloud cover, obscuring their beauty. Although I must say the Mountains are majestic with their emerald green bottoms and greyed or snowy tops. I want to see Rocky Mountain Sheep or a bear or something in the line of a creature.

Getting close to Banff there was a light sprinkling of snow then farther on, full on snow covered the ground. It was actually cold enough for the snow to stick. It had likely fallen on Monday or on the weekend when a bad storm had swept through. It seemed like a winter wonderland in Banff. This is where we had planned on staying. Neither of us had the forethought to book a accommodation. Ken drove into Banff anyway and we ate. Ken decided to look on-line for an available, reasonably priced hotel. As he was doing so the number of hotels was disappearing and the cheaper hotels were also dropping off. Unusual to see but considering the unpredictable weather and the business of the area it might not have been so unusual. Off we drove to Calgary, mostly in sunlight. We booked something in Calgary at a reasonable price on the west end.

Our hotel, Centro, was adequate to good. It was warm and cozy to key requirements when it is minus six degrees, but feels like minus twelve. We had on warm jackets, toques and gloves. Ugh, what weather, especially since Sunday I wore a short skirt and sleeveless top. It was great to stop and get off the road.

Thursday, September 11, 2014
Cold Sunny
Mileage 523 143 km
Last night we stayed at Centro Motel in Calgary, AB

Awesomeness: It called itself a boutique hotel and was really clean and nice inside. Actually it was great because it was at a reasonable price compared to most hotels in Calgary and we had missed out on reasonably priced hotels in Banff the afternoon before.


I actually did yoga in the hotel room. Wow, did I feel better after that. Sitting for a few days makes you rather stiff and sore. Then it was the breakfast that come with the room.

Alberta could be called big sky country, too. The sky was blue and bright. The weather was very cold compared to anything we are used to. We walked the .9 miles to Market Mall. It was the mall we ate at with Dad and Fern about a year ago when we drove them back to Moose Jaw. The mall has an Apple Store - Ken's favorite store. We want to upgrade our iPhone, iPad and iPod. This gave us a chance to find out what best suits our needs. We want to get an iPhone 5s and an iPod 5th generation and an iPad air - looking forward to the upgrades.


Walking was a healthy part of out day. After a great ethnic food lunch at the mall we walked to University of Alberta campus as there is a C Train (I believe Calgary Train?) stop. It was a bit unusual to be walking through campus with the halls full of students. We both said, "glad we are not going to school now". We paid our dues, that was so much work and not pay.

The C Train was like any other subway type train but this train is not subterranean. We exited downtown and again walked around. We checked out wine stores, a cooking store and bakeries. Wow, was it cold, not impressed by downtown on such a cold day.

We ate at a Hungarian restaurant. We have never ate at a Hungarian restaurant before. Ken's Mother was Hungarian so have both had Hungarian food. The sauce on the little dumplings had paprika and mushrooms in it along with sour cream. It appeared to be a very friendly, family oriented place.

I read on Quora about the free app DuoLingo for learning different languages. Most people praised it, a few gave it a bad review. I decided to try it as what do I have to lose as it is free and I have spare time right now that I could put into learning Spanish. Those who spend time in Mexico often say that learning Spanish enriches your experience. Let's try out that theory. What I started with I liked. Less pictures than Rosetta Stone, more translation so you know what you are learning, more of a competitive experience, along with mixing up the tasks through each lesson - speaking, writing, translating. I give it a 10 out of 10 so far.

We found the right bus connection and had only a small walk back to the hotel. It was so nice to be back at the hotel, so cozy and warm. Both of us were tired from the cold walks. We watched the news which is something we never do.

Friday, September 12, 2014
Cold Cloudy
Mileage 523 143 km
Last night we stayed at Centro Motel in Calgary, AB

Awesomeness: We could walk to the mall that the Apple Store was in. From there we could walk to their Skytrain or CTrain which took us downtown. The bed was extremely cozy and hard to leave. The breakfast was wonderful even though it was a "help yourself type".


Repeat yesterday's initial experience - yoga, breakfast downstairs but today Ken went jogging, something he started recently at ten minutes a day. After packing up, we were off back to the Apple Store. It is still relatively cold out for September, still some snow on the ground. We are moving on to Lethbridge, AB which is almost directly south of Calgary, AB.

You could see the Rocky Mountains towards the west and in the distance. Again, spectacular! We have entered onto what is very much a prairie landscape - trees only in the towns and yellowish grassland.

We are later than expected for our arrival at Kelly and Joel's. Kelly is our niece. We have brought them the dark oak dining room suite which we inherited from my Father and Mother. We wanted to keep it in the family so it is wonderful that Kelly wanted it for her future home. At the present time it will reside in her basement until she buys a home that will accommodate this art deco style dining room suite. I have mixed feelings about passing it on at this time but we did not want to store it while we travel, etc.


First thing Ken and Joel carried the suite and all the boxes of stuff into the basement. Ken was quite happy to shed the encumbrance of the U-Haul trailer which we had following us for days.

Chili is their new pooch, a cocker spanial, poodle cross. She is a brown, fluffy, puppy with a lively personality. Penny is their two year old Schnauzer, poodle cross that is covered in white, curly hair. She is much less lively and barks less than last time we saw her. They are wonderful little companions for Kelly and Joel. We went for a much needed walk with the four of them after supper. It is still rather cold in Lethbridge but not as bad a Calgary was.