"Just
got back from a long weekend dry camping with my wife, Melita at Pinery
Provencal Park in Grand Bend Ont. This was basically a shakedown for our
up-coming trip to Newfoundland in July. She absolutely loves the camper and this
gave us the opportunity to make lists and actually enjoy the unit stand alone.
The absolute luxury was sure a change from our VW bus days (I actually felt that
I had sold-out my Hippie principles but so what!) Primitive camping in luxury,
we’re going to have a lot of that in Newfie. We didn’t take any pictures on our
trip from California to Ontario. I just put the hammer down and drove. We ate
the specials at sleazy casinos and truck stops along I-80. Reno was a big
disappointment. We averaged 16 miles to the US gal (19.5 Imp gal) at 60 MPH. The
only problem I had was the unit was slightly out of alignment when I picked it
up so I stopped at a number of tire stores along the way and got a price on new
tires with an alignment. ( I wanted to get new tires before I imported it.) I
got some great prices but the unit was too large for every alignment rack we
encountered. We also tried the World’s Largest Truck-stop in Willcott Iowa (Try
the shrimp special- 60 deep fried shrimp, hot fries, slaw, roll and Never-ending
Iced Tea -$8) and the guy at the counter said “sorry, we don’t do cars”. I was
able to get an alignment here at home and they told me I’ve got at least another
season left on the tires. Crossing the border was not too bad. We arrived @4am
and spent an hour looking for the export office (whose driveway is now
non-existent due to never-ending construction) All my papers were in order and I
was allowed to leave. On the Canadian side, I declared the import and was
directed to secondary to present the paperwork and pay the taxes. To my
surprise, a number of the officers on duty were guys that I had worked with in
security at Casino Windsor years ago and are now working at Costoms. Needless to
say, they “Hooked me up”. Anyway, I promise to send pictures of our upcoming
trip."
Kim
