April 8-9, 2018

Due to the rain on the coast, we decided to head inland and enter Canada in Osoyoos. Rain is messy to deal with in an RV. Our next stop was Avery Park near Wishram, WA. This is a beautiful free campsite on the Columbia River. The area is government property and free to use, but during the salmon run, it is closed to the public and only the local native tribes can use it. There are picnic tables, fire-pits, pit-toilets, and a garbage bin. The problem with the site was the trains. All. Night. Long.

After a sleepless night, we moved on to Yakima. We had heard on the Chinook forums that an RV shop, Aubrey’s, bought as many Chinook parts as they could when the company was liquidated. The parts manager, Carolyn, was most helpful. We were able to get new lenses for our porch and patio lights, but we had no luck on getting a step replacement.

Yakima had this old-school McDonald’s restaurant and a car wash for my dad’s GTO.

We camped overnight at Cabela’s and then made the final trek north into Canada.

Re-entry into Canada
April 10, 2018

In Canada, everyone jokes that B.C. stands for Bring Cash. B.C. has lots of economic woes, and so it taxes the heck out of its citizens.

On the US side, two US agents boarded the Chinook and opened drawers and doors. They were friendly enough, but I’m not sure what they were looking for since we were leaving their country.  Then, we travelled on to the Canadian border guard. It was our lucky day. She was wonderful! Because we have no space, we didn’t really buy any goods, but we did have alcohol. We rattled off our amounts. We were over our limit of 1L each (we had 7L total), and we were expecting to pay the duty. Most of our friends cross in Coutts, AB with much more than 7 liters and just pay the duty. It works out to be a big savings even after paying duty. Well, this border guard said that she was going to give us an education that day (and not charge us) and advised us to cross in Alberta or Saskatchewan next year. She said that in BC, the duty is (are you sitting down?) $1.50 PER OUNCE over your 1L limit! If our vehicle had BC plates, I don’t think we would have been so lucky. Lesson learned: Never ever ever cross into BC.