of ferries and motorhomes

Well!!

We survived our weekend on the mainland at the Abbotsford RV show. I have to say that I'm kind of disappointed in BC Ferries though. We got on the 9am ferry to Vancouver on Saturday and, having the dog, didn't want to leave him alone in our truck while we fought for a seat on the loud and crowded passenger decks. So we took Arlo and went in search of the pet room, which is a simple enclosure on the vehicle deck of many of the ferries. On this particular ferry, it happened to be a wide space in the sidewalk on the car deck with a sign instructing us not to leave our dog unattended. Imagine sitting in a plastic chair in a big parking garage for an hour and a half - same exact atmosphere, only with wind because the ferry is sailing over the ocean and it is February. So there we sat, apparently looking so pitiful that one passenger on her way to the upper decks asked us if we'd like her to bring us a coffee. We declined, but what a sweetie!

There were some other people with dogs further down the sidewalk in the other part of the dog area, so we went down with Arlo and the three dogs played for a bit. Arlo was all excited and barked a couple of times as a ferry employee walked by. I corrected him and I know the ferry guy saw me do it - but, shouting to be heard over the roar of the engines, the ferry worker told me not to let my dog bark (remember that we were in the designated dog area at the time) because - this is a good one - "people are trying to sleep". ...um, what? Keep in mind also that it was probably about 9:30 or 10 in the morning. All the dog owners kind of smirked and/or rolled their eyes. I made a sarcastic comment after the guy walked away, not noticing that he had circled around behind our group from the other side of the sidewalk and had likely heard what I said. Ah well. I forget what my comment was, but rest assured that it was witty and amusing.

SO...being the pacifist suckers we were, we decided to just go back to our truck and sit in it for the rest of the trip. As we started walking along the vehicle deck, I noticed that there were a lot of axes and fire extinguishers around the place, but no life jackets or signs indicating where they might be. Hmm...didn't a BC ferry just sink last year? There was another crew member near our truck, so I went over and asked him "where are the nearest life jackets?" He said "what?" and I repeated my question. Here's another perfect BC Ferries quote: he said "Oh, they're all around" and then just stared at me. There was a pause in the conversation as I digested this cryptic non-answer. Was this guy really NOT gonna tell me where the lifejackets on the vehicle deck were? I persisted, and got lots more evasion. He showed me some of those life-preserver rings that were hanging on the walls as the back of the ferry and after that he told me not to worry because all the crew was trained for emergency situations, and I could just go to him if there was a problem.

Yeah, no flaws in that plan! Hah!

I was really not impressed and started making my way back to the truck. I guess the guy thought about how bad it would look if I complained to BC Ferries (or, heaven forbid, the newspapers) that a BC Ferries employee failed to show me where the life jackets were upon request, so as I was walking away he popped into an "employees only" room behind the little mesh fence at the back of the ferry and reappeared with a life jacket in his hands, saying "here's one!" Great, thanks guy. Now I have proof that there is at least one well-hidden life jacket on the car deck. I'll bet it won't end up on the body of a paying passenger in the event of an emergency.

Anyway, the ferry didn't sink and we were soon on our way to Abbotsford. Our cheap hotel was easy to find and had friendly employees. Mark was convinced they were mocking us because the guy at the check-in desk was smiling too much or something, but I just think they were friendly. (The place has a surprisingly adequate continental breakfast the next morning - yay for free breakfast!)

So the guy behind the counter that Mark disliked so much gave us directions to his favourite Indian food establishment (I cannot say restaurant after having been there) and after getting lost once or twice, we found it and hurried in to grab a quick bite before going to the RV show. I'm not quite sure how to report on this place. It was just...weird. We walked in to find ourselves in a huge, very dim room, with empty tables and piles of various junk scattered around the place. It was half past noon on a Saturday and there was only one table that was occupied, and I'm pretty sure it was full of people that worked there. We just stood there for a minute or so before turning around and noticing that a menu was posted by the entrance, and there was some sort of deli counter with human activity occuring at it. We looked at the menu and then placed our order with the girl behind the deli counter. She said it would be a half hour. Hmm...I'm not even sure we were allowed to sit down - it looked like the type of room you have to book for a banquet, and it was already clear that there would be nobody actually serving us. The prospect of waiting a half hour in order to eat out of a styrofoam dish in an uncomfortable atmosphere was not very compelling. We left and went straight to...

THE EARLYBIRD RV SHOW!!

Mark's overall impression: lots of jogging pants and fanny packs, and he felt very out of place. I agree, but feeling out of place doesn't really usually register in my mind, so I was just having an amusing time looking at all the silliness.

There were so many HUGE motor homes and "bus conversions" and just generally ginormous and over-the-top RVs - I mean, it was fun to go inside them and poke around, but we're just not in the market for things that are almost too big to drive and cost $300,000. Yes, really. Some of them, anyway. We wandered around for a long time and assimilated lots of RV info. We went to the private/used sales area in the hopes of finding something reasonable, but alas. Everything was still huge out there, too. Don't any people want simple campers or trailers with just the basics? I guess not.

There was an informative talk that was also a thinly veiled sales pitch about solar panels and kits for motorhomes. We'll have to look into that as soon as we buy our thing.

We also learned that weekend that our truck can only hold the tiniest of the tiny pickup campers, which would be fine with us, except that even the weight of a tiny one puts our truck VERY near it's weight capacity...do we really want to punish the truck like that for at least three months of travelling? I think that's kind of inviting disaster. So, we're now considering a travel trailer instead, which will make normal parking a bit more of a bitch, but has advantages like being able to easily unhook the truck and go jetting around while the trailer stays in a campground.

The RV show was really crowded full of slow people, and the booths were mostly high-end crap that we weren't interested in. We did manage to have quite a bit of fun in spite of it all, and really we did go to learn and that's what happened, so mission accomplished. Do you know what a "tongue load" is? Sounds dirty, doesn't it? It's not! It's very boring! But I know what it is now and how it affects my existence!

There was a booth for Dawson City at the show so we went to talk to the people at that booth. I had ulterior motives - we've been toying with the idea of taking a trip up north for maybe a month this summer, just to test everything out. I would love to hit the Yukon and visit Whitehorse and Dawson City, but Mark has been talking about visiting the Queen Charlotte Islands. the lady at the booth was really nice and I think Mark got a bit more enthusiastic about it, because now the tentative plan is to go to Whitehorse & Dawson City, and then MAYBE all the was up to Inuvik, land of the midnight sun. Then, on the way back, we might hit the Queen Charlotte Islands.

So we had our fill of the RV show and started the trip back home. We went to lots of RV dealerships, both in Abbotsford and here on the island, on the way back. We didn't end up buying anything, which was good because that wasn't the plan that weekend, but we are well on our way to finding what we want.

This weekend we are trying to find the time to go up-island and look around in the lots in Duncan/Cowichan/wherever we see one. Wish us luck!