Sicamous (sick-ah-moose)

After our DAYS of moving up to Calgary we had Sunday to unpack, rest, and repack a suitcase and then we were off on Monday morning to go meet up with Mark's mom, stepdad, Dave, and two younger sisters, Tanessa and Mercedez in Sicamous, British Columbia. It's about a 6 hour-ish drive. Sorry for the picture overload. These were all from my camera phone, so sorry about that too. It's just easier to carry in your pocket and take a quick pic.

They have fences along the side of the highway to keep the animals from trying to cross and getting hit by traffic, so they had to build these animal crossings so they could get to the other side.

Once you get up past Banff, around Lake Louise area, the river water on the side of the road starts getting light blue/turquoise colored. It's so pretty!

Our first night we drove the boat out to this floating restaurant called the Shark Shack. Good food!

Mercedez, Tanessa, and Val at the restaurant.

After eating we went over to another floating dock across from the restaurant to fill up with gas...

...and check out the convenience store...

...nice one, Tanessa.

Tanessa and Mercedez on the tube.

Mark skiing.

Mercedez getting a boat driving lesson from Uncle Greg.

Stud at the wheel.

Mercedez taught me how to make these bracelets...Mark + Mandy = BFF

Blue, the boat doggy!

Margaret Falls = beautiful!

On the right: Dave and Tanessa in front of the waterfall.

 Blue just walked right into the freezing water...she was thirsty!

On our way back to Sicamous we saw a market by the side of the road. We stopped to get some produce and they had a little farm that we got to check out.

We stopped by Dutchmen Dairy which makes their own freakin' ice cream! It.was.amazing.

 Thank you, little cows, for such delicious ice cream...well actually, thank you to the mommy cows.

On Saturday we got together with Val's brother, Greg, and four of his five kids and some of there kids (a mini fam reunion). Greg and his son both had boats too, so we had three boats and went to this little beach they knew of. They had this old banana boat they call Jaws and everyone had fun getting pulled around by that. The falling off part...wellllll...yeah, it was fun that one time I fell off and got water up my nose...and that other time I fell off face first into the water....and that other time my head hit someone else's body as everyone fell in the water. After all that I just chilled on the sand with my friend, Harry Potter.

The rest are just random shots from around the lake.

After a week of living in a little trailer with six people and a dog and bumping around on a boat almost everyday I was ready to come back to a regular sized house and not swaying while standing on land (I really did sway while standing after being on the boat all day. It was a weird feeling).

I had a lot of fun and it was so beautiful. My first trip to BC was a treat! It has some really amazing places to see.

Great vaca!

Moving California to Calgary

In case you didn't know Mark and I moved from Monrovia, CA to Calgary, AB (you know, in Canada). It was quite the process. We only took what would fit in the Alero. Mark bought a humongous duffel bag to go on top of the car. It was pretty much stuffed with clothes and shoes and two tennis racquets. The trunk and back seat were stuffed as well. We left almost two weeks ago on Wednesday night at 10 pm. We drove through the night because we didn't want the car to overheat with all that weight on it + it's mid August + we were driving through desert for a good chunk of time.

 As we were driving north on the 15 the sun came out.....and my eyes were burning from being so tired.

We stopped in Highland, UT at my brother, Jeff, and sister-in-law, Stacy's house to sleep for a few hours, hang out, get Mark's shoulder worked on by Stacy (a ten year old injury, NBD), meet up with some friends, eat Cafe Rio. For some reason I mostly took pictures of Jeff and Stacy's dog, Oso, a German Shepherd/Saint Bernard mix. I was blown away that he had gotten even bigger since the last time I saw him. My kitty, Dinah, that I left with Jeff and Stacy is still around. Technically it's their cat now. I need to let go.

We got to see my best friend, Whitney, in American Fork and had Cafe Rio. It was so awesome talking to her and catching up and hearing her stories. I miss her so much!

We slept the night at Jeff and Stacy's and Friday morning started driving north again.

We drove for about an hour and stopped in Layton, UT to see Mark's grandpa and his wife, Kay. We visited for about an hour before heading out again. Kay gave me my first Canadian money, $20 that she had in her wallet from her last time up there.

Idaho - not much to look at.

Montana - some pretty areas.

Montana - pretty winding roads.

We stopped in Great Falls, MT for the night and Saturday was our last day of driving through MT and then going through the border and on up to Calgary.

Montana - the pretty part is gone and now we're back to fields.

Approaching the border. First we had to get the car exported from the states. I ran up ahead to start this. Then realized the title was still in the car so I go out to find where Mark is in the car line up. He's two cars away from going through the border. I had left my passport up with the US export officer because they need it. Since Mark was so close to the window he told me to jump in. The Canadian officer at the window was really rude to us and I wanted to slap her in the face and cry at the same time because there was so much going on and it was all so overwhelming. So we go in the Canadian side and park, go back to the US side to finish exporting and get my passport back, go back to the Canadian side and tell them we need to talk to immigration, and sit down to wait......and wait.....and wait. We waited there for about six hours, I think it was. I think we were at the border for a total of seven to eight hours. I can't quite remember now. I've been trying to block the experience. The reason we had to wait so long to talk to immigration was because other people were going to the border to get their permanent residency. They don't have to go to the border to do this, but the wait is shorter for them if they do. When I finally got called up my process was much shorter than everyone else's had been because I was just going through the border. She got the paperwork she needed from us, made some copies, ran a background check, and then put a visa in my passport. Then we had to go import the car to Canada. Luckily this didn't take as long and the officer that helped us was very helpful. I think it was the end of his shift, so he just wanted to go home....like we did.

Finally! We were on our freakin' way! Alberta - looks a lot like Idaho and parts of Montana.

By the time we got through the border it was about 8:00 at night and we hadn't eaten. We stopped in Lethbridge (about a half hour north of the border) for dinner at Tim Horton's. It's famous in Canada. There's like one on every corner. They serve sandwiches, paninis, donuts, coffee, and hot chocolate.

We used my $20 to pay for the food and this was my change. Apparently they don't mind if people give them American money because I got a US penny and dime back in my change. 

canadian money lesson:

Those two bigger coins are $2 (toonies). The lowest their money goes in paper is to $5. They have coins for $2 and $1 and then regular coin change like US does. The $1 coins are called loonies. Pretty weird, eh?

Calgary is about three hours north of the border. We got in at 11 pm Saturday night. We unloaded the car and found a place to sleep. The next day we unpacked everything, finding places for our stuff. In the evening we took a walk at Fish Creek Park near Mark's mom's house. Here are some pictures of the pretty walk.

Then we had to pack up a suitcase to head out to Sicamous, British Columbia, where Mark's mom, stepdad, Dave, and two younger sisters, Tanessa and Mercedez had already gone to a couple days before for vacation. That'll be my next post - our week at the lake.