Saturday, May 12, 2012

Foiled at the Border!

On Thursday, John and I drove from beautiful Steamboat Rock State Park (Washington) to the Canadian border at Oroville, Washington with excitement.

Steamboat Rock State Park, Washington (We camped out there under the trees).
We weren't prepared to hear that we could not enter as "residents" of Canada without first presenting U.S. Customs stamped export papers for all our vehicles. Our prior research had not unearthed this detail.

In other words, we needed to have titles in hand for all our vehicles or else we couldn't take the vehicles into Canada. Luckily, we had the title to the truck with us. But the banks hold the titles for our Toyota car and The Jazz.

After hours at the Canadian and U.S. Immigration Offices, we turned back to Oroville (Washington) to take care of getting titles and officially exporting the vehicles from the U.S. Needless to say we were both exhausted, disappointed and frustrated. We wondered how many weeks all this would take.

Luckily, Miss Gingee is a good traveler
 even when picking up on our stress.
Today is Saturday. It's Day 17 of being snowbirds. This transition period into a  new lifestyle and moving to Canada is proving to have it stressors. I guess that's the nature of big change.  We definitely are having an RV adventure!

Oroville (Washington) has several camping options. You can camp up on Highway 97 for $8 per night (includes electricity) at Prince's RV Park or you can camp in one of two nice campgrounds - Osoyoos Lake Veterans Memorial State Park (no hookups but beautiful on the lake for $24 per night) or Royal Oaks RV Park (private and very nice for a weekly rate of $150). We've chosen Royal Oaks after the first noisy night by the highway at Prince's. I'm loving being camped by the Simikameen River.


View of the Simikameen River running behind The Jazz at
River Oaks RV Park in Oroville, Washington.
John and Gingee taking a walk at Osoyoos Lake State Veterans Memorial State Park.

We're trying to see the "opportunity" in this challenge and to keep a good attitude. After all it is a good "moment" even if we don't know whether we'll be taking care of the title business for another week or another month. Life unfolds and we practice being patient, flexible and living in the moment.

What do you do when things don't go the way you planned?

11 comments:

  1. Even Gingee looks disgusted!!

    No matter which border you cross, you can bet it will be a pain in some unanticipated way.

    Seems like your bank should be able to fax copies of the titles fairly soon, or does it have to be the original?

    We ran into a problem bringing a trailer that belonged to Dan's brother into Mexico. Ultimately we had to go back to Tucson and transfer the title to Dan.

    The place you're staying at least looks gorgeous, so do enjoy while you are waiting.

    Love and blessings for a speedy transit through the bureaucracy!
    June

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    1. June, The titles have to be originals! Thanks for your kind support!

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  2. Relax. You're not on a schedule I imagine since you are now full timers. Always expect the unexpected when traveling/living in an RV and accept it as part of the lifestyle. If you can't do that, think of all of us out here that wanted to live the lifestyle and didn't get to do it or no longer can co it. Now, that's what inconvenience really is. Enjoy your lives. Patience is a virtue, but you won't need much of it when you settle into full timing. Don't forget, you're only 17 days in.

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  3. No matter how careful you research, there is always some fine print just to trip you up.

    Hopefully, you can resolve this quickly and get "home"!

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  4. that is too bad about the border dilemma!..hope you get the issues resolved soon so Canada will welcome you with open arms!!..hang in there..enjoy the park where you are..it looks beautiful!!

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  5. Wil they send you the titles without a full pay off? What do I do when things don't go my way? Usually I get upset, and then go with a new direction. Eating always helps.

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    1. No titles without full payments. We were wanting to pay off the Jazz anyway as a way to keep expenses lower in our snowbird lifestyle. So...

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  6. Once my colleague arrive at Karachi with the knowledge that he can get Visa on arrival, but to his dismay that was not the case as one must apply the Visa in the originating country. The problem was that there were only 2 flights a week into Karachi and there are no hotels at the airport !!!!!

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  7. The good thing about our lifestyle is we have time to work things out and life still goes on... Wishing you luck on getting things done speedy!
    Have f un & Travel safe
    Donna

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  8. I think the park looks lovely. Hope you can get those papers without too much red tape.

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  9. frustrating!!! Hope you'll soon be on your way, again....Gingee is just so beautiful!!!

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