Come Hell or High Water...

Day 21 – Wednesday, July 3, 2013

Come Hell or High Water…the show will go on.  That’s what Calgary said about putting on the Stampede after a devastating flood just 12 days ago.  The melt-off from the mountain snow, along with 4 straight days of rain, resulted in the worst flood in their history.  As we drove in, we could see some of the flood water still standing, and the road we were supposed to take to get to our destination was closed due to flooding; but, for the most part, the city is ready for the big party!

We crossed the border without a problem.  We were the only people at the customs station, so it went very quickly.  We had to give them our passports and Spot’s papers, and got the go-ahead.  So, now the Lundcruiser, and Spot are both international travelers!!  My brain hurts from trying to convert km to mph to determine the speed limit.  We stopped at a bank and exchanged currency.  The exchange rate is favorable right now—$1 = 1.02 CAN.  Gas prices were great…1.17.  (That’s CANs per liter, not $ per gallon.  My brain shut down trying to do that conversion calculation.) 

We are parked at McMahon stadium, which is the stadium for the Calgary Stampede Football Team (Canadian Football League).  Their season has started, and we saw the team show up for practice today, which was kind of cool.

There are 80 motorhomes in our group—quite a diverse group, both young and old (we consider ourselves young) with people from NY to California, a few from Canada, and even one guy from London!  We are the only people from Indiana.  We met a couple from Minnesota that will be on our Alaska trip. 

We had a group dinner this evening, and were all inducted as honorary Calgarians.  I have my white hat to prove it!  It is going to be a fun week of activities--Yahoo! 

We found a McDonalds close by with free wi-fi, so guess where we’ll be having our morning coffee!  Hopefully it will allow us to have our internet fix each day!  Double Yahoo!!