A new swim raft for the park!

A beautiful day yesterday and with quite a few campers in the park we recruited some of the guys to help out putting our new swim raft together. It's quite heavy duty, and it's huge! 16' x 16'.

It came in two sections that had to be bolted together, and of course it's heavy. So then you have to build it on a trailer of some sort so that you can put it in the water right side up.

New glasses

Because we are so "frugal", we got to the point where we had to order new glasses for each of us. I was using three different pairs of glasses! One progressive, but the lenses were plastic and they got scuffed up easily over time. And one pair for working on the computer. And one pair for watching movies on the computer at a distance.

Ruth's glasses were still fine, but her prescription had changed. Then the other day, the glasses started coming apart. So it was time for some new ones for both of us!

A dramatic evening sky...

Wednesday is our grocery day, so we drove the 45 minutes each way to the town of Swift Current. We always have some running around to do for the park while we're there, and so besides getting groceries, yesterday's goal was to find some specialty stainless steel nuts and bolts to put our swim raft together.

We thought we were going to have to special order them, but the third place we checked had them in stock.

Why not do it now...?

I saw a blurb on facebook that said the Quebec couple who stopped in here back in early May while on a long distance canoe trip were interviewed on television in Winnipeg yesterday.

Pierre and Jennifer, along with their dog Jasmine, had been here at the park for a night and they were an interesting couple to talk to. In fact, we found we had a lot in common with them. Well, other than the fact that we don't do long distance canoe trips!

Ontario - Yours to Discover

Continuing our series on Canada's different provinces and territories leading up to Canada's 150th birthday on July 1st. As we head east across Canada, we are now at the province of Ontario.

Ruth and I were both born in Ontario, so we've spent lots of time there. Mostly in and around Canada's capital city of Ottawa... but we've explored a lot of the rest of the province as well...

We're booked for Barbados!

After humming and hawing for the morning, we finally decided to book the trip. As I had said yesterday, the airfare wasn't a screaming deal, but it was a decent deal. And, it was flying from Ottawa so we didn't have to make our own way to Montreal or Toronto.

And to top it off, it came out to be cheaper than we were expecting!

Barbados for two weeks?

Hmmm. A flight deal passed across my screen yesterday evening. $579 CAD ($440 USD) return from Ottawa to Bridgetown, Barbados.

We've got about three weeks in the October/November time frame where we're looking for a trip. We haven't been to anywhere in the Caribbean for a very long time. The flight deal happens to be through Air Canada, and of course we've got those travel vouchers to use up at some point. Our out of pocket costs for the return flight would end up being $142 CAD ($110 USD) each for the round trip flight.

The water is rising

The water level of the lake here at the park is dependent on the runoff from the snow melt in the Rocky Mountains west of Calgary. They had a fair bit of snow this past winter, and we are now getting the benefit of that. The last two years our water level has been low, but this year is going to be different!

We have a marina area that hasn't been usable since our first year here in 2014, so it will be nice to see it full again.

Manitoba - Fishing, Hunting, and Polar Bears!

Continuing our series on Canada's different provinces and territories in celebration of Canada's 150th birthday coming up on July 1st.

Manitoba is geographically the middle province. It's more often than not considered part of western Canada though. With a population of around 1.3 million, it has only slightly more people than its neighbour Saskatchewan.

The White Towns of Andalusia, Spain

This past winter while we were RVing in Spain we came across many towns and villages that were all painted white, they are known as "White Towns". These towns are mostly found in the region of Andalusia in the southern portion of Spain and they are usually found in the mountains.

Pics around the park

Pretty quiet weekend here at Cabri Park, despite the fact that it wasn't bad weather-wise. But, we were told that there were quite a few events taking place in the area, so perhaps people were just busy with other things.

Reservations are on the upswing though. Not many sites left for August long weekend, but of course we will be pretty much sold out for that period, as happens every year.

Well, I heard back from Air Canada

In case you missed our earlier story about Air Canada, you can read all about it here...

http://www.travelwithkevinandruth.com/2017/06/we-tried-to-book-flight-to-china-this.html

Anyhow, I had sent a formal complaint by email to Air Canada. This is the only avenue available to you to register a complaint. You cannot actually speak to someone on the telephone, other than a standard customer service agent. And if that customer service agent can't fix your problem, they will tell you to register a complaint online.

Saskatchewan - Land of the Living Skies

Next up in our series leading up to Canada's 150th birthday is the province of Saskatchewan. Also known as... the province you have to drive through to get to Alberta.

Most people driving across Canada don't spend much time in Saskatchewan. The province is overlooked because the Trans Canada highway crosses in an area where there is not much to see. And instead of getting off the main highway to see some sights, people simply carry on and only see the worst the province has to offer.

Rodent problems

We're fortunate to have central air conditioning in the old mobile home that we live in here at the park. It sure does make things a little more comfortable when the temperature gets up over 28C (81F) or so. Although, we never had air conditioning at home, so we know that we could get by without it if we had to.

Good thing, because we thought we were going to have to get by without it.

RV Tire Pressure

Man, there's a lot of bad information being distributed on the internet. Yesterday, Ruth was reading one of the RV'ing groups that we belong to on facebook and they were talking about tire pressure.

The question was "Do you inflate your tires to what it says on the tire, or what it says on the vehicle?"

Home on the range

Where the deer and the antelope play.

Ruth went to pick up some flowers for gardens that she has made here at the park, and along the way she saw a few pronghorn antelope. There are quite a few of them in this area here on the prairies, and it's funny how we occasionally see deer in and around the park, but the pronghorn seem to stay up on the flat parts.

We tried to book a flight to China this morning...

I was all set to write the blog post this morning when I saw a flash up on my facebook notifications....

Montreal to Shanghai, China for $683 CAD ($515 USD) return on Air Canada.

For some reason, at the time I thought it said $638 return, but it was a great deal nonetheless. Anyhow, we have those two Air Canada flight vouchers from when we got bumped on our way out to Regina at the end of April, so we thought about it for a couple of hours and then decided to book.

At some point, we want to do something epic...

Meeting a couple of guys like Mike and David makes us want to get out there and do more neat stuff. As much as some of you think that we are fairly adventurous, our activities pale in comparison when we see what other people are doing. I mean really, can you imagine what it takes to paddle a canoe across Canada? We have no ambition to do that. The same way that we have no ambition to climb Mt. Everest.

But, there are some things we'd like to do. Something epic... something that makes people say "wow" when you tell them what you did.

A moose on the loose!

Lots of fun having Mike Ranta and his dog Spitzi here at the park yesterday. And meeting photojournalist David Jackson was interesting as well. He is traveling with Mike and Spitzi and documenting their journey.

Yesterday morning, Mike was scheduled to do a talk at the long term care residence in Cabri, so Ruth and I took some time out of our busy schedule to go up and listen to him and what he has to say.

Some special visitors arrived yesterday...

Last year in May, long distance canoer Mike Ranta and his dog Spitzi arrived at the park on their 200 day journey across Canada.

He's doing the trip again in celebration of Canada's 150th birthday and we were pleased that he decided to stop in and spend some time with us again this year. And, he's got a traveling companion with him this time. Professional photojournalist David Jackson is doing the entire trip with him and documenting their journey with some fantastic photos!

May Expenses

Well, I had to go back into our 10 years of budget history to see the most we ever spent on groceries in a month. Because we certainly broke that record last month!

We remain convinced that it will even itself out over the next four months (yes, we are 1/5 of the way through our time here already!), or at least we're hoping that it will.

Alberta - Wild Rose Country

Next up in our series celebrating Canada's 150th birthday is the province of Alberta.

This province has a population of about 4.1 million people, most of them living in and around the two major cities, Calgary and Edmonton. Alberta has an oil based economy and is the largest producer of conventional crude oil, synthetic crude, natural gas and gas products in Canada. Alberta is the world’s second largest exporter of natural gas and the fourth largest producer of natural gas.

The older you get, the more difficult it is...

While that sentence applies to a lot of things, this particular time I'm talking about learning a new language.

When we were kids here in Canada, we took French in school. But it was very basic. I think we got 20 minutes per day (or something like that) in grades 1 through 8, and that increased to 40 minutes per day in high school.

It's nearly impossible to keep clean...

I've always been really good at keeping a clean car. Washed, vacuumed, and with crystal clear glass. But the little blue car has been neglected the last couple of years because it's so impossible to keep it clean living here. And it's frustrating.

I had given it a quick clean up when we parked it last September, but when we arrived here at the end of April and got it fired up, it had a nasty smell in it.

Beautiful British Columbia

That's what it says on the vehicle licence plates issued by the Canadian province of British Columbia. And it's true! British Columbia (or simply "B.C." as it's called by many Canadians) is a beautiful province.

Home to 4.7 million people, British Columbia is the 5th largest province by area, and the 3rd most populated province. Over half of the population is in the area around the city of Vancouver.

It was a blustery day!

Well, just an update about what's been going on around the park. We had a decent Canadian May long weekend. Quite a few of the seasonal campers moved their trailers in for the summer, and the weather was good for this time of year. We only had three or four day to day campers come in, but that's typical. Our park is usually fairly quiet until the water level in the lake rises.

Haven't seen our owls again. Haven't even seen remains of what they've been eating, which we usually do.

A lesson in modern farming

Our regular readers will remember last fall when we had a lesson in modern harvesting when the crop was ready to be taken off the field. At the time, we got to ride along in a high tech combine and we learned a little about farming.

Yesterday, we were invited to learn a little about what farmers are busy doing at this time of year... planting the crops. Or, simply called "seeding"...

Canada's 150th Birthday

This is a big year in Canada, with lots going on in celebration of the country's 150th birthday. So over the next few weeks leading up to the big day on July 1st, we're going to be talking a lot about Canada.

There are 10 provinces and 3 northern territories that make up Canada.

Sunday morning pancakes

Actually, they are "weekend" pancakes for us, because we only happen to be having them this morning. So while they are Sunday morning pancakes today, they could just as easily be Saturday lunch pancakes next weekend!

Ruth and I have a bit of a tradition with weekend pancakes. As well, we do weekend bacon and eggs!

Great RV and Camping Deals

As you know, we love a great deal. In fact, who doesn't love a great deal? Even people with lots of money love to get a great deal. That could even be how they got to have lots of money! After all, they say that a penny saved is a penny earned.

Most of our regular readers know that I'm pretty good at finding great deals.

Opening day!

Well, it's opening day for most campgrounds here in Canada. Monday is "Victoria Day" so it's a holiday long weekend up here in the great white north. Americans have to wait another week yet for their "Memorial Day" May long weekend.

But things are not so white up here any more! Mostly very green. And they're calling for a beautiful weekend with sunshine and highs around 21C (70F) for the next four days.

We found our baby owl...

Late Tuesday afternoon, our summer employee Kevin was cutting some grass in one section of the park and he spotted our baby owl! We came and had a look, and sure enough, there it was sitting against the bushes. We were so happy to see it alive and well.

We had seen the mom in the same area, so she's definitely looking after it and making sure it's fed. After dinner, we decided to go move it and put it in a nearby tree. So we grabbed the camera and went to see how it was doing.

Our three favorite places in Mexico

We've been to 29 of the 31 states in Mexico. We're still missing Hidalgo and Tlaxcala. And while there are many places that we like in Mexico, there are three places have become our favorites. These are not normal Mexican vacation spots.

You'll notice that places like Puerto Vallarta and Cancun don't make the list of our top three!

Casino Camping

Back on October 17, 2007, on only our second night in our motorhome, we woke up in the Sudbury Casino parking lot. No, it's not because we drank too much, or because the engine wouldn't start. We had actually asked if we could overnight in their parking lot.

At the time, and even today, many RV'ers will overnight in parking lots if they're in transit. Walmart parking lots are somewhat famous for this activity, however we've always found that there are better options.

Casino camping is one such better option!

This mom is going to be busy!

Well, we're more than a little disappointed to say that there has been no sign of our little baby owl. Yesterday, Ruth saw both the mom and the dad in nearby trees. This is rare, because we hardly ever see them at the same time. Usually the dad is off doing... well... dad things. But, haven't caught sight of the baby. We're still hopeful that it's safe and sound stashed away somewhere.

Sitting here this morning, and we saw a deer come wandering into the bush beside our house trailer.

Camping in Europe

I've been meaning to do this post for a while now, simply so that we have a record of the following resources that we used while we were camping in Europe for two months. We will definitely be going back to Europe at some point to do some more RV travel. The best way to see Europe is in a campervan!

In fact, we might even buy an RV to use in Europe.

No more owls...?

The strong east wind never let up yesterday at all. It was a pretty constant 40 km/h (25 mph) all day, and right through the night. Remember yesterday I had said we were amazed that our owl nest stayed up in that tree?

Well I guess I spoke too soon...

33 years and the adventure continues!

It was 33 years ago today that we were standing in a small church in Galetta, Ontario saying "I do"!

We were only 22 years old at the time. Seems awfully young to be getting married, doesn't it? Especially since we had only known each other for 14 months or so! But, some things were meant to be, and here we are still carrying on.

Even the packaging is impressive!

We did a lot of flying this past winter, and we were offered the opportunity to try out a top quality set of earbud headphones so that we could enjoy a premium listening experience while watching the in flight entertainment systems on the various aircraft.

The Swedish brand Sudio sent us each one pair of their top quality earphones. Ruth chose the blue ones, and I chose the black ones!

How to save money grocery shopping!

We are having a bit of sticker price shock here in Saskatchewan. It's only May 10th, and we have already spent over $600 on groceries this month. Partly because we didn't have the motorhome with us and so we arrived to totally empty cupboards and a totally empty refrigerator.

So there was some stocking up to be done.

Booked another flight ticket!

This time, it's for our return flight back to Ottawa at the end of September. Of course we have those $800 each travel vouchers from our Air Canada flight bump experience a couple of weeks ago. But just because they were given to us doesn't mean we would squander them.

So yesterday I saw that the Regina To Ottawa flight had dropped from $323 CAD to $191 CAD. To put that in perspective, we had paid $235 CAD each for our flight from Ottawa to Regina a couple of weeks ago.

I should have been a plumber...

We noticed yesterday that the drain under the kitchen sink was dripping. It's a double sink, and the dishwasher hooks into the same drain. It was only a small drip, but it wasn't going to get better on it's own!

Turns out the seal between the drain pipe and the sink itself was broken and it needs a new pipe. After taking it apart it wouldn't go back together, so of course now we can't use the dishwasher. But fortunately we can still use the second sink but we have to be careful and drain it slowly.

How to do a motorhome exchange

In the summer of 2016, we gave our motorhome to strangers from Europe to use here in North America for two months. Just imagine that. People we had never met before were going to be using our motorhome. And they were going to be using it for free.

However... a few months later, the tables were turned. We went to Spain and used their motorhome for two months! For free. All of a sudden, this is looking like a pretty good deal!

You can almost watch the leaves opening up!

Ruth was busy all day yesterday doing leaf clean-up. Hard work when it's this warm. The temperature got up to 30C (86F) yesterday, but there is no humidity at all, and there was a breeze all day as well. Supposed to be warm again today, then back to normal with highs of around 20C (68F) and sunny all next week.

Perfect weather.