We missed an important junction. I saw it, but too late. We were in the wrong lane and passed helplessly by

Our next port of call was to a niece in Qualicum Beach, a warm-hearted girl who lived in a wooden house surrounded by six acres of land. Her sister happened to be staying there also for a week which saved us from having to go to Powell River. They were interested in our forthcoming expedition. Although they had lived in that part of the world for most of their lives, they had never been to the Yukon or to Alaska.

“Are you sure you’ll be okay?” they asked in worried voices. “A small camper did you say?” “Yes,” we replied. “We’ve chosen the smallest one we could find in the brochure.”

“I didn’t think we had small anything in this part of the world.” She left it at that, but made the same offer as Sheila, my friend in Salt Spring had a day or two earlier. “If you get into any sort of difficulty, we’re here to help. Just phone.”

After a week we crossed over to Vancouver and had a cheerful time with a brother-in-law and family. Next morning we were ready to go and made our way to where we were to pick up our camper.

Outskirts

We got a taxi to take us there. The taxi driver had a bit of trouble finding the place but we were pleased to note it was on the outskirts of Vancouver and in the direction we wanted to go.

I had been worrying quietly for some time. How do you get a vehicle you are not familiar with out of a city you are not familiar with?

We entered into a huge shed. A man walking on stilts was painting an enormously tall wall. Ranged along the opposite side were a row of the tallest campers I had ever seen. To me, that morning in that shed, they looked enormous.

Across the top of each in big scrawling letters was ‘Rocky Mountain Campers’. My heart sank.

I looked around. I could see nothing smaller. Surely they didn’t expect us to drive one of these monsters. But that’s just what they did. We sat down opposite the guy at the desk. I looked at Henry. He didn’t say anything but I could see the corners of his mouth had drooped. Always so confident, that was not a good sign.

“Have you nothing smaller?” I said. “We did order the smallest one in the brochure.” “That’s it,” said the man. “Do you not have anything else?” “Nope.”

What about a car? We could stay at motels. “Nope, don’t have a car, either. ’Fraid that’s our little lot.”

Well if it was that or nothing, we couldn’t draw back now. Out came all the forms, all the rules and regulations. It all seemed straight forward enough until we came to rule 26: Clients can’t take the camper into the Yukon, Alaska or Northwest Territories.

Here Henry stopped him. “But that’s exactly where we’re heading for. It was all arranged over the phone. We were definitely told we could go there. We would not have hired the camper had we been told otherwise. Anyway, why this regulation?”

“I guess it is because the roads are a bit dodgy up there,” came the reply. “Campers that go there tend to come back covered in dents from flying gravel and with their windscreens all pitted.”

“Well what do we do now?” I said despairingly. “We don’t really need a camper if we can’t go there.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” said the fellow. He left and there was much discussion with a colleague. After a few phone calls, he was back at the desk.

Misinformed

“The company’s decided that you folks can go to these places seeing as how you were misinformed but you’ll need to pay us $300 extra.”

There was nothing else we could do; we agreed. He continued with the rules all about what to do if we had an accident. “Now when you guys have an accident,” he said. “Surely you mean, if,” I said.

After the form-filling and various extra payments we were ready to go, but by now other customers were waiting to be seen. Our young man was in a hurry. Our monster was brought out and we were shown, in a matter of minutes, how everything worked.

It was impossible to take it all in. We asked about a manual of instructions but there was none. We were given a small map showing how to get out of Vancouver and he quickly explained what further roads to take to reach Hope, our first destination.

In spite of the excitement and confusion, all might have gone well had we not missed an important junction. I saw it, but too late. We were in the wrong lane and passed helplessly by.

We took two more hours to get out of the busy suburb of Vancouver called Langley. At one point the Rocky Mountain Campers man’s prediction: “When you have an accident” very nearly came true.

We came to a busy intersection and did something we shouldn’t have done. (I still don’t know what, but their traffic rules are different from ours).

A stretch limousine came winging down, much faster than it should have done, and had almost to go sideways to miss us. All the traffic stopped in fright and let us go where we were heading for.

If the rest of the traffic got a fright it was nothing to what we got. Henry manoeuvred into a side road and ran the camper on to a bank. It slipped back on to the road. Where was the hand brake? On the floor.

Henry wasn’t accustomed to driving an automatic. Everything about it was different. To make matters worse, the rain had come on heavily. How did the windscreen wipers work?

During our rest on the bank, however, we managed to work out most things and started again. We still had trouble getting on to the proper trail, when all of a sudden I saw it for the second time.

Frightening

We were in the wrong lane again. There was no way we could see what was behind us. The camper was so wide that even the extra long mirrors gave you no view to speak of. Henry indicated and dared to move over. At last we were on our way. After that first, frightening beginning things went well enough.

We drew into the camp site at Hope in the late afternoon. We had hamburgers at a nearby restaurant and then explored our first Canadian camp site, pretty among trees.

We began to learn the language; the dumping station for getting rid of waste; the electricity for boosting supplies, the water supply for filling up Camper tanks of which we had three; one for drinking water, one for dish washing, one for the shower and lavatory. They held a lot of water and were situated at the top of the vehicle.

“All that water on the top,” said Henry, “makes it difficult to drive. It gives it a swaying motion just like a ship at sea!”

Later we kept the tanks low in water. The camper itself was comfortable, everything one could wish. We climbed up on to our double bed that night and fell asleep easily. Also the van was new. It had done only 600 miles.

“At least we won’t be in too much danger of breaking down when we are out in the barren lands,” Henry said optimistically.

More tomorrow.