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  • Day 84

    Back to Vanouver

    October 17, 2022 in Canada ⋅ ⛅ 13 °C

    Sun 16th Oct: Since we were meeting Natalie at 11 am, we had to get out of bed fairly smartly if we wanted to do the 9 km G-spot loop trail first. Again no signs pointing where to go, so it took a few wrong turns before we got on the right trail - eventually we came across rocks with the name on and with a bit of jogging on the Flats, manage to get to the top reasonably quickly. It had wonderful views overlooking Penticton, nestled in between Okanagan Lake in the north and Skaha Lake in the South. We got into town and had a wonderful catchup with Natalie, who has certainly been busy since leaving NZ in 2020. Sadly we said our farewells to her, and carried on south, heading to Osoyoos. Thought we better try another winery - there certainly was enough of them - and eventually stopped at Golden Hills, and had a tasting. The lady was very nice serving us, however we preferred the wines at the previous tasting we had. Just outside of Osoyoos we stopped at the "spotted lake". We could only view it from the roadside, as it is a sacred medicine lake of the local first nation people. As I understand, it has high concentration of minerals and as the water evaporates over summer it leaves mineral deposits as spots on the surface - quite unique. We then had to decide, down to USA and North Cascade National Park or Vancouver to see if we can get repairs done to the van (the back bottom panel is breaking away and needs replacing). Practicality won and we headed towards Vancouver stopping on a side road just east of Princeton.
    Mon 17th: Woke to a red sun, and hazy sky and as we traveled west, the haze got so thick at times reducing visibility to about 200 m, the worst we have ever seen it. Search on the internet told us there are currently 207 active forest fires in BC and quite a large one north of Chilliwack, which was between us and Vancouver, and the greater Vancouver area had an air quality alert out telling people to avoid outside activity - no hiking for us today, not that we could see much anyway. So probably a good day for driving. We stopped at a lookout at Hope, where a massive landslide in 1965, changed the landscape and killed 4 people. We could just make out the mountain where the slide came down. At Abbortsford, we stopped at Fraserway RV, a big RV franchise where Fiona brought the van from to ask about getting it repaired. We needed an appointment for it to be assessed and the next available was beginning of December - we carried on. We then went to the wreckers where we had got the tow hitch from in August, to see what they had. Managed to get a new microwave plate and a suggestion of another RV repair place to try. This place was helpful, and looked at what was required and later in the night we got a quote $3047 (gulp). But they can't do it in the next 2 weeks, and the storage place we had organized is 45 mins away. So we will see if we can find a repair place near north Vancouver where the van will be stored, tomorrow. Tonight we are camping out at Walmart. Absolutely no exercise today - better find something to do tomorrow. Steps V 2662
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