Monthly Archives: May 2022

The Bomber Command Museum of Canada

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Our first stop in Canada was in High River, Alberta. From there, we were able to visit several museums/parks within a 45 minute drive. I will have several blog posts on these museums over the next several days. For quick updates, I will use Instagram, as that works well with limited internet. For the more interesting things, or rather the touristy places that I take a lot of photos at, I will do a blog post, as Instagram is limited to 10 photos. Our Instagram page is liv2rv. https://www.instagram.com. Occasionally I may just post a blog with links to the IG pages, for those that are not on IG.

Located about 20 miles south of High River is The Bomber Command Museum of Canada https://www.bombercommandmuseum.ca. The museum commemorates those that served in the Bomber Command division during World War II.

The memorial wall contains the names of over 10,000 Canadian Bomber Command members that died in World War II.

During WWII the bombing forces of Canada were under British command to fight in Europe against the Nazi’s. The bombers suffered great losses during daylight raids, so they began operating almost exclusively at night.

The museum has displays of the instrument panels from the Lancaster bomber airplane.

This is the pilot’s instrument panel and flying controls, along with a photograph of a pilot.

The Flight Engineer’s Panel

Dan was checking out the mockup of a Lancaster cockpit that you can sit in. This mockup was used in the 1992 film “Map of the Human Heart.”

Air training bases in Canada had their own fire department. This is a 1942 Ford Aerodrome/Crash Fire Truck. After the war, the town of Nanton used it as their first fire truck. It remained in service until 1977. It was called “Old Bumpy” due to it’s ride.

This is a 1942 De Havilland Tiger Moth. It was the most widely used basic training airplane under the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan.

In 1939, the Royal Air Force established the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF) which grew to 180,000 members during WWII. In 1941, the Royal Canadian Air Force Women’s Division (WD) was formed. Over 17,000 Canadian women joined and served. The museum has a display honoring their service. The women in the Air Force were issued bicycles for transportation.

Canadair CT-114 Tutor. Originally used for training pilots from 1963-2000, the plane is now used by “The Snowbirds,” Canada’s air demonstration team.

The main feature of the museum is the Lancaster, a heavy bomber plane. It was the most successful bomber used in WWII.

View from the rear

Specially modified Lancaster were used to transport and deploy the Grand Slam Bomb. Forty one of these 22,400 pound bombs were dropped near the end of WWII. The museum houses a full-size mockup of the 25 foot long bomb.

A large number of Nose Art reproductions are contained throughout the museum. We always enjoy looking at the creativity on display.

Quote of the Day: “The Navy can lose us the war, but only the Air Force can win it. The fighters are our salvation, but the bombers alone provide the means of victory.” – Winston Churchill, September 1940 (this quote is on display at the museum)

Dogs are welcome in Canada

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Hello everyone, it’s me, Makena, your favorite dog blogger.

Keeping my peeps informed!

While my parents are busy playing tourists, I thought I would get you updated on my life. For the past eight summers, my parents have always worked. So I’m not sure what to expect this summer, since they will be playing tourists. I’m hoping they will be around more, and that I will have more places to sniff and pee. I’ll probably be spending a lot more time in my kennel with all the traveling. I’ve gotten pretty good at napping while they drive.

How I roll

Traveling to Canada with a dog

My parents wrote about the requirements of traveling into Canada as a human, so I thought I would do the same for us four legged folks. We don’t need any special apps like the humans do, but we do need to be current on our rabies vaccination. Here is a link for more information.

https://travel.gc.ca/returning/customs/bringing-your-pet-to-canada

As with the humans, there are also food restrictions for pets. You can only bring a maximum of 20 kilograms of dog food into the country. The equates to a whopping 44 pounds of dog food. Well, I say whopping, because my dog food comes in 4.5 pound bags. But for those big dogs, like my friend Cody, that could be an issue. My mom stocked up on three bags of food for me, which should last me all summer, plus a large container of treats. I’m well under the 20 kilogram requirements. This is just something to be aware of if you have bigger dogs.

When we crossed over the border, the border officer did not inquire if I was on board. I slept through the crossing!

Hanging out with my peeps

I haven’t seen my buddy Cody since last October when we left Teton Cabins in Wyoming. Apparently he has been taking steroids or something, because he has gotten huge! But he also went to doggie obedience school, so he’s very well behaved now – except for that butt sniffing thing!

This was Cody and I when we first met last summer, after Cody adopted Karen and Al.

Now look at him!

Our first stop in Canada was High River, Alberta, where my friend Buddy lives. Even though Buddy and I are neighbors in Yuma, we like our space. My parents always force us to pose together.

But this is really how we like to be – socially distanced!

Now if only Cody can learn this – I will have all summer to teach him! Hopefully he is a fast learner.

Stuck in the corner!

Quote of the Day: “My fashion philosophy is, if you are not covered in dog hair, your life is empty.” – Elayne Boosler

Bienvenue au Canada

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We finally made it across the border into Canada! We had no issues crossing. The border guard only inquired about alcohol, firearms, tobacco products and weapons such as pepper spray (not allowed) and bear spray (allowed). They did not inquire about food or plants when we crossed at the Sweetgrass MT/Coutts, Alberta border.

The ArriveCAN app is still required, and that is where you enter your passport and vaccine status (you must be fully vaccinated). They did not inquire if we had a pet, and we did not offer. The big piece of advice that all the Canadians gave us was to just politely answer the Border officers questions in as few words as possible.

This webpage has the most current information if you are planning on traveling to Canada, via vehicle, cruise ship or airplane.

https://travel.gc.ca/

We feel very blessed

For two years, we have been trying to get to Alaska for the summer. In February 2020, we first started to hear about this thing called Covid-19. At the time, we were told it would be over “very quickly” and that only 7 Americans were sick, and they would be fine. So we continued to be optimistic that we would still be able to go in 2020. Well that information didn’t turnout so well.

The weekend before we crossed, we were at a campground in Shelby, Montana. I kept staring out the window of our RV at a giant United States flag at half staff. It had been lowered in memory of the one million Americans that have died because of Covid-19. It’s a humbling figure.

Not a day goes by that I don’t feel grateful for the life that I have. The last two years have really reinforced those feelings. Between Covid and family and friends battling serious illnesses, it just puts things in perspective. Life is so uncertain. Drown out the noise, and just do the best you can each and every day. Don’t live in fear, just live.

VERIZON COVERAGE

While we were waiting in line at the border, our phones dinged with a message from our carrier, Verizon. It welcomed us to Canada and said we would be on roaming coverage in Canada, and we would be limited to 0.5 GB of high speed data per line, per day. After that, it would switch to 2 G speed. I used up my data once, and let me tell you, 2 G speed is useless. We are doing our best to be thrifty. My phone is connected to TELLUS network, and Dan’s has connected to Roger’s Network. We have identical phones, but have no idea why we are on two different networks,

Karen and Al have both Verizon and AT&T. They have not had any issues with coverage in Canada with their AT&T plan, but Verizon has limited them as well.

INSTAGRAM ACCOUNT

I have set up an Instagram page, and will use that for quick posts, due to the lack of cell/internet access. Our friend Bob “Buckeye” Miller started following us before I had even made a post – thanks Bob!

Here is a link to my first post.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Cd0p-IGOyf5/?utm_source=ig_web_button_share_sheet

So if you are looking for photos, you can click on the link. We have visited several interesting places so far, and I do want to post some blogs when I have more robust internet. 0.5 GB doesn’t allow for photos. But it seems to do fine on Instagram.

My Instagram account is a work in progress, so be patient.

We are currently in a campground in St Albert, Alberta, and they have free wi-fi, but you are limited to just two devices. I will try to get a few blog posts ready to go, but my photos are on a laptop. We are using our free device coupons on the iPads. We went to a nearby Walmart yesterday and I found an SD card adapter for my iPad that I will try out. Hopefully I can put the photos on the iPad using that device.

On a side note, the Walmart in St Albert no longer provides plastic bags. You have to bring your own reusable bags. I’m not sure if that is a city-wide ordinance here or not. Also, you have to put in a coin to get your shopping cart (like Aldi does). Can you imagine Walmart banning plastic bags at all their stores in the US?

Quote of the Day: “It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.” – Marcus Aurelius

Heading North to Alaska (finally)

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After two long years of waiting, we are finally making our way to Alaska! We left Arizona at the end of April, and have been slowly making our way north to the border. We will be meeting up with our friends Al and Karen on Sunday in Shelby, Montana, and plan on crossing into Alberta Canada on Tuesday, May 17th. We will be stopping in High River for a few days, and meeting up with Don and Kathy, our “neighbors” in Yuma.

In a matter of days, we went from the mid 90’s in Arizona, to our first winter weather advisory! It was actually enjoyable to finally get out of the heat.

Now we are getting pounded by the wind in Shelby. The motorhome has a full wall slide with a slide topper. After listening to it get battered around for an hour, we decided to put the slide in for the day. Definitely not a day to be driving an RV.

We had a nice winter in Yuma. Dan’s parents were able to rent a park model in our RV park for two months. Dan’s brother Gary and his wife Julia were also able to fly down for a visit, along with their daughter Jasmine, who lives in Arizona. Makena was even allowed to visit in the park model. Everyone looks so excited!

Dan’s mom Joan loves to line dance, and they have classes two days a week in the park. The line dancers also participated in the park’s Mardi Gras parade, and Joan donned her mask to dance along the streets!

Our friend Ellen (who is behind Joan in the picture above holding the Red Hat ladies banner) turned the big 70 this March, so we had her and Tom over to celebrate! Ellen loves her cannoli’s!

Happy 70th!

We had a few outings/meals/card days at Dave and Marilyn’s house. Marilyn decided it was time to bust out a giant bottle of wine that she had stored in their garage for the past 6 years. Nothing like 110 degree summers to properly “age” the wine!! The cork disintegrated as Dan tried to get it out. As you can expect, it was not the best testing wine! It was only fitting we used dixie cups for our tasting!

We had a nice surprise visit from our friend Judy. She has recently retired and decided to escape the weather in Wisconsin and visit some friends of hers in Sun City. They all made the trek out to Yuma for the day. These ladies enjoy golfing, and making “sand angels” in the sand traps on golf courses! Avid blog reader Keith promised to be with Judy the next time they visit!

Jasmine turned the big 30 in April, and her mom Julia, and sisters Brooke and Carmen flew down to help her celebrate. We were able to meet up with them for brunch, followed by an afternoon at a nearby park, where we attempted to play pickleball on the tennis court.

Carmen (mom to be), Julia, Jasmine, Brooke and I
Pickleball in sandals

This is our ninth year of full-time RV’ing, and this will be our first summer where we will not be working. It’s time to play tourist! For us, the price of gas has dropped about 50 cents per gallon since we left Arizona. Depending on what day it is, it’s either going up, or going back down. There’s nothing we can do about it, and we have waited two years for this trip. I plan on keeping track of all our expenses once we cross into Canada. Karen has done an excellent job planning our route, and we have booked almost all of our campgrounds already. We have a few flexible days in Canada on the way to Alaska.

Canada has an app, ArriveCan, that you have to complete before you cross the border. We have entered as much information ahead of time (passport and vaccine information), and then you have to complete the rest of the information 72 hours ahead of your arrival. So we will finish that up Sunday. From what we have heard so far, this app makes crossing the border a lot more efficient, because they will have all your information on file, and won’t have to enter the data as you cross. We shall find out on Tuesday how well it works for us.

INSTAGRAM

I have been looking into setting up an Instagram account for our travels. I think it will make it much easier to post updates than blogging. IG allows you to post up to 10 photos, and that’s what most people like to look at anyway. If I do set up an account, I will just post links on this blog, to each post that I do on Instagram. I’m not sure how much internet/cell service we will be getting in Canada and Alaska.

Back in 2014 when we were working at Crazy Horse, I recall talking with one of the college students working there for the summer. When I mentioned that I had a blog, she said “that’s old school, why don’t you do Instagram?!” Well, 8 years later, I guess I’m getting up to date with technology! I will let you know when I get that set up. I noticed they have Instagram for beginners videos on You Tube, so I will be watching a few of them!

Let’s get this long awaited journey started!

Quote of the Day: “Once a year, go someplace you’ve never been before” – Dalai Lama