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Well, here we are.  The border. Finally!  Our trip up until now has been magnificent, but in all honesty, we were getting excited for the excitement of the border crossing, and for visiting a foreign country.  Mind you, I don’t consider Canada a foreign country at all, but my children did, and it was fun basking in their sweet child-like wonder.  So, crossing the border was extremely exciting for them, and a bit of a hassle for me.  For this trip, we had to cross the border a total of 4 times, twice into Canada, and twice back into the US.  Of the four crossings, this initial crossing into Canada was the biggest hassle, and took the longest amount of time.

We entered Alberta, Canada on the 15 freeway.  My kids got a kick out of the fact that we live less than a mile off the 15 freeway, and here we were entering a “foreign country” on the same exact road.  Of course we didn’t take the 15 the entire way, but a great deal of it.  Once you hit the border, the 15 becomes Alberta Highway 4.  The American city you are in before you hit the border is Sweet Grass, Montana, and the Canadian City on the other side is Coutts, Alberta.  This border crossing station is one of the most busy of all the stations, as the Alberta Highway 4/Interstate 15 route is called the CANAMEX corridor, and is responsible for a great deal of trade that occurs between Canada, Mexico, and the U.S.  This border station is not open 24 hours a day, so it is best to check before hand to ensure they will be open.  However, during the spring and summer months, they are open during all daylight hours.

We arrived at the checkpoint at about 11 a.m.. The line was quite long, which I found surprising.  As someone who has been through the U.S./Mexico border a few times, I was expecting the line to move at the same speed.  Unfortunately, it didn’t, and was extremely slow.  Obviously cars with Canadian plates were ushered through  much quicker than vehicles with American plates.  Once it was our turn, as expected, the border agent asked us to pull over to a side area where he could look inside our RV.  I was told to expect this, so it didn’t really bother me.  In this day and age, I completely understand and respect the need for tight controls at the border, and I feel both our nations security is worth the small inconvenience I experienced at the border.  The border agent was extremely nice, but also very business like.  He asked me where we were going, and how long we expected to stay.  I told him my general plan, but told him it wasn’t in stone.  He asked me whether I had enough money to afford the trip, which I thought was odd.  He then came into our RV, and looked around a bit.  Then he asked about Gisele, our Chihuahua, and asked to see the health certificate.  Mind you, this took about 5 minutes thus far.  It may not seem like a long time, but at the time, it felt like forever.  Then he looked at the kids, and asked them questions!  The first question being “Where is your Dad, kids?”.  At this point I volunteered up the custody letter I brought along with me, but the agent seemed perturbed that I interrupted him.  He then asked the kids again to answer, which they did.  I offered the custody papers, but he never looked at it.  He did asked for my passport and my drivers license, and he briefly left with those, along with the animal health certificate.  Even though I was totally prepared for this, I still felt incredibly nervous.  Mind you, I had nothing to hide.  But it still was a very nerve racking experience.  The whole time I was imagining that I had forgotten something, and we wouldn’t be allowed into Canada.  But luckily, that didn’t happen.  After about 3-4 minutes, the border agent returned, handed me back my license, passport, and animal certificate, and told me to have a safe trip.  There was a little bit of small talk, him asking me how much the RV cost, how I liked it, etc.  He never asked me about whether I was bringing anything into the country, about liquor or cigarettes, or agriculture.  He never mentioned anything about prescription medications either.  But still, always be prepared.  As I mentioned earlier, this was the toughest of our four crossings, and you just never know what you are going to get when you hit that border.  So, be prepared for anything.

All in all, from the time we got into the border crossing lane (which was the bus lane, as with the mirrors, our RV was just too large for the car lane), it took about 40 minutes until we were free to go.  Half of that was spent waiting in line.  Again, I didn’t really mind the wait, as I have a new found respect for border security.  The kids were a bit antsy, and our Chihuahua felt it necessary to bark the entire time the border agent was in our RV, but other than that, piece of cake.  Plus, once we were done, it was party time!  We were now in Canada, and our first major destination of Yellowknife was now in our sights, even though we were days and days away from arriving there.  Luckily, there is so much to see in Canada, and hopefully you will continue to read so you can learn about all the fun and exciting things we did in Canada, prior to getting to our ultimate destination of Alaska.

Please come back on Thursday, October 9th for our fifteenth installment, “Oh, Canada“.  See you there!