Expedition Canada

A Vancouver Visit Dad in contemplative mood Fri April 29th WARNING There are going to be quite a few baby pictures in forthcoming blogs. We had been holding off coming over to Vancouver to clear our shipping container contents though Customs, until the wee bairn had arrived.  With Sebastian (Seb/Sebi) now home we caught a Thursday afternoon ferry and headed over to Granville Island and our favourite Vancouver hotel.   The plan was to go over to the Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) office closest to Granville Island first thing Friday. A local dog sitter, a lovely lady called Karla, was going to look after Jack for the day until Duty duties and baby visits were complete. 'Oh', she said 'have you seen the news reports about the queues at that office, people have been arriving the night before to queue for passports'.   Noooooo.  "We're not queuing" I helpfully offered on the drive over to the CBSA.  "We'll come over another day on the early fe

Blog Exclusive Tue Apr 26th  Royal Proclamation Sebastian Wilfred Dabous Cronk b. Apr 25th 2022 - 7lb 12oz Needless to say we are delighted with the arrival of the young fella which is the icing on the cake of our move to Canada.  Celebrations are likely to continue throughout the week!   Mum and baby (and Dad who has already lost count of the diapers he's changed) are doing great and we plan to head over to Vancouver at the end of the week for hugs and cuddles. In other far less important news .....  The ferry service to Vancouver is enjoying an hourly service this week as they can only use the bottom half of the ship.  The Langdale upper loading ramp is having some major work done so only the lower deck is available from the secondary dock.  One of the ferries serving Vancouver Island has been diverted on to the Langdale route to maintain capacity.  We rather hope that BC Ferries don't hinder our trip across to Vancouver later in the week.   Using our own boat is not an optio

Bank Account Open! Fri Apr 22nd Hopkins Landing - from the sea - Soames Hill to the left which has stairs to the top! It might not sound very important but it will make a huge difference managing our presence here.  We can move our iPhones to a Canada location, which means we can download Apps  that are not available on the UK site; we can move mobiles to more competitive contracts rather than pre-paid and most importantly we can move money from the UK when the £ - CA$ is more in our favour and avoid excessive bank charges.  Driving licences next. If you thought the musical opening was for a family event, we are still awaiting news on that front!   The week seems to have flown by.  I made a quick trip over to Vancouver to pick up a keyboard to start a long-promised aim to improve my music reading and playing.  Fred has been playing lots of tennis and Jack has been on lots of walks.   It does not feel Spring like yet, even though the buds are bursting.  The temperatures have been below

Snow Atop, Lakes Melted Thu Apr 13th A beer in Merlin's to rehydrate! If you think about it, there is something slightly odd about forcing your feet into footwear, which either at the beginning or end of the day, or indeed all day, make your feet feel like what I imagine young Chinese girls felt when their feet were broken and bound to create Lotus feet. Probably won't be so quiet Easter weekend Having dressed in multi-layers of warm clothing that have you glowing under exertion or shivering when seated, you then strap two 'planks of wood' to your feet and ascend the nearest alp (usually in the face of a howling gale) before arriving at the top in a state of suspended animation from the cold.  At that point, you hurl yourself off the top of said alp in a variety of styles and speeds, aiming to reach the bottom in one piece, before doing it all over again, and again.  If you are lucky there will be sufficient light/visibility to show all the bumps and dips on the way dow

Whistler in Spring Sun Apr 10th Rogers Arena from across far side of False Creek - on morning run Editorial Correction Last week's headline "A year in BC" was not strictly accurate.  Although we arrived in Toronto on April 3rd, we didn't actually get to Vancouver until April 6th.  I shall put it down to artistic licence.  '363 Days in BC' sounds meaningless and 'A year in BC bar a few days' strays too far from the message.  So I will leave it as written.  Fortunately nobody spotted the error or were too kind to point it out. Blog Update This last week we have started to think about packing up the house ready for movers, who are booked for May 21st.  There isn't a huge amount to do, it's only the possessions we have acquired since arriving in Canada, plus the workshop machinery.  Some of it is a two or three person lift so better done by professionals.   The Federal Budget caught much attention, even reported on BBC News.  No home sales to fore

A year in BC Sun Apr 3rd Howe Sound Catchy title for a book don't you think?  Maybe not. Easter Saturday 3rd April 2021 A year ago today we arrived in Canada.  Departing an empty Heathrow airport, on a near empty Air  Canada aircraft to Toronto.  International flights to Vancouver had all been cancelled.  All incoming international flight passengers were being ‘processed’ in Ontario.  Queuing for a passport check, immigration discussion, Covid tests and then a bus to our quarantine hotel.  Hotel room OK, food well off the bottom of the scale.   Two days later after negative Covid tests we were on our way to Vancouver and the final eleven days of our quarantine in North Van.  Our garden suite was great, our host welcoming and Jack arriving midway through our quarantine, the icing on the cake.   Our house search started over a year ago, before we left the UK.  Tentative offers made no progress.  On Thursday last, we closed (completed) on a purchase and now have our own small piece o