Alright for all of you who have had the great pleasure of traveling through the boarder and any one of the many Crossings you can take by car, this story is for you. Picture a sunny long day of traveling, at this point we had crushed close to a thousand k and were quite happy about our current progress. We arrive at the border to find no line up whats so ever and are immediately able to see a border guard. We engaged in some light bantering back and forth and the guard was very understanding of what we were doing. After a quick check and a few questions he sent us on our way and wished up good luck in our travels, yaaa that didn’t happen to us……
Everything up until us engaging in light banter with the guard is true. It actually went a little something like this.
Guard: Good day
US: hello
Guard: whats your reason for coming into the states.
Us: To go mountain biking.
Guard: Where
Us: Colorado and pretty much everywhere else on the west coast
Guard: Why
Us: Because you have good trails
Guard: Do you guys not have jobs
Us: No were students
Guard: how much money do ya have?
Us: about 270 in cash combined plus money in an account.
For some reason this was not acceptable and he couldn’t figure out how we were planning on financing this trip.
Guard: how do you guys have the money to do this?
Us: Um we saved it.
At this point we had apparently really thrown him for a loop.
Guard: What’s in the bins?
Us: clothes, biking gear and camping gear.
Guard: You guys plan on camping the entire time?
Us: Yes
Apparently another unacceptable answer from the look he gave us
Guard: Why do you have three bikes?
Us: we are meeting the third guy in Colorado
Guard: Why?
Us: Hes flying in from Australia
I Think that was the final nail in the coffin
Guard: Alright fellas just pull ahead and see the Two men waiting
At this point we were ushered ahead and greeted by 2 more border guards who ordered us to exit the vehicle and only take our wallets and head inside, he also requested me to leave my keys with him. Inside we were told to stand at the edge of the carpet and not to move until they were ready to see us. After a quick huddle between Ben and myself we decided against asking if we could use the washroom as we feared our urine would be collected and stored in a government data base for future cross references to determine if we had consumed the ever illegal fruit and vegetables harvested in Canada. ( Please check your apples and oranges and the boarder). After a plethora of questions trying to figure out how 2 guys could just be actually riding their bikes for 2 months and not human mules smuggling illegal drugs into the country we made some headway to negotiate our release. After they finally deemed us to be of a low threat to national security we were told to sit and wait and that we would be able to leave shortly. This was not the case for the buddy sitting beside us.
After a quick search of the truck to verify we were actually going on a bike trip we were released and able to hit the road again. All in all we lost a little over an hour. This has not been the first time nor will it be the last time I will be searched at the border. The new motto of the trip ( It could have been worse).
At the time of this post it’s about 9 at night and we are just approaching Flint Michigan, apparently moral is not so high in this city since the recession hit. Actually it’s so low it made a nationwide top 5 list of places where people are most depressed. Thankfully we are just passing through.
June 15/2009
Just sending out a BIG thanks to paul and ginny for sweet send off BBQ we had yesterday. Was great to see everyone before we headed out on the road today. Lets hope pauls hosts a few more Q's in his day.
THE END OF THE CHEESEBURGER PICNIK AND ROOTBEER FLOAT.
I figured it was about time that we started to really make this blog come alive and what better day to do that then the official day 1 of our trip. June 15 has been a day marked on our calendars for close to a year, a day that was set aside to begin an adventure that im sure will leave a lasting impression on the three of us. I was actually impressed at how prepared we were today, Benny and I have done a lot of traveling together and hes by no means the most prepared or fastest when it comes to getting stuff done but then again who am I kidding. I must admit though he really picked it up when it came to trail research, that is completly his domain and im just along for the ride. All in all though we were able to get on the road by 1 after we had to deal with a few things beyond our control.
The day started out with me taking my truck to the shop to try and fix a problem that had poped up on saturday. After a few quick visits to some local auto shops they were able to figure out that the reason my truck sounded like a jet engine taking off when ever I would step on the gas was caused by some bearings in the pully wheels that were just about shot. as i tended to that situation benny tied up some loose ends concerning our account and credit card we just got for the trip.
As I write this post we are traveling through Quebec close to reveir de loup parden my french I couldnt remember how it was spelled but you get the idea. so far we have put in 735km today and im expecting we will be able bust out a couple hundred more befor we start to look for a place to pull over and sleep at, I cant say im looking forward to sleeping in this truck the next couple nights but it could always be worse. Anyways between the three of us were gonna try our best to post as often as possible so you guys can feel like your almost on the trip with us. (Macleaner its still not to late to come you just say the word and we'll come get ya).
We are planning on reaching Denver Colorado Thursday so we can be on time to pick up Tyler as he joins our group to complete our tripod. (Also if anyone knows Tylers flight number that would be greatly appreciated and might come in handy haha) once we have assembled we will begin our epic quest hopefully on Friday, just bear with us untill then Its kind of hard to make all this driving sound even the least bit glamourous.
Benny has chosen to elect Ryan Taylor as MVP of the day for hooking him up with a set of his favorite grips that are unavailable in Canada at the moment.
No comments:
Post a Comment