A nice scenic drive over the mountain to the Okanogan River and north along the river brought me to the Canadian Border. I got up to the entry point and when the Customs guy asked whether I had any firearms or alcohol, I gave him a inventory of the alcoholic beverages I had on board. He got serious, asked me to park over there and take my passport into the office. Another officer asked me to go through the inventory again. Then another officer explained that there were limits on the amount of alcohol that I could import. I knew perfectly what those limits were, having looked it up on the web before I started the trip, but he had to tell me, even though I was below the limits. So it turns out that I was way over the limits, those were “or” not “and” so any one of my beverage categories, beer, wine, or spirits was my entire allotment.
Finally into Canada. The first thing that happened was that my phone made a bunch of new noises, announcing that I had “system text messages” saying that 1) I’m “Roaming” and all phone calls will be $0.89 a minute (bend me over), and 2) that roaming data is available for $2.05 per MB. Where’s that KY?
The highway north from the border to Westbank is crowded and slow. It passes by some 400 wineries in the 70 miles from the border to Westbank! It seems like every driveway and side road is signposted for one or more wineries.
I got to Westbank, but didn’t have an address for Whiskey Jacks, the bar where I had agreed to meet Brian. I had counted on using my phone to look it up. No data, no map, no address. OK, I’ll try 411. A $2 information call later got me a “that number isn’t correct, please check your dialing or dial 411” message. A bad turn put me in a driveway too narrow to turn around in, so I actually had a make a K-turn with the trailer, for the first time. No problem! It seems I actually have the hang of backing this thing up. I decided to head back toward the old downtown, and lo and behold, there it is, on my right. A right turn and I discovered a huge parking lot with lots of room to put the truck and trailer.
As I was getting out of the truck, I noticed a guy getting out of a 1953 Ford 2-door wagon across the street, and walking in my direction. I asked him about the car and we walked into the pub together. Into the middle of Brian’s Friday lunch with the car guys. Several beers and lunch later, we adjourned to Brian’s “farm” for some more beers.
Brian’s farm is 4 acres in the middle of town. It was once an egg farm with 6,000 chickens in two big barns, with a 3rd building as the egg processing plant. Brian has converted the processing plant into his shop and home. His son Levi is an armourer, making arms and armor for SCA and movies. Levi’s girlfriend Koreen is a costume designer for movies, and they have workspace at the back of one of the barn buildings. The two barn buildings are now full of Brian’s stuff, and cars, and cars, and cars, and car parts, and did I mention cars. Brian owns 40 himself and rents storage space indoors and out to another 30 or 40 cars, busses, an RV or two, some tractors and farm equipment, and only god knows what all else. If it has wheels, Brian can build it, fix it, restore it, hot rod it, drive it, or race it. Every vehicle has a story and Brian loves to tell those stories.
“Woody’s Farm”
Three days with Brian, Sandi, Levi, and Koreen have left me exhausted! What a high-energy family. We worked, shopped, ate, swapped stories, drank, and generally have a great time. Brian goes a mile a minute and expects everyone to keep up with him. I discovered that sometimes you have to peel off and do your own thing. Friday afternoon’s lunch with the car guys turned into Friday night’s beer night with the car guys, then early Saturday morning’s drinking around the fire pit with Brian, Sandi, and Brett, the guy with the 53 Ford 2-door wagon. Still keeping up at 1:00 AM!
Saturday, Brian showed me around town and told tales of his childhood as we ran a series of errands, including having hydraulic hoses made for the swather. We attracted some attention running those errands, because were running them in Brian’s “daily driver,” a 1946 Studebaker pickup truck. It’s painted flat black with flames ;-). Sandi made us a delightful dinner, and Brian told stories until I finally quit at near 11:00 PM.
Brian’s Rec room
Sunday started with Brian and I installing and trying to hook up the hydraulic hoses he’d had made yesterday. The quick disconnect couplings don’t seem to mate properly, so we went next door to the neighbor’s to look at his tractor. Steve is a Hungarian emigrant who has been here 50 years and still has an enormous accent and can’t spell any English word correctly, even the varietal names of his own wines! He’s also a distiller, and when Brian indicated that I like ‘shine Steve dragged out the “good stuff,” some 25-year old prune whiskey. At about 105 proof it was strong but very tasty. No prune character to it, but some interesting sherry notes. The age is deceptive. It’s in a glass carboy, on oak chips. It has picked up some color from the Oak, but nothing like if it were in a barrel.
Steve and I Tasting
Steve doesn’t hook up his farm implements the same way as Brian, and in the end Steve and Brian were on their backs under Steve’s tractor. We were saved by the bell, literally when Sandi rang the dinner bell for breakfast.
On Sunday one of the car guys, Dave, came by in his 1968 Dodge Charger. He has had it since he was 17 years old. It’s so shiny Black that the guys joke that he won’t even consider taking it out if there is even the slightest chance of rain. He took me for a ride. Whoooo heeeeeee! There is nothing on earth like a 60’s muscle car. His puts 500+ horse power on the rear wheels and we did a very quick zero-to-100 up the street above Brian’s ;-)
All in all, I had the most fun I’ve had with my clothes on in a long time!
Sunday evening, Sandi was cooking pork ribs on the gas grille for the family and Steve and Laura from next door. She started the ribs, turned down the flame and went in the house. A couple of minutes later Brian noticed black smoke coming from the grille. A quick look showed that the gunk in the bottom of the grille was soaking up the pork fat and burning like a torch. Sandi moved the ribs to the oven and Brian got the fire under control after about 10 minutes of spraying with a water sprayer. No damage to anything but the schedule. The dinner was excellent, fueled by a couple of 1.75s of Steve’s somewhat rough red wine.
On Monday morning I finally got hitched up and on the road toward Nelson BC, my original Canadian destination.