Through the hoodoos to Calgary, Alberta

Well, despite a few rough patches over the last week or two it looks like everything is coming together.

Yesterday, we made our way from Cabri, Saskatchewan to Calgary, Alberta. Originally, we were going to have to be in Calgary by 11:00am to drop off the car rental, but now that we are not leaving Canada until Monday I managed to extend the car rental until Sunday.

Great news!

I opened my email this morning to find my Australia visitor visa approved!

The whole situation sucked though. It never should have been an issue to begin with. But, what's done is done, so there's nothing to do but look at the bright side. And the bright side is that we are now going to be seeing Singapore and Malaysia as well. It feels like we're getting a whole new trip out of the deal... which essentially we are, however it has cost us quite a lot more money as well.

When life hands you lemons...

...you need to make lemonade!

So yesterday, we made our way to the fancy new medical center in the town of Leader, Saskatchewan (pop 870). About an hour drive, but worth it compared to having to go back to the hospital in Swift Current!

Well, where do I start?

Lots to talk about today.

Let's start with our Australia trip. I still don't have a visa to travel to Australia, but of course that could change at any moment. Still, we're now planning on it not showing up in time. So, our inexpensive Australia trip is about to become an expensive Australia trip.

What a circus this has become. And complicated more by the fact that Ruth is still not feeling well and may not be well enough to travel on Thursday anyhow.

Back to the pharmacist

Well, Ruth felt quite a bit better yesterday, but she was complaining of a debilitating headache that just wouldn't let up. We finally decided that it was one of the side effect of the antibiotic Trimethoprin that she had been prescribed.

But we really didn't want to go back to the emergency room at the hospital. And since the Trimethoprin had been available at the pharmacist without a prescription and he had said there were other substitutes available we decided to drive back into the city and get something different.

Just an update

Ruth didn't have a great morning yesterday, but by noon your well wishes were starting to make a difference. And it helped that the medication was kicking in too! The doctor had said that it would take 24 hours or so for the antibiotics to start to take effect, and about a week to totally get better.

While Ruth stayed home to recuperate, I went out to the park to see how I could help out.

Off to the hospital

We don't often talk about health issues, unless they directly affect our travels. And really, we don't have any health issues. We're both healthy and in good condition and neither one of us take any medications for anything.

So when something goes wrong, it's a bit frustrating.

Back at Cabri, Saskatchewan

Yesterday we did the long drive from Calgary, Alberta to Cabri, Saskatchewan. It's not a really exciting drive, and we wanted to do it all in one day. So we stuck to the main 4 lane highway.

It certainly could have been more interesting to use some back roads, but it would have taken at least an extra hour and a half, and as it was it took six hours. That's enough for us.

Smooth flight to Calgary

We had an uneventful flight to Calgary. Everything right on schedule. Arrived at 10:30am local time. A little chilly, at 7C (45F) though!

We hopped in an Uber from the airport to the car rental place. The Uber was pricier than expected, at $37 CAD, ($27 USD) for the 22 km (13.6 mile) ride, but it still made more sense than taking the local bus. And, our car rental is so cheap that we could justify the convenient but pricey Uber ride.

On our way to Calgary

We are at Ottawa airport as I write this, waiting for our four hour and twenty minute flight to Calgary. This flight was a freebie, paid for with travel point from our Visa credit card. But, I still got a deal on it because it was on sale at the time for $210 each one way so I needed to use less points to cover the fare.

We will arrive in Calgary at around 10:20am, and will likely use Uber to make our way to the car rental place located about 20 minutes from the airport.

I can't believe I'm still paying for this...

Okay, this is a long story... you better make yourself comfortable!

Some of our long time readers might remember that I (Kevin) need to get a special visa to visit the United States. I've talked about it before on this blog, but it's been a few years so I'll refresh your memory.

Ottawa River Flooding

It was a gorgeous spring day yesterday, so Ruth and I spent a fair bit of time outside. We had stayed overnight at a friends place near the Ottawa River, so we went for a walk on the paths above the shoreline.

You may have seen on the news that the Ottawa River has experienced record flooding this spring. The river flows from the north, starting at Lake Timiskaming and then making up the Ontario - Quebec border as it makes its way to the St. Lawrence Seaway at Montreal.

Visiting with some new full time RV'ers

Saturday afternoon, we went and visited with Judi and Ian, a couple we had met with a year and a half ago when they were contemplating selling their house and buying a motorhome to live in.

Now, they have done exactly that.

You probably noticed some advertising

While we've been having some downtime here, I've been getting caught up on some things that we just don't have time to do when we're off traveling. I know it's a little boring for you right now (I can tell from our lower blog statistics!), but we'll be back in the air on Wednesday and off to have more adventures.

One of those things was to look for a new advertising partner for this website.

Our new Chester luggage

I promised to tell you about our new carry on luggage. It's quite a different style compared to the backpack type we had been using since 2012. But the backpack style ones were getting pretty rough looking, having traveled with us to somewhere around twenty different countries since we got them.

And, with airlines getting more and more strict about the size and weight of carry on luggage, we figured it would be in our best interests to look for something that is specifically designed for that purpose.