To Err is Human, Although Embarrasing

We started off on the wrong foot today and the rest of the day was up and down.  This morning was actually our earliest start so far.  We bragged to Herm, the Tail Gunner, that at this rate we would be the first rig to leave the campground by the end of the trip.  We probably should have waited a little longer before leaving.  Maybe we should have followed someone (but that doesn't always work).  We turned out of the RV Park, drove up to the crossroads, and turned left (we should have gone straight).  We then realized we were on the ramp for 101 West instead of East!  It’s a divided highway so we had no choice but to keep going until we got to the next exit.  Fortunately, it was only a couple of miles or so.  We managed to get on the correct highway and heading in the right direction with only about three other RVs seeing us screw up.

Our next task was to get fuel because we were down to almost one-quarter of a tank.  Irving is a big name in fuel up here and our trip log listed an Irving station that was big-rig friendly just on the other side of Truro (where we watched the Tidal Bore yesterday).  We were behind Barb when we took the exit ramp but were caught at the stoplight.  We watched Barb as she pulled into the station and we also saw Richard and Mary’s coach there, already at the pumps.  We spotted two diesel pumps for trucks on the backside of the station and pulled around to that side.  Truck pumps are a lot faster than “regular” pumps and I prefer them if available.  The lanes are usually easier to get into when you are driving something as big as a motorhome with a tow-car (after all, they are for 18-wheelers).  I did a big circle around the pumps to come in from the other side and pulled up to one of the pumps.  I was shutting the engine down when someone began tapping on my driver’s side window.  It was Richard who had seen me pull into the rear pumps and ran over to tell me that only trucks with Irving cards were allowed to use these pumps.  He knew this because he had also tried the same thing when he first arrived at the station.  I pulled out, drove back around the station, and pulled in behind Barb and that’s when I noticed that Barb’s lane did not have diesel available.  Her motorhome has a gasoline engine.  I can’t back the RV with the tow-car so I had no choice but to wait until she had pulled off and then wait for a pickup to leave the lane next to her so I could cut across to that lane, which had a diesel pump.  I was blocking two lanes but, what the hell.  This was the third pump I had attempted to use and I wasn’t moving until I finished filling the tank.  This was also our first fill-up in Canada and it really did hurt.  The pumps show Canadian dollars and liters instead of US dollars and gallons (of course).  I don’t know exactly how much the fuel cost per gallon, but four liters (about a gallon) was $5.20 Canadian, which would be a little bit more in US dollars.  At 7.5 miles per gallon you can do the math to see how much 2,500 miles in Canada is going to cost in fuel.

After filling the tank we got back on the highway and continued towards our first stop, about 80 or 90 miles further up the road.  It was the Gran Pré (not the race) National Historic Site, which was dedicated to the history of the Acadians who were expelled by the British back in the 1750’s.  By this time we were kind of taking it easy and following several other RVs of our group.  “Gran Pré Road” was the name of the road that we crossed at the cross-road but there was no sign for the Historic Site so we all continued straight ahead, right into the SMALL town (with SMALL streets) of Wolfville.  People stopped on the sidewalks to watch us parade through, and then watched us again as we paraded back out, once we found a big enough place to turn around.  We didn’t know it at the time, but we weren’t the first of the group to do this.  We got some directions and went back to the Gran Pré Road.  There was a sign for the historic site on this side of the intersection and we took a left and were there in about a mile.  They had a large parking lot for RVs so we had no trouble parking.

Once inside we watched a very interesting 22-minute video from which I gathered that Acadians  are probably not big fans of the British.  The film told the story of the “Great Expulsion”.  It was when the British shipped the Acadians out of Nova Scotia because they would not sign an oath of allegiance to Great Britain.  It reminded me of how we Southerners still lament about the “War of Northern Aggression,” or "The Lost Cause".

We also saw an exhibit that depicted how the Acadians lived.  But, the best thing about the place was the garden out back.  It was very well manicured and would have been perfect for photographs if only there had been a blue sky instead of a gray overcast.  

As we were leaving Gran Pré we noticed Candy and Alice and Herm and Georgia getting ready to leave.  Carol Ann and I decided to take a short cut instead of backtracking to the highway but it took us through Wolfville again and slowed us down.  As we were getting back on the highway we met Herm and Georgia getting off to find a restaurant and then we came up behind Candy and Alice about 15 or 20 miles before we were to exit.  So much for the short cut.  We settled back and followed the rest of the way.  

We are now at The Cove Oceanfront Campground, right on the Bay of Fundy, near Annapolis-Royal and Digby.  The sites are a little narrow and we had to back in at an angle.  There is a picnic table between each coach but with our slides out it is almost impossible to walk around the table.  We were so close to the table that I couldn’t open my storage bay door to get out the water hose.  No sooner had I slid the table over when a guy from the RV park came running up and told me I couldn’t move the table because they used them to “guide” the RVs in (they use the tables as "borders" for the sites).  I told him it was in the way of my slide-out but he told me that the slide-out would clear the table just fine.  I trusted him.  Another mistake!  My slide-out pushed the picnic table over about two feet.  I don’t think it did any damage other than a couple of scratches, which is a lot less than I got on the Mexico trip last year.

We are having a great time, even though it is cold, foggy, and wet most of the time.  Springtime in Canada!