OK, ok, I think I'll just make a bulleted list:
- The "Duty Free America" stores at the border crossings are lent a sense of legitimacy by being in such incredibly close proximity to the Customs booths. Don't buy it. They have big "Currency Exchange" signs posted all over. Don't don't DON'T convert your currency there! They will RAPE you! And I'm not using that term lightly. While the US dollar is no longer hugely more valuable than the Canadian dollar, it's still a bit stronger. I exchanged $300 US for $297 Canadian. What!?!? My $300 was worth about $320 Canadian. They charged me a $23 fee to make the exchange. So, at a bank, I would have gotten $320 for my money. Just spending the US currency at Canadian stores, my $300 would have been worth $300. By exchanging my currency at Duty Free America, I got $297 Canadian for my $300 US. $297 Canadian is worth $281 US. So, in the end, Duty Free America charged me $19 for the privilege of parking in their shitty parking lot for 15 minutes. Thanks, Duty Free America! You suck!
- You're not supposed to take much in the way of food or produce across the border. I assume the pretense for this is preventing the transfer of US pests to Canada and vice versa, or something. Bullshit. Canada just wants to take all your money. Everything in Canada costs about twice what it costs in the US. Everything. And no, we were not staying in a touristy area -- we were way out in the boondocks. Next time, I'm filling the truck tires with food. $13 for a six pack of beer? SERIOUSLY?!?!?
- Oh, and speaking of beer -- you can't buy it at the grocery store. You have to drive 20 miles to the Beer Store. I'm not shitting you. This is the kind of nanny state bullshit Obama is driving us toward. You want some?
- Sarnia, Ontario, Canada is a hell hole. On our way back to the USA, we approached Sarnia with approximately 6 gallons of gas in the tank (we were hoping to make it back to Michigan with nothing but fumes in the tank, since gas in Canada costs FOUR DOLLARS PER GALLON). No problem, that much gas should get us 60 miles into Michigan. Wrong. With no warning at all, we hit a construction zone in which we moved about 1 mile in 1 hour. By the time we reached the only open exit, the low fuel light was on. I exited and began the search for a gas station. Sarnians apparently have decided that gas stations aren't their thing. We drove until I was sure we were going to run out of gas in the middle of the road. With a 26' camper in tow. So it's not like I was going to be able to push the truck off to the shoulder! Anyway, I parked and walked to a business and they directed me to a gas station. We made it. By this time I was totally lost, and asked the gas station attendant how to get to the Blue Water Bridge. She sent me all the way back to the start of the construction zone. Thanks, lady. Thanks to Sarnia, the trip that took us 6 hours to go from Alma Michigan to Ridgeway Ontario took us 11 hours to go the opposite way. Sarnia sucks.
- Oh! I almost forgot to tell you about Canada's idiot insect population. As we pulled into our campsite, the truck was literally SWARMED by horseflies. Or maybe they were deerflies. Anyway, we were terrified to get out of the truck and set up camp. We seriously considered driving the whole rig to the camp office to cancel our reservations (gladly paying the penalty) and driving somewhere else. We were certain that our whole week would be a nightmare at this campsite. Anyway, I decided that I would sacrifice myself for my family. I would park the rig, grab something to swat with, and run back to the (locked) camper to get bug spray and long clothes for everyone. I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt with no hat. We steeled ourselves. When I opened that door, the cab was sure to be instantly filled with hundreds of biting insects, right? Nope. I opened the door and sprinted out. The ravenous beasts totally ignored me. The whole week, the bugs attacked the truck like they hadn't eaten in weeks, but they never tried to take a bite out of us. Weird.
- Niagara Falls. The whole reason we made the trip. Yes, of course, the Falls were beautiful. But we had to walk through miles of disgusting tourist trap nastiness to get to them. Ripley's Believe It Or Not museums and stuff. Ick. As Kristina said to me, Taquamenon Falls in Michigan's Upper Peninsula and Cumberland Falls in Kentucky were just as beautiful, and greatly more enjoyable because of the undisturbed natural beauty surrounding them.
