Day 3 - Seattle WA to Kamloops CA - 402 miles

Pics: http://picasaweb.google.com/brandonjhuff/CanadaSeptember7

By the numbers
3491 - Rain Showers
1 - meaningless speeding ticket from the Canadian Police
2 - great Canadian beers
23 - crappy Canadian beers

We got a decent start in the morning despite staying up until 2am drinking scotch and absinthe (Dan has become quite the connoisseur). Blearily, we pop open a couple Red Bulls, put our luggage on the wet bikes, and hit the road. The wet road. The raining road. But we were prepared and head north to Everett for some much needed coffee and breakfast.

We pull into an IHOP and get any water-sensitive gear off the bikes. The cute hostess walks us to our table and the place stops and they all briefly stare at us. I'm sure they're used to the rain but I don't think they expected to see two guys riding...didn' we check the forecast?? And the rain keeps on coming. All the way to the Border.

About 15 minutes before we get to the border crossing, I'm in my own world just checking out traffic as we slowly pass everyone. Gotta watch out for the police, doncha know? I'm checking out the working class folks and see the usual Mom and Dad enjoying a Monday off. I glace right a couple lanes over and I see a very cute woman emphatically giving me a thumbs up. I roll off the throttle to get a better look and do something, anything, to return the response. But, motorcycle gear fails to let me communicate, "how YOU doing?" to my new, smiling friend. Oh, well. Hopefully, all the women up here are this friendly. I noticed they sure are cute...consistently cute. Must be something to do with the rain.

We get to the border crossing and have to wait for just 2 cars to pass through before we're up for questioning. It's sunny and we have papers in hand ready to go. I'm asked the usual questions - reason for my stay, how long, whether I have guns (good thing I left the 9mm at home), and what my profession is. "Contract killer" I respond, but he only heard me say "Consultant". We gear up and I ride into Canada for the first time.

It's all farm land as we roll past corn and alfalfa fields. Hmm - not what I expected. We stop for gas in a small town just outside of Vancouver and put on some more gear since we're headed for Whistler. I'm concerned I don't have enough gear but there's not much I can do about it!

We head north and to Vancouver and it's quite a sight. Very pretty but the architecture reminds me of a large malasian city or if SF had more glass sky scrapers scattered throughout the city. We cross over the bridges and follows the signs through downtown to Whistler. This town is clean with lime green trash cans everywhere. Minutes later, we're quickly gaining elevation as we head towards the site of the 2010 winter olympics - Whistler. Clearly, they've been doing a lot of preparation as the roads are brand new and perfectly maintained.

The road gently turns through the gorgeous landscape and we pick up speed. 100mph is the speed limit. Cool. No, wait, 100kmh. That's what, 60mph?? Bah - the fun police are at it again. Dan leads since he's been up here before and we start moving. MOVING. There are no surprises on this road -- every turn has been though out and there's no "dead man's turn" that we need to look out for. Nice. I'm all too aware that the police could be around any turn...but they aren't. Sweet! This road is like a race track. It only encourages bad behavior.

Up and down we go watching the road instead of the views. But you just can't help notice the green water and steeply angled mountains that start at the water and go almost straight up. Gorgeous. The water is a shade of green I haven't seen before - more like aquamarine but milky. Makes Emerald Bay in Tahoe look cute, adorable in comparison.

Up we go, slowing down only for small towns and RVs -- lots of RVs. The road is awesome and we're enjoying every minute of it. For a while. We turn one corner and the road goes up. Coming the other direction is a police car with it's lights on. It turns around and comes right for us. Ugggh. Ticket time.

The officer comes up to me first, smiling, and says that he didn't get a radar lock on me but did get one on the guy in front of me. He asks if we're friends and I confirm. He walks up to Dan and checks his tires out before saying a word to him. Strange. Dan takes his helmet off and gives him his registration. I try to get my camera out but can't get a pic without getting caught.

The mounty goes back to his car for about 5 minutes then comes back to Dan. He's smiling and Dan's laughing as he hands him his ticket. WTF is going on here?! I wonder if it's a paper ticket verifying that he was warned - nah, that's too crazy, even for Canada. Dan puts his gear back on and we hit the road.

We stop in Whistler to rest for a bit and I get the whole story. The officer was apologetic for having to pull him over. This would NEVER happen in CA. Dan had asked how it works to get a ticket in Canada. The officer laughs and explains that nothing will happen is he doesn't pay the ticket. It's not tied to the US DMV so there's no points and if he doesn't pay it nothing happens. Sweet! This is like a free ticket to awsometown - we just have to pay the ticket(s) and keep on trucking!

We head up 99 towards Kamloops and this road is amazing. Elevation changes, great views, and lots of twists and turns. The scenery is so varied so my head is on a swivel soaking it all in. We get rained on a bit but the roads never got too wet. I'm convinced that there may not be a better day ride than from Vancouver BC to Kamloops - I highly recommend it to any motorcyclist.

We roll in to Kamloops and check in to the hotel. Nice place. We ask where we can get good beer and they point us one block over to Frick n Frack. We wander in and it's pretty dead so we sit at the bar. Zachary is tending bar and he's from Vancouver. He came out to Kamloops for a change of pace. So, did the other two waitresses. Hmm - I wonder what's here in Kamloops to draw people to it...

We order dinner and beers - lots of beers. We had some scotch before we left the room so, surely, 6 beers would do no harm. We never had the same beer twice and tried as many as we could. Literally. Most of them were bad - coors light bad. But there were a few gems in the mix. I order a fried Mars bar and can't wait. Zach brought it out and said "I had them make it special for you". He puts the plate down and I see that the frieds mars bar is in the center, flanked by two scoops of ice cream at one end and a curling line of whip cream at the other. Use your imagination and you'll figure it out. We nearly fall off our stools laughing and think that maybe Canada won't be too bad. Nice and funny folks.

We stumble back to the room and I lie down, just for a second, only to wake up at 3am still in my clothes. Hey, it's vacation. Don't judge me.