Only a few days left in Canada!

Starting to get Excited!!

Wow our time is going fast! We arrived back in Abbotsford on Sunday after spending a week in Comox where we had dinner with the family to celebrate Dwayne's stepmom's 95th birthday. Then flew to Edmonton for a week. We enjoyed visiting with family and friends before we leave until next June. Had a great Buen Viaje! dinner with friends in Edmonton put on by our friends Sue and Greg - so much fun!  Sue made a delicious lasagna and the other girls brought yummy sides and dessert. A bit of wine and beer (plus grapefruit juice for me- my "pensioner's Radler Beer" LOL!!) and a great evening visiting 😄

The girlfriends :) Didn't get a pic of the guys or everyone at the table :(

When we flew into Abbotsford we met our daughter in the waiting lounge because she was getting on the plane we just got off of to fly to Calgary to attend business meetings the next 2 days in High River. First time we have been greeted arriving in the secured departures area 😍 Our son in law was waiting for us outside after dropping her off.

We have been tracking Vanna since she left Vancouver's port last week. Our original date of arrival for Vanna in Cartegena, Colombia was Oct 1st. Then when the ship left Oct 17th it showed Oct 2nd. Yesterday I checked again and now the arrival date is Oct 3 at 14:30! Hope it doesnt continue to change!  So guess we are going to be staying at the Airbnb in Cartegena a little longer since I originally booked it until Oct 4th.  So think we will be staying in Cartegena for the weekend since the ship is just arriving on a Thursday and who knows when it will be off loaded from the container ship. Plus I doubt all the paperwork will be done in one day 😉 We know how slow paperwork is processed in Central America and don't think it will be any different in South America.  But that's ok we have a month in Colombia -hoping that is enough.

Have been plotting out our route through Colombia and Ecuador

Also through Peru but that's as far as I have planned. Not sure at that point if we go to Bolivia or Chile.

Our plan is to spend a month in each of the 8 countries we are going to travel through. We may not need a month in Ecuador but I'm sure we can spend more then a month in Peru.  I've been looking online for information of getting tickets for Machu Picchu. Seems we should be able to get some once we get to Cusco or Aguas Calientes. Wont need to buy online and hope we are buying from a "real" site. I also review an app called IOverlanders that has lots of good places to boondock plus members give good ideas of what to see or do in areas. So I found some entries as to where to buy tickets in Aguas Calientes. But not hiking the steep 12km walk up from there to get to MP like many of the writers do!! Will be taking a bus 😉 Hopefully I'll be able to get more info on that from slowcarfasthouse.com blog since they are in Peru now. Both Geneva and Mike have been helpful in answering a lot of questions I've asked them 😊 Hoping we can meet up with them somewhere in South America :)

That will be so much fun to meet other "overlanders" during our trip. Lots of Europeans ship their RV to South America. I was also following a blog written by a Dutch couple that spent a year in South America travelling in a Toyota 4Runner and staying in BnBs. They just finished this month and returned to their home in New Zealand after selling their car in Chile to a French couple, this is also where they had bought the car. We haven't decided yet if we are bringing Vanna back to Canada to sell or sell in South America, or leave it in Uraguay if we haven't finished touring around and want to return - or MAYBE ship to Europe for our next trip???? LOL!!!!  Lots of options, the only big problem is always being allowed out of the province by our healthcare system for more than the allowed 7 months. I know....geez 7 months should be long enough to travel LOL! But when reading blogs of other people who travel for a year or even more, it seems that 7 months just won't be enough. We originally wanted to go for 9 months but ran short because of the time it would take to ship  Vanna. And we need province healthcare coverage to buy additional travel insurance - something Dwayne does not want to go without, so can't be cut off of provincial healthcare.  This trip is costing us $2300 for the 8 months. Guess that is about the same as we paid when we travelled to Europe and Morocco for 9 months 3 years ago.

I've also been rereading a blog my friend Sue wrote back in 1997 when she was lucky enough to travel with her Dad for 35 days in Greece!!  Wow how things have changed!! Finding internet in hotels was just starting to get setup and not many had it. Guess there were some Internet Cafes where a person could go and send emails home 😃  I remember having to do that even in 2000 in Mexico!  She also writes "had to go back to my room because I forgot my film"  what is film??? LOL!!! Things have changed ALOT since 1997!! Now if I can't find wifi while travelling I start to have panic attacks!!! No not really, but maybe just a little bit of anxiety until I can find a McDonalds! LOL!!!

Well time to get back to some planning and getting things ready to pack to leave on Friday for Panama City. We're lucky that the owner of the Airbnb is meeting us at the airport and driving us to his place. Should be fun to finally see the Panama Canal.

Our BnB in Panama with a beautiful view of the city - 3 nights for $130C  :) 

And just a reminder -if you don't want to miss any of our exciting ;) trip blogs,  signup for it to be delivered to your email - the best way not to miss any of the crazy things we may encounter!! LOL!!!

I have tried to fix the problem some people are having leaving comments, plus my own problem of trying to reply to comments with no luck.  I have to "go to the blogging community" to resolve my problem. Since "chatting" with a tech from Google couldn't help me 😝