I hate flying – on commercial airliners. Nothing seems to go as smooth as I would like and I tend to get stressed when I can’t concentrate on the major task at hand. The logistics surrounding an adventure like this make it a major project. Living on the road for two months, camping , training and keeping with friends and commitments turn this into a time management expose. I am not real good at time management. I like to procrastinate. So I tend to have a lot of last minute issues to deal with.

Tried Uber for the first time and it was not only less expensive but the driver was at my place within minutes. On a preior ride, the driver from the cab company overslept and was 45 minutes late. No worries, though since I built extra time in the schedule and my direct flight was turned into a layover. Now in order to fly to Canmore, I had to first fly to Dallas which is in the opposite direction. Also I couldn’t use my frequent flyer miles on a first class upgrade even though I booked the flight 7 months ago. First class always makes a flight less stressful. Less hassles with TSA.

Seems like TSA wasn’t real happy with me as I kept finding things in my cargo shorts pockets that I swore were empty. They were not amused and did not like the suggestion that I take them off. So I got the special wand and hand swabs. Lucky me no body cavity search…

The flights were not too bad but on the first leg, I was seated next to a very large dude and a woman who occupied the aisle seat who wasn’t very mobile. The airline did have several people booked into the same seat and worked that out. On the flight from Dallas to Canmore, the seat next to me was unoccupied and the little boy across the aisle serenaded me for over three hours and the dude behind me kept bumping the back of my seat.

Before I arrived in Calgary, the stewardess gave me a disclosure form for Canadian customs. It was all the customary stuff. One box, I deliberated over and that was if I had some goods coming into Canada separately from my flight. Indeed, I did, as I had shipped my bike via Fedex and it was already in Canmore. Better to err on the side of disclosure, I thought. So the flight deplaned and there was a special line for all Canadian and American citizens and I had touse some machines that were in retrospect easy but to an old fart like me could have had instructions in Chinese. A young lady helped me navigate that and I was in the line to get to my waiting ride to Canmore from Calgary but first had to talk to the customs guy and everyone was proceeding rapidly through the queue – except me.

Seems that the gentleman didn’t like that I checked that box and even though I explained it was just for the bicycle that I would be riding, I need to go to another queue that wasn’t moving very fast. All the people in line looked like crooks, drug smugglers and folks that I’d pick out as the ones to watch. So after a long wait, this new gentleman asks me some questions and I explain about my bike. He frowns and said that I had to go into an office that was labeled with a big E and talk to them in there.

The Big E room was not hard to find as the E was like an eye chart E only 5 feet tall. So I go into this room and you had to take a number. I had number 40 something and it seems they are serving number 26. There was no line but people got called up and from the signage, it appeared like these folks were attempting to get asylum in Canada. I quickly took another look at the form and there was no mention of asylum. I was standing around for about 15 minutes and the gentleman at the desk was still working with the person who was there when I walked in. I was getting nervous about my scheduled ride so I apprehended an official looking gentleman who walked by and asked him for clarification. He quickly agreed that he didn’t think I was in the right place and got a quick word in with the man still working with his initial applicant. He stamped my form and told me to show it to the guy at the next station.

The next station gentleman waived me through but frowned quite a bit and said I could retrieve my luggage. Now I am bringing quite a bit of gear on this trip and it is quite heavy. Luckily it was waiting for me on the carousel and I got one of the (free) carts to haul it to the (hopefully) waiting bus. I really needed to use the facilities but I knew I might miss the ride.

So after pushing this cart, laden with all my gear – 3 large and heavy bags, I arrive at the proper destination for the ride pickup and the lady tells me to get out there immediately as the bus leaves in 3 minutes. No restroom break but the driver gives me a bottle of water..

Approximately 75 minutes later, Iarrive in Canmore, but they don’t drop off at every hotel so I get “dumped” with my gear at their dropoff point. I complain to the driver and dioes help me unload my luggage and tells me with it being that heavy, I should call a taxi even though it is only 700 meters away. Did I mention that my back was killing me? No tip for the driver.

I used the facilities at the hotel (not my hotel) singing the old Alka Seltzer ditty “Oh what a relief it is!” and the desk person graciously called me a cab which arrived within 5 minutes. I could tell the driver was not having a very good day but we had a nice chat over 700 meters. He helped me with my bags and told me that I owed him $6 Canadian. I gave him $20 and he said that I made his day and so I guess we were even. I didn’t tell him that he got the bus driver’s tip.

Since this is getting long, I will follow-up with a part 2 that takes me into my second day in Canmore

Tailwinds

Chuck