Dartmouth, Nova Scotia – Rifled cupboards and generous hosts

The harbour appears a bit homespun; I can’t spot more than three employees. All of them are very helpful, everybody knows, we want to fetch our Unimog, and asks where the journey will take us. A great joy: a couple of minutes later we can drive off with an externally undamaged Arminius. The fright follows later on inspecting the interior cabin. The customs didn’t handle our belongings what you would call squeamish. The storage compartments had been partially loaded with care and considerably full. Since the officers just had thrown back the content wildly, not everything fitted in again. They had distributed the rest evenly onto bed and worktop. They had ripped the soft case of the old laptop that we already had packed into the car when opening or closing the drawer with too much screw. They had ruthlessly opened the storage compartment lids and had teared the bed sheets that should protect our mattresses. Particularly annoying because custom made special sizes aren’t that cheap. However, they didn’t find anything of interest. Everything was there, nothing was missing, and we got our customs papers without problems. Who knows what had provoked them; perhaps the locked cabin, maybe the military four-wheel driver, perhaps it just had been a bad day.

 

The invitation of Ian and Clair has saved our day. The two English live in Nova Scotia at present and had contacted us via e-mail in advance after discovering our webpage on the internet. Ian picks us up at the hotel, takes us to the harbour, to his home, and goes shopping with us. Claire let us use their internet connection, their washing machine, their tumble dryer. We may stand for two nights in their driveway; we can sort us and clear away the customs chaos. A world trip could not start more pleasant than with an invitation already for the first nights. This gives reason for hope! Thank you Claire and Ian!

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