We stayed in Vancouver on Indian Arm at the home of a fellow mogger. When we finished there, we headed for Langley, BC for a mogger BBQ and then to see some rigs at the Mross facility in Langley. From there, we crossed back into the U.S. and visited a buddy for a few days. Based on information that we got from the Vancouver crew and my buddy, we decided to cross the ocean and visit the San Juan Islands and from there Vancouver Island in Canada.
The photos below are what we saw.
We crossed several major bridges on our way to Langley, BC. From the first bridge, we got a good view of downtown Vancouver and its industrial waterfront.
Every major city has something in common -- traffic. Vancouver is no exception.
We crossed another major bridge, this one was over the Fraser River.
From the crest of the Fraser bridge, we could see the Vancouver rail yards. We had passed through here in 2007 as part of our trans-Canada rail tour.
We arrived at the home of a fellow mogger Pete. Pete has this nice 1300 L/37 that he bought in Germany when he lived there. Pete was lucky enough to take this rig to Tunisia and Libya in north Africa. Tunisia sounded good, but the concept of going to Libya with an American passport did not sound "interesting" to me. He stated that he had no issues, however.
Alex's very clean U1200.
Pete also has a 'rover that he uses for light-duty wheeling.
I needed to do an oil change, but only brought one filter. I was told that Hans Mross was close by, so we visited his facility. I got what I wanted as well as some other spare parts that might come in handy. As we will see in the following part, no amount of spare parts would have helped our situation. Above is a MB-Trac tractor from Mercedes that Hans had at his facility.
The star attraction at the Mross facility was this 2450 6x6 that he was selling for a Swiss couple.
This is a big rig that weighs in at about 30,000 pounds. The camper is a Unicat model that is custom for this chassis. This thing is a beast!!
I think this is a 417 configured for plowing.
A 416 DOKA.
A 406 with EROPs roll bar.
I could not resist putting my 1300 next to the 2450 for a size comparison. The 2450 is a very capable vehicle. That said, I think it is too big to do any serious 'wheeling. I would love to see this rig in Pritchett Canyon in Moab.
We went from Vancouver to Bellingham, WA and stayed with some close friends George and Randi. George really did a great job of BBQing for us. Above, he works the grill cooking dinner for us. Thanks George!!
Next morning, we were sitting at the kitchen table and I saw something walk by the front door. I grabbed the camera and this is what I saw.
From Bellingham, we decided to head back into Canada. So, we packed and drove to Anacortes, WA and took the ferry over to San Juan Island. From there, our plan was to continue on to Sidney, BC. Above, you can see the cars lined up for the ferry to San Juan.
Washington State runs many ferries to and from the islands. Above, 2 ferries are docked and loading at Anacortes at the same time.
On our way to San Juan Island, we saw plenty of pleasure boats, and some were very expensive.
Some of the islands in the chain are very small and are not capable of sustaining a house.
Several of the islands had very nice homes right on the shore line.
Nearly to Friday Harbor, we spotted this nice sail boat.
More nice hardware towing nice hardware.
Some young passengers pose for a photograph.
There were a large number of kayakers near Friday Harbor.
When we docked, the passengers could only gape at the mog as we disembarked.
The ferry is actually quite big and can hold many cars and full sized semi trucks.
San Juan Island was nice, with many farms.
We drove all over the island seeking a place to camp. The island is nearly all private land and every camp site was full. In the end, we stayed at the Best Western Motel in Friday Harbor and ate at a restaurant. That was OK given that it was really, really hot. The temperatures were nearly 100 degrees during the day and it did not cool down much at night. The following day, we would take the afternoon ferry to Sidney, BC.
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Photos and Text Copyright Bill Caid 2009, all rights reserved.
For your enjoyment only, not for commercial use.