June 24 - Bellingham WA to Sechelt, BC: Boats and Trains and Rains
Well, it rained all night, so we all rode out in "rain gear". This obviously means different things to different folks. For instance, Steve scrounged some zip lock bags to cover his feet; others pulled out Gore-tex socks, neoprene overboots, while some of us just got wet. Me, the combination of thin waterproof shoe cover, Gore-tex socks, and fenders did little to prevent the water from entering around my cleats, and totally immersing my feet. At least they were warm and wet.
By the time we'd rolled six miles down the hill to Fairhaven, where the
Alaska ferry terminal and Amtrak station are outside of Bellingham, the
rain had pretty much stopped, and the sky just looked wet. Rob and
Mike commandeered the sag wagon, searching for non-knobbies for Mike's MTB.
(They came back 20 minutes later, a bit sheepish the bike store wasn't open
at 8:30 AM.) We filled the truck, RV, and bike racks with the "steeds",
and wandered our separate ways to wait for the 10:20 trains to Vancouver
BC.
Inside the terminal, I dried my shoes (hah!), and found a local ladies'
bridge club out for a day in the big city
The train pulled in, barely stopped to load us in the lounge of the dining car, and took off in less than a minute. Once on board, we had loads of fun filling out the immigration forms and comparing decade old passport photos.
The train emptied us onto an open platform, where all the passengers
lined up single file in the heavy falling mist. Some clever person from
our group got the bright idea to form a double line under the canopy, which
prompted the baggage handler following us to muse, "Hmm, now there's
a good idea, eh?" Like, no one in Canada thinks of getting out of the
rain?