Author: hairymonster

Driving from Moncton to Halifax was just a bit over 3 hours drive time. Of course, I took my time, and made many stops and breaks. Once again, I started driving right at sunrise to maximize daylight driving time. I think I crossed the boarder into Nova Scotia approximately 7AM, right after my daily brew of coffee.

I made early breakfast/lunch in a small town just before Halifax by the side of the highway. That was a cool experience. That actually got a few chuckles out of people passing by at the parking lot.

My first landing in Halifax was at Pier 21. I got the see the “In My Yesterday” exhibit at the Canadian Immigration Museum. That was one of my highlights of this trip that I was most looking forward to. I knew that exhibit was ending soon, and I am very glad I was able to see it while it was still in town.

I finished the exhibit at around 1:00PM local time. I reach the part where I dreaded the most, where I have to book accommodations.I looked up hotels.com and everything was in the $300-$500 range per night. Yikes! It’s because this is peak season. I found a university dorm facility being rented out for about $55/night about an hour away. I was about to pull the trigger, but then Murray told me that there is another dorm that is in central Halifax, and just cost a bit more. I ended up booking a University dorm for $242.81 for three nights. I’m quite pleased with that.

I went to the local Costco to pick up some groceries. I thought the Costco back home was bad, the Costco here is like a zoo! I actually spent more time looking for parking than I did grocery shopping!

While unpacking my stuff, and cleaning random stuff, I accidentally spilled water onto my laptop keyboard. If this was at home, I wouldn’t even think anything of it. I have all the tools and spare parts to get things resolved within 5 minutes. Unfortunately, I’m not. Some keys got stuck, rendering my laptop very useless. It was already around 6PM localtime, the local Canada Computers and Best Buy are already closed on a Sunday. So I look up the local Thrift stores, and found a place called Mission Mart. Normally, I refuse to buy second hand keyboards, because of how nasty it is. The first keyboard I picked up off the shelf was for 89cents! Wow. But it was quite grimy amd a little too beaten up for my taste, so I put it back. I saw a nice looking chiclet style that wasn’t too nasty looking for $3.89. Not bad, and I also have lots of sanitary wipes in my car. I also picked up a brand new PD/QC USB-A/USB-C car charger for $1.97, and an extra long USB 2.0/USBA-B cable for another $1.97 from the clearance shelf, both brand new sealed in original packaging. Apparently, the second hand products here are tax free? The total came out to be $7.91. The lady asked if I wanted to round up for donation. Meh, it’s only 9 cents. Why not? I’ve been to many of the mainstream ones like Value Village, and I was never able to find anything interesting, or they would be overpriced. The items at this independent seem to be very reasonably priced.

This is why I prefer roadtrips instead of going on a prepackaged tour with a guide. Having my own car, being able to re-scheduled things on the fly is quite nice.

Oh, I changed the header of my blog to “The adventures of a Chinese guy, his sports car, and an instant pot” What do you guys think of my new slogan?

While grocery shopping in Quebec, some random dude driving a Prius with his partner parked next to me. First thing he said was “SUBARU!!!”

We had a friendly chat. I told him where I was going. He said, that’s the perfect GT car to use for this kind of road trip! He gets it! The only thing close to a sporty car I have seen throughout the whole trip over was some older dude driving an 8th Civic 2dr. Everybody else drove SUVs.

This morning, while filling for gas, another older gentleman who was riding a Harley mentioned I’ll have an amazing time driving my car in Moncton. I’m looking forward to it!

Oh, and here is a pro-tip I learned from this road trip so far. If your car has sporty suspensions, and you’re cooking with an instant pot, don’t drive while it is cooking. The bounciness will make the pressure valve come loose, causing you to lose pressure. I was wondering, what’s the whooshing sound I keep hearing?

Cooking breakfast at the (closed) New Brunswick welcome centre

Drove a little over 800KM today. The inverter worked flawlessly. I was able to make coffee without breaking a sweat. The instant pot worked quite well too, though I still need to figure out the rice:water ratio. It is still a bit soggy. I’m very pleased with the outcome.

Trip took a little longer than predicted, because there was some major traffic accident just before entering the city, that tacked on another 1.5 hour onto the trip. I also took my time, and had many rest/power nap stops along the way.

Will be driving to New Brunswick first thing tomorrow morning.

I am very happy to announce, this is the first time EVER where I never had to purchase anything from a fast food restaurant. I did go into several to use washroom facilities, but being able to eat NON fast food was quite liberating. Not to mention very easy on the wallet.

I did purchase some hotdogs, and frozen corn from the supermarket. $10 total. That will last me several meals. Heck of a lot cheaper than the alternative from fastfood restaurants…

She looks so clean…

As many of you know, I have been a proud member of Freedom Mobile since they established their Canadian presence in Canada back in 2009 (formerly known as Wind Mobile). Unfortunately, their coverage beyond the major cities is very lacking. Anything past Ottawa will be considered roaming. Hopefully with the purchase by Videotron, they will expand coverage further into the east coast in the future. For the time being, I will need a temporary number with data plan that has better coverage.

If you have my main personal number, this wouldn’t change very much. You can still call me at this number, since it will be automatically forwarded to my new temporary number. SMS messages will be delayed somewhat, since I will be accessing it in a slightly different manner. WhatsApp and WeChat will not change. However, if the number is not forwarded properly, just reach me at 647-656-8362.

I’ve always purchased temporary sim-cards whenever I travel out of city for extended periods.

If you watched the latest episode of The Grand Tour, you’ll get that reference. In a way, my little road trip is very similar to what those three crazy Brits did. The BRZ is probably one of the most inappropriate vehicle to use in this kind of application.

Trip is about a week away. Can’t wait!

As of today, the Pandemic is under relative control…ish. My personal issues are also under control…ish. I just spent the past few weeks installing the inverter, and the mini fridge. In order to make more room, the rear seats and paneling have been removed once again. I spent more money on wires and interconnects than I did on the fridge and inverter combined! Everything is tested and running, and the small 1kw water kettle that I purchased from Wal-Mart works without a hitch.

It would appear that the opportunity to drive again has arrived.

I am in the process of planning out the itinerary. I will update this blog as soon as I have more information to share.

Hello there. It has been a while, hasn’t it? Yes, I did make it back home safely. Aside from the slight black ice scare, the remainder of the road trip has been relatively uneventful. The only other slight mishap was when the car developed a rock chip on the front windshield from the sand being applied onto the road at Banff. I heard a LOUD bang, and immediately noticed a 1 inch crack right by the edge of the passenger side. I wasn’t too worried. As of today, the crack has spread to approximately 10 inches long.

Unfortunately, we are still in the midst of a global pandemic with Covid. The new Omicron variant is as the most contagious variant so far, and my family nearly had a scare after being (potentially) exposed to a co-worker who was infected. Luckily, the test turned out negative.

I figure I’d write a little status update of what my situation is currently.

Also, I just picked up a new toy. Check this out…

My new toy…

I will be installing this once the weather is warmer. I plan to use this with a small 3quart Instantpot that will consume 600watts or so. I am sick and tired of eating fast food from McDonalds, A&W and Tim Hortons. Being able to buy food from local grocery stores would be quite nice!

Below is a small redacted snippet of a recent entry of my personal journal. It documents my current state of mind, along with what my plans are for the near future.

I’m so ANGRY at everything right now. I feel robbed of everything dear to me. I have sacrificed so much to be where I am. <…> I finally got around to begin to fulfill my life goal of driving coast to coast across Canada solo in my car. My Mother tagged along for the first leg of the trip in 2019 because she wanted to try it, and also so she could do her Grandmother duties when she got to Vancouver. I didn’t mind, since I figured I could enjoy the return trip back to Toronto as she stayed. But because of natural causes, I had to rush back home to escape a massive snowstorm along the way. Yet I was optimistic I could do it again the next year. Then Covid hit. Next year, I drove my Mom again to Vancouver, this time in the Accord. And I drove back in a Winter storm. This was significantly less enjoyable, since I was unable to make stops along the way in order to minimize Covid exposure. Again, I was still hopeful I could finally do it in 2021.

I have owned the BRZ since Spring of 2019. It is currently 2022. I have owned the car for almost 3 years now, yet I have only driven it for less than 6 months. I know it is stupid to put so much emotion to an inanimate object. A machine. But every time I walk past the car, it gives me hope that perhaps, this year, I can make the second leg of my road trip. And many more after that. As I said to my friends, I’m not picky about my food, or the clothing I wear. I’m very picky about the type of car I am seen driving.

So I promised myself last fall, that no matter what, I would be driving the BRZ come spring time. I had so much planned.

I hope I get to keep that promise.

Had a late start, began to drive around 18:00 local time. Can’t wait to go back to my own bed!!!

Had a slight scare shortly before I arrived at Kamloops, where I am staying for the night. An 18 wheeler suddenly hard braked, or downshifted on a very rough patch of black ice at night. His hazards turned on suddenly, so I knew to ease on the throttle, however, it wasn’t slowing enough. I was about to gracefully to overtake him on the passing lane, but there was somebody else there, and I was boxed in. I tried heavy braking and downshifting, but I was fishtailing with ABS kicked in hard. Instead, I forced my way onto the right shoulder and overtook the truck from there. Luckily, he knew my intentions, and was able to give me some space to pull through. I quickly pulled to the closest parking lot, looked up a hotel for the night, and decided to rest. As I write this entry, it is currently 23:06 localtime, October 26, 2020. I will be gaining 3 hours ahead as this roadtrip progresses

Adrenaline is still in my system after that slight scare. I should sleep soon, since I have a 13 hour drive tomorrow to Saskatoon. I know that it should be a much better drive the moment I make it past Banff, since I can safely allow my mom to take over the wheel for an hour or two on the straightaway so I can rest a bit. I actually had intentions to drive for several more hours tonight until I reached Golden, BC, so I would have shave off several more hours for tomorrow. I think I will just call it a night earlier, and take advantage of more daylight tomorrow.

I am no stranger to long distance road trips. I’ve been to many states over the past years. I have also traveled across Canada twice now. This is the first time I have really had such a “close call” in my driving career.

Total Date	2020-08-11 to 2020-08-14 (4 days)
KM Traveled	4450
KM/L	14.28204634
MPG Converted (all highway)	33.59351531
Fuel Consumed (L)	311.5800
Fuel Total Cost (Canadian Pesos)	$345.18
$/KM	0.077569531

Don’t do what I did. Driving up to 19 hours a day on is not a good way to get here! If only I made one extra stop, I think I would be a lot less exhausted by the time I started tackling the mountain pass of Coquihalla.

According to the EPA, the 2007 Accord 4dr/4cyl claims to achieve 31MPG highway, and 21MPG city. Almost all the driving performed above is highway. I guess I just proved that with regular full synthetic oil change, along with basic maintenance, even a 13 year old workhorse can easily outperform the EPA MPG rating! I visited the pump 8 times.

This entry will be my last entry for a while. I will be spending time with my Nephew for now. I will re-awaken this blog when I am ready to drive home again.