Friday, Saturday and Sunday, August 5, 6 and 7, 2016 (St. Albert Kinsmen RV Park, St. Albert, AB)

Friday was another shopping day...yikes! But we need a new wardrobe for our trip to Africa this fall. We started off at MEC (Mountain Equipment Co-op)...there is one store in Edmonton (apparently another is opening in the fall). The parking, especially in our truck, was atrocious. After driving around and around looking for a spot, we finally found one a few blocks away on a side street. We were very disappointed in MEC...they didn't have any light coloured clothing. We are looking for light coloured, light weight, UV protected pants with the zip off pant legs...always tons of them around when you're not looking for them. Anyway, all the colours were dark...so we walked away empty handed.

Next, we headed to Camper's Village...a store we've never heard of but Esther had suggested. I manage to find a pair of pants...but Steve had no luck.

Our last stop was at West Edmonton Mall...wow, it's the largest mall in North America and is huge! It's been years since I have been there...I had forgotten just how big it is!
There is an Ice Palace...
Marine Land...

Sea Lions, playing shy...
Pirate Ship...


And a Water Park...quite amazing! West Edmonton Mall is definitely a popular tourist destination for families!

We didn't have time to through the amusement park area.
Win this Lamborghini...

We walked and walked from one end to the other...seems like the stores we wanted to visit were at opposite ends of the mall! At the end of the day, we went home with a good start on our travel requirements. Steve found pants and two shirts at Atmosphere and I found an anti-theft shoulder bag.

Saturday morning we went shopping again...this time for groceries. After a stop at Walmart and Save-On-Foods, we swung by Kal Tire to have the u-bolts re-torqued after our front and rear-end alignments.

I spent the rest of the afternoon working on blog update and preparing for company for dinner while Steve was out in the truck re-programming the radio. It got totally un-programmed while the battery was disconnected when the transmission shift selector keypad was being replaced last month. It's quite a job to do and is a feature Steve absolutely hates about this radio. Because you would normally program it once and forget about it it's a major learning every time...took him over an hour! Maybe he's just getting too old for all this new technology. :-)

Gordon and Esther arrived around 5:30...and we sat outside visiting over a cocktail.
Gordon presented us with gifts from the Canada Store...to ensure the folks in Amsterdam and France know where we are from. All sorts of "Canada" paraphernalia...sweatshirts, flags, pins, luggage stickers all in a nylon "Canada" bag, and a bottle of African Wine. Perfect! Thanks so much...very thoughtful!
 No confusion as to where we are from!

Around 7:00 we headed inside for dinner..."Classy Chicken" (chicken and broccoli in a mild curry sauce), corn-on-the-cob (from BC!) and Caesar salad....


After dinner, we relaxed in the living room reminiscing about the three trips to Mexico we have made together. We even hooked up the laptop to the TV so we could look at the pictures. We've had some wonderful trips with this fabulous couple and are so looking forward to our next adventure...Africa in October!

Sunday was a work day. After breakfast, Steve got started on his work outside. My plan was to get our blogs totally up-to-date...unfortunately, it ended up being one of those days where nothing seemed to go smoothly for me. I went to do the dishes only to find the galley holding tank full...and it would take a little time before Steve could empty it because he was emptying and flushing the black tank first. Okay...I'll get working on the blog posts then, only to find the park wi-fi is down...sheesh! I finally managed to get the dishes all done but the wi-fi was still down...so I vacuumed (yes, that's twice within five days!) and cleaned the bathroom.

When the wi-fi was back up and running, I thought I'd quickly download the software so the mouse from my old laptop would work on the new laptop. No problem downloading that...but when I tried to set it up, the laptop would not recognize the device (mouse). So that took a while but I finally got that working.

In the meantime, Steve had been researching on the Shaw Direct website to see if there would be a cheaper bundle of channels for our satellite TV. He thought we would be able to change our package on-line but we couldn't figure out how...it let's new customers pick and choose what they want but apparently existing customers are unable to do that yet. So we spent a bunch of time on-line 'chatting' with a Shaw rep. It was actually a pretty cool way of doing it but still...it took quite a while. Am I ever going to work on our blog updates?!

Well I did managed to get another one posted late this afternoon...and am now finishing this final one. It is after 9 pm and I'm going to get it done! Tomorrow we hit the road again...so for now, we will be up-to-date...



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