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| August 24, 2008. Day 74 - A few miles over the US/Canada border - Beaver Creek. |
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| It rain heavily over night, a light rain continued for the rest of the day. Despite Marcelo braving the elements early in the morning to uncover the solar car and turn the array on, with all the rain the battery was not able to get a much charge. We woke up in a down pour around 12.00. Tired of waiting, we hit the road anyway. After a slow 6 miles we had to stop for another recharge while Marcelo stayed inside the solar car taking a power nap (double meaning wink wink). After that we tried to make some miles again and unfortunately we had to stop again but this time after just a couple of miles trying to climb a hill we pulled the car over and waited from 13:10 until 19:15. In the meanwhile we ate a bit, watched some a-team, slept and made funny jokes, Morgan let loose with some fire works. While waiting we also met a guy from Quebec on his bike, he has been biking all over the world for the past 3 years, his name was Stephan. Bon voyage, monsieur! We also chat with a number of passers by stopping to see the solar car, take photos and learn about the project. Lot's of compliments, many in disbelieve of our accomplishments and others congratulation us and saying they have either seeing us on TV, read on the newspaper or heard from others. Thanks everyone, your moral support is much appreciated! At 19:15 we went on the road again! Around 20:00 we arrived at the Canada custom. Interesting the Canadian custom is located in Beaver Creek, about 30kms from the boarder with USA. No problem, the usual questioning plus a few questions about the project. In Beaver Creek, we met Jean-luc and Stephanie who before even knowing our names invited us stay at their home. They were awesome, made us all feel right at home. We had a nice place to sleep and relax (and showers and laundry and rock star Wii! ). Later we all went to a restaurant at the Westmark Hotel in the Beaver Creek to eat and for a little celebration as our last night together. Everyone will be going their separated ways in Whitehorse. We had a great evening talking about each others most memorable experience joining Marcelo and the solar car project tour. None of us single out any particular day, as everyday had its own memorable experience, always something new happening. Meeting someone special and having a great unique experience. However, everyone felt that the most exciting moments took place when something happened to the solar car. It kept us busy and on the edge; like when Marcelo went flying with the solar car car into the bush after tierod broke and collapsing the front suspension. The first reaction was to the safety or our driver Mr.solar car, then the extent of damages to the solar car, not knowing at first if the car could repaired or not, etc... We didn't want to talk about saying goodbye. It was a nice enjoyable evening, this time our new friend Emory was still with us. After eating we went back to Jean-luc & Stephanie's home for a movie and some popcorn, we watched "Into the wild". We went to bed around 03.00hrs, too much of a good thing :) Jean-luc got the Westmark hotel to sponsor breakfast for the entire crew in the morning. Michael barely finished his dinner and was already talking about breakfast, he was excited about it. |
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