Oh Canada!

I am now in Canada. It has been an interesting trip so far. We all were told to meet in the Lewis Stages office, in Salt Lake City, at 7:00am, on Thursday. I got there about fifteen minutes before that, figuring we would have a short introduction, and then head out. We all met then, but there was paperwork to be done, and things took a while. There were three people assigned to each bus, and we were all given maps. A dozen buses were being driven to Canada. After all the paperwork was done and things were kind of organized, we headed out. By this time, it was almost 10:00am. Rest stops and meal times were all planned out, and we were supposed to stay in order, so no one, ideally, would get left behind and lost. We were to drive to Ellensburg, Washington, on Thursday.

The trip to Ellensburg went fine. It was pretty simple really, get on I-15 North, and go to Ogden. There we would get on I-84 West, and take that to Hermiston, Oregon. There we would get on I-82 West, which would take us to Washington. In Washington, we would drive a few miles on I-90 West just a couple of miles, and then stop for the night. We would all stay in a particular order, and no one would get lost or left behind. Turned out, this was easier said than done. The convoy broke apart after the first rest stop, and everyone was on their own. We all met up again at the designated stops, and then all headed out and got separated again before long. Besides that, the trip was uneventful as far as the Washington state line.

When we crossed from Oregon to Washington, we had to stop at a weight station. Buses usually have to stop at state lines unless they are carrying passengers. The weight is not the concern, it just allows authorities to conduct a quick safety inspection. It also gives them the option of checking the vehicle and driver paperwork, if they choose. Well, they decided to check our paperwork, and they were picky about it. We all had to park and go into the office to show our log books. They were ruthless. If the lines were not straight enough, they threatened to fine the driver. If the log page was not neat enough, they threatened to fine them again. It was rediculious. For the drivers who had nothing wrong with the log books, they asked to see the vehicle registration. On the registration, which had been copied at the office, the Washington part was partially cut off, and they threatened to pull the buses out of service, and not let us drive any farther. We spent an hour and a half at that weigh station. We later learned that getting into Canada was easier than Washington, and I thought Washington was only a state line. somehow, we all managed to dodge getting a citation, which was nothing short of a miracle.

Once we left the weigh station, we continued on without any problems. There was a little confusion on the location of the hotel, but we found it. We were all put two in a room. It was about 1:45am when we finally arrived there, due to the weigh station delays, the late start, and lengthy meal stops. I think most of us fell asleep pretty quickly that night.

On Friday morning, after a good night sleep, we all got up to hit the road again. One nice thing about being a driver is you are required to have at least eight hours off between shifts, so even though we got in late, we were able to get a good night sleep ebfore we headed out again. We all refueled and hit the road. It took a few hours to get across Washington, and we did not have any more weigh station problems. We got on I-5 North, and headed for the Canadian border. The border was an interesting experience. Since we were not driving private vehicles across, we had to have each bus cleared as a commercial good. They had to be declared in customs, because they are worth more than $800, and tariffs had to be paid according to their estimated value. The value on these is around $350,000. There was a lot of paperwork. It was not difficult, just time consuming. It took just over two hours to get across the border, although it was far less of a hassle than getting into Washington had been! Once across the border, we drove to Vancouver. There we parked the buses and went to a downtown hotel for the night. I stayed at a place called the Shaughnessy.

The next morning, we got up and went back down to the bus yard in Vancouver for some training and orientation. We got our uniforms, which consists of a coat. We also got our olympic accreditation, which proves we belong here. We also got our assignments. I was assigned to a place called Whistler, which is about 120 kilometres north of Vancouver. Next, we drove up there. There was a bit of a mix up, and two people who are not qualified to drive motor coaches in Canada were assigned to take them here. I was asked last minute if I would mind driving. That sounded better than riding to me! I drove. It is a narrow, hilly highway, with a ton of curves. It was rather interesting. The speed limit is 80 km/h for almost the whole way to Whistler, but it is hard to go that fast in a bus, because of the dynamics of the road. It is a fun road to drive though. It is actually surprisingly similar to Alaska here. When we arrived in Whistler, we dropped off the buses, and then went to our accomodations. It is a little temporary camp called CSC Rainbow Village. My accomodations are a building made of shipping containers stacked three high, with windows and doors cut in them. It is finished on the inside, so it does not feel like it is the inside of a container, but it is a rather small room. It is not exactly what I was expecting, but it seems to be working just fine. The container building has everything we really need. The kitchen and dining room is there, and they feed us all our meals. There are several lounges, laundry rooms, washrooms, and an internet cafe there too. Our room even has a balcony! One nice thing to living in a container is that you cannot hear anything that goes on in the room, or container, next to you, because there is a pair of corrigated steel walls between you and the next room! You cannot hear anything from one room to the next! As rediculious as it sounds to live in a shipping container, it really is not such a bad arrangement!

A few people have asked what I am doing up here. Well, I am driving buses for security personnel. Lewis Stages is the company I work for, which is a Salt Lake City based company. They were hired by Edison Transportation, who was hired by Gameday Management. Gameday Management was hired to manage transportation for Contemporary Security Canada. Contemporary Security Canada, or CSC, was contracted by the Vancouver Olympic Committee to manage security at all the venues during the Winter Olympics. The Vancouver Olympic Committee, or Vanoc, was created by the International Olympic Committee. Basically I am a sub-sub-sub-subcontractor! arious other companies have been sub-sub-subcontracted to move spectators, athletes, and other employees. In total, there are about 2,000 buses here for the olympics from all over the USA and Canada. I do not know the exact number of employees here, but it is a lot. Vanoc has 35,000 employees working directly for them. I am not counted in this number. There are 25,000 volunteers, and a roughly estimated total of 75,000 paid employees working for the olympics in some way. As you can imagine, this does wonders for the local economy. It ends up costing the city and British Columbia quite a lot, but it is quite the economic boost.

The olympics are more than just athletic competitions. I am learning this actually. Those are the focus of the event of course, but the olympics also includes concerts every night and arts exhibits. The mission of the olympics is to enrich the lives of those in this area, and the art exhibits and concerts are part of that. The concerts are free, and are usually a well known person or band. They have a different concert every night, both in Vancouver and in Whistler. Displays and art exhibits are set up all over both towns, also available for free to the public. There is actually quite a lot more going on than just the athletic events everyone knows from watching tv.

On a side note, for any of you who have ever seen the movie "Cool Runnings," about the Jamaican bobsleigh team, they will be here this year, and they are racing in Whistler. I am hoping I will get to go to that event.