Vom Regen in die Traufe

Victoria is a really beautiful city, but after four weeks of continuous rain, I had enough. It was time to head towards the snow. After doing a Google image search and reading some reports online, I decided to drive to Kelowna. The ferry ride with the snow-capped mountains in the background was really nice. I took one of my roommates with me until Vancouver, where I picked up another hitchhiker who wanted to go to Kelowna.
To her misfortune, she rode with me. Because shortly after Hope, at the beginning of the Coquihalla Pass, my car, which I had bought just a month earlier, broke down with a transmission problem. In the middle of nowhere, with no cell phone reception. As bad as it was in that moment, what I will always remember is the kindness and helpfulness of the Canadians. My car hadn't even come to a stop when another car with a Canadian couple inside stopped. The two were worth their weight in gold. Not only did they manage to reach the BCAA (the Canadian equivalent of AAA) with their cell phone, they also let me tow my car for free using their membership and waited with us for about an hour and a half to two hours for the tow truck. I'm sure no one in Germany would have done that. In the end, they even took my hitchhiker with them so she wouldn't be stuck with me.

I was towed to Hope with the car. Actually a cute little town, but when you're stuck there with too many things in the car that won't fit in the suitcase, and you don't know how to get away, you suddenly feel very lonely and trapped. Of course, it was also a long holiday weekend, so I had to wait until Tuesday to get the diagnosis of total loss. The repair would have cost about three times the value of the car :(
So I found a store, bought a second suitcase (I was lucky to find a store in that town that had them), and the next day I continued to Kelowna by Greyhound bus.

The drive over the Coquihalla is truly incredibly beautiful, I hope I can enjoy it when I drive back to Vancouver.