I actually have decent campground WiFi for a bit, so I thought I would summarize our experiences with Canada’s random COVID testing process. I will update this post as we learn more, because it is an evolving saga!
Canada reserves the right to randomly choose border crossing folk for a PCR COVID test. If you are selected you are supposed to take the test within 24 hours of crossing the border. It makes great sense to me. We crossed the border Saturday, and nothing was said about it. Normal, right? Wrong!
On Tuesday, four entire days after we entered Canada, I got an email telling me someone in my party had been selected for the entry test. It didn’t even tell us whether it was Kevin or me. Sigh. And since the process is really much more oriented to air travelers of Canadians returning home, the instructions were pretty meaningless for RVers like us. It took two long phone calls to figure out what we were supposed to do. We needed to provide an address for a kit to be sent via Canada Post, planned for 5-7 days in the future. We are here in Calgary until Friday, then we spend 3 nights at Rocky Mountain House, so I gave them the RMH address. It confused the poor man on the phone so much because it is a very, very, very rural address! (Has anyone else ever seen an “house” number of of 400,009? I added the comma for readability. Yup, that is part of the street address of our campground.)
So I think I have everything settled, though it is still iffy whether we get the test in time. And, of course, the night after RMH is boondocking with no address. Then today (Wednesday) I get a call from Canadian Public Health, automated, informing us (finally) that Kevin was the lucky random testee. Also part of the call was “Did you take the test with it 24 hours?” No. “Why not?” Luckily, “No one told me,” was the second alternative given. The call ended with Kevin being told to call the lab which we did yesterday. Sigh. Oh the trials of international travel in COVID times. Oh, and we have at least 3, maybe 4, people in our tour group of around 40 that have COVID right now!
To be continued …