Worst US/Canadian border crossing

I think the best crossing we've had was going into the US at Sarnia-Port Huron. The officer asked us the usual "Where are you going? Where did you come from? Did you make any stops?" questions, which I answered including a lunch stop in London where we walked the dog. He then addressed our dog that was looking out the window, "And did you leave anything behind in Canada?" he asked her. I answered for her with, "Just a wet spot, officer. If she had left anything else, I would have bagged the evidence and brought it with us." Well, that broke him up, and he was still laughing as he waved us on through. ;)

If you use the "turducken" approach by hiding your drugs inside the barrels of your handguns which you then secrete inside a raw turkey you will have no problems, so I have been told.

About the 6th time crossing in my MH, went in at the end of I-81...second MH of two. First one had to pull to the curb for inspection. Agent ask me the normal questions and I said I had my "normal bar" which usually buys you some slack on amount. Had to estimate...18 beers, a liter total of alcohol, and 3 bottles of wine. Sat outside as 2 agents searched each MH's insides only. After 20 minutes a pimple face kid asked me to open the safe...fortunately I remembered where the key was... nothing in it. Was accused of lying as I had 22 beers, 1.5 L of alcohol, and 2 bottles of wine. Told them I did not inventory my booze and my numbers were a pretty good guess. Had to pay duty on 2 bottles of wine. Total time was over an hour.

The other MH had much the same situation and had to pay some duty on a little excess.

The "worst" was simply the motorhome search as we crossed into Canada. The guards searched every nook and cranny, bags, etc - all very politely and carefully. We sat on the curb with our 2 dogs. Whole process took maybe 20 minutes; and then we were sent on our way. But every crossing after that (going to Alaska and back; and then the next year, visiting Nova Scotia) was simply easy and quick - show our passports and recite our license plate. I'm assuming we were in some database that declared us to be "good people" or some such thing :-) But we also follow the advice of others regarding sunglasses off, window open, polite, forthcoming with answers but not chatty.

Returning from Canada with an aircraft on a trailer, tried to enter at the I-5 Peace Arch, was told to pull into the inspection area, and to enter the building to see the officer. after a 45 minute wait we were told we could not import aircraft at that station, and that we would have to renter Canada and go to Blaine and enter the commercial entry point, So back to Canada and then tried to enter at the commercial check point.
Border agents took our pass ports, told us to park in the impound area for inspection, A different agent came and told us to follow him into the building.
After a 6.5 hour wait we were told that there was no duty on the aircraft and we were free to go.
During the 6 and a half hour wait, we noted no less than 12 agents playing solitaire on their computers.

Wasn't the worst crossing for me, but for three others it was a bad day crossing into Canada at Blaine, Washington. I drove up, and they had me pull into the long search RV area, exit the RV, and wait in the main reception section.

During the first 30 minutes I was waiting, my guards were pulled off my RV inspection to 1) arrest Asian woman (well dressed - seemingly didn't speak anything by Vietnamese) trying to cross in the trunk of a car; 2) arrest a young punk being a wise ass trying to cross over on a bicycle and wasn't patient enough to wait, tried to scamper across; 3) arrest a dumbass with a trunk with several kilos of pot inside. You should have seen his face, looked like he was a newbie and had no idea how many years he was going to spend in prison.

After 50 odd minutes of watching most of the guards interviewing the perps in tiny interview rooms with glass walls (like in police shows), 3 guards per perp, the guards finally got around to my RV. Ten minutes later I was done and on my way. Pretty efficient actually.

Very exciting time there at the crossing. Got to see 3 arrests. But the delay before the border and at the border is why I only cross at remote locations now days. Less traffic, less likely to be delays.

Like at Oroville, Washington. They haven't even bothered to come into the RV the several times I've crossed there. Just ask where I'm going, how long I'll be staying and wave me through.

The first time I crossed at Oroville, I handed them a sheet listing the liquor I was carrying. The puzzled look on the face of the guard induced me to tell them that I was suppose to do that according to the Canadian government's web site. They laid it down on the desk never referred to it again, asked their questions, and waved me through. I haven't made a list since, speak only when spoken too, don't volunteer anything, and soon I'm done and driving off.

I've had trouble both us to can and can to us.

Don't volunteer information.

My wife has family in Canada. Between that and going back and forth to northern New York we have crossed the border lots of times.
Far and away the worst crossings have been returning to the states through the Ambassador Bridge. The tunnel has never been that bad, but if we don't want to go through downtown Detroit, the bridge is a better route and the duty free store is better.

Matt

rhagfo wrote:

2chiefsRus wrote:
Can't really call it the worst but it was puzzling. It was crossing at Sarnia from the US crossing to Canada. We were asked to pull to the side and they searched everywhere inside the coach and the toad. They even opened all the zippers on our golf bags in the trunk of our car. All the cabinets in the motorhome, under the cushions, literally everywhere they could think of. The puzzling part was they never once opened the outside storage bays......

You likely won the random deep search lottery, the outside storage bays were likely never used as a hiding space for drugs.

I got that we won the random search award. We have 56 years of military service between the two of us with 8 years at Andrews Air Force Base where the President's plane is maintained. If they were going to do a deep search, then the search should have included the storage bays. It was just surprising to me but nothing to be concerned about.

The longest (time wise) crossing we've had was at Sweetgrass, Montana. The US side was visually searching every vehicle. We were told that they were looking for a terrorist.

We have been searched a number of times, both going into Canada and reentering the US. Our first ever crossing was at Jackman, Maine (Armstrong, Quebec). We were searched on the Canadian side, apparently because we had two golden retrievers with us. "Those are nice hunting dogs. Are you don't have any guns?" The young agents went through everything inside the RV, but never looked in an outside bay. When they were through, they had golden retriever hair all over their nice crisp blue uniforms.

We've been searched twice entering the US; both were agricultural searches - we had potatoes confiscated Houlton, Maine.

At every crossing, whether searched or not, we have found the border agents to be polite and professional.

Tom