The objective for day 1 was simple: move all our stuff from Belgium to Canada, preferably with no pieces missing and everything intact. Additionally, we also needed to get some documentation arranged at the border to be able to buy a car here. After spending 10 hours sitting next to the fattest guy on the plane (note: this is not Marijke talking about Patrick!), we were happy to achieve all of this!

Over and above these achievements, we also set the following trip records on day 1:

• Visited 3 countries in one day (Belgium, Netherlands, Canada)
• Spent the longest time in the air (9 hours 26 minutes)
• Covered the most time zones in a day (9 hours difference)
• Travelled the furthest west ever (123 degrees west longitude)
• Hauled the most bags (3 pieces checked-in, 5 pieces carry-on)
• Checked in & out of a country in less than 10 seconds (border officer made a mistake so we now have a stamp “entered Canada in error” in our passport)
• Informed that we are the first Belgians to travel to Canada to buy a car and drive it south (according to Canadian border officer wearing a bullet proof vest – so we are sure she has seen some crazy things before)
• Checked the inside of the Vancouver airport transit zone while waiting for our paperwork (only for 30 minutes)
• Crossed the most Asian people and restaurants in the street in one day (a little surprising being in Canada but making sense after discovering we are in the middle of an Asian neighbourhood)

We will probably set and break new records in the next days… So far everything went smoothly (except maybe negotiating a key out of the Chinese landlady’s mother who is definitely fluent in Chinese – English to be confirmed). We only managed to stay up until 9:00 PM local time yesterday and we slept the sleep of the dead until 4:00 AM.

I took a walk around the world

To ease my troubled mind

I really don’t mind what happens now and then

As long as you’ll be my friend at the end