Hope was shortly behind us.

Factually rather than literally and we sped on a wide motorway towards Kelowna through steep sided rocky valleys and on stretches of highway where the 18 wheel behemoths stopped sparring with you in the outside lane at 70mph and had to crunch many gears and grind up 5% gradients at a fraction of that speed. Arriving in Kelowna Anna had identified a cool cafe, Sprout Bread, where I had another grilled cheese sandwich, this time on freshly hewn sourdough. A memorable treat.

From here we huffed and puffed through the dense traffic and gazillion traffic lights to the apartment where June lived. Kelowna will live long in my memory as a very busy city. June was a second cousin once removed to Anna. This connection was found relatively recently via Ancestry.com and we were keen to meet her face to face. June had emigrated to Canada in the 1950s and despite a short repatriation to Scotland this had been her home ever since. It brought home how different an age it was when, of course, reaching Canada was by ship! One interesting opportunity that arose in meeting at June’s apartment was to watch the osprey nest clearly visible from her upper floor location. These birds nested here every year and whilst we were there the mother protected the chicks and the male fished and returned with food for all. The burning sun was intolerable for the mother on this perch in 31°C but she stuck to the task of guarding the chicks and using her wings to provide shade.

Meeting up was a delight and family information was exchanged over beverages before we said goodbye and planned to meet the following day.

Our departure led us across the lake to West Kelowna where our hostess awaited. Kelowna is divided into two parts either side of the lake and connected by a bridge. The traffic is now of such a volume that this bridge is a bottleneck most of the time. The solution of building a newer wider bridge is hampered by the land on one side belonging to a First Nation tribe. Their negotiating stance is unsupportable and whilst legislation remains in place to allow such a ‘hostage taking’ position the locals and others will have to queue.

Our accommodation for two nights was at the mercy of the indomitable Suzana in her immaculate and beautiful abode. The landlady originated from Serbia and she’d arrived in Canada in the mid 1990s as a refugee from the Balkans war. An immediate feeling swept over us that we were in her grip: she wanted to know our movements, plan our stay, sort out our dining arrangements in the locality and promoted her Serbian cuisine for breakfast. She held a number of robust views on various matters not least the President of the United States: we were discovering she wasn’t alone in that disdain. She really wanted to make our stay memorable; she did, but not in the way she hoped! We went with the flow on the first breakfast and dined at her recommendations but when we said we’d leave on day two before breakfast we were made to feel quite small. “Why so early?” “We have a long drive” “ How far?” “Err, we’ll drive as far as we can south, maybe 300 miles” “Only 300 miles! I had planned a special Serbian dish for breakfast!” She and her husband returned to our unforgivable decision more than once during our stay.

Anyway we did leave when we wanted and parted on friendly terms but, frankly, her reaction was unnecessary and made the experience ultimately miserable.

Meanwhile the next day we took June out for lunch at The Quail’s Gate Estate Winery in West Kelowna where we enjoyed an exceptional meal in a beautiful setting, which was basically at the top of a vineyard on a lake. Completely magnificent, as was the food and drink.

It has to be said that despite June’s life in Canada her accent was completely untouched by her stay although I did feel it essential to correct her description of a pavement as a sidewalk! (She resisted the temptation, no doubt, to hit me.) June’s daughters had grown up as Canadians and lived in Toronto and nearby in a ski resort. Whilst I would never be so indiscreet as to divulge a lady’s age it would be sufficiently vague to advise June was a nonagenarian and happily in magnificent health. Several digital photos later were exchanged by AirDrop – now I know a lot of much younger folk who’d have no idea how to do that!

So creeping out of our accommodation we departed before 7am and sped south to the American border. Routine questions were asked by the Border official including “Where are you headed”  (I did feel an urge to suggest “where are we going?” was better English but as she was holding our two passports and had the power to block our passage I thought better of it.) So I said “Yakima”, “Where?” “Err, Yakima”, thus ensued a blank look and a peevish countenance. Anna lent across and translated for me: “Yack-eema”. Two nations divided by one language, eh? Anyway after this we confirmed we were not packing weaponry and were allowed to go.