I’m going to chalk it up to luck, because there’s no way I could plan this, even if I had a feed of the weather channel piped directly into my brain. But as far as I can tell, whenever I step out to take a hike/stroll/amble, the rain stops. Up the mountain, down the river, around town, wherever – it stops. And only when I get within 50 feet of my car do the clouds gather and rain comes down again in big drenching gobs.

Maybe it’s one of those Tesla subscription things I signed up for accidentally without knowing it? Somewhere down the menu between “auto park,” “full self-driving,” and “robot apocalypse” there was a “automatic weather control” feature I’ve subscribed to that engages whenever the car senses I’ve left its immediate environment. Remember, we’re talking Elon here.

Speaking of Elon, a few people have asked for more on that fertile mill for “What – really?!?” complaints, so I’ll take a minute or two to tell you more about my experience with Tesla camping. As I mentioned, there’s “camping mode,” which doesn’t come with a lot of documentation. Meaning none. You engage it and it takes this as a suggestion that you want to camp in the car for the evening, and acts accordingly. Following, as far as I can tell, Elon Musk’s conception of what car camping involves.

First of all, I have to announce that camping mode does indeed turn the screen off. Eventually. On its own damned time, and there’s nothing you can do to tell it to hurry up a little. Oh, and before it does? It will display 10-15 minutes of a lovely little animated digital campfire. I kid you not. No, don’t touch that screen, or it’ll go back to full bright and start its enigmatic countdown again from the beginning.

Then there’s climate control. Camping mode wants to keep things at exactly whatever temperature you’ve selected when you engaged it. Ambient? Doesn’t exist. If you set it to 68 degrees, it will provide the necessary heat to keep the cabin at precisely 68 degrees. Don’t want to burn all that energy? Don’t bother setting the temperature down to, say, 40, because it will promptly engage the air conditioning and refrigerate you down to that temperature until it runs out of battery. You just want to turn the heat/air conditioning off? Whoops – that’ll take you out of camping mode, wake up the big 17″ screen and set it on “stun” to blind you with its default “wakey wakey” brightness. (Same, by the way, if you want to adjust the temperature while in camping mode. FLASH, and you’re blinded again, illuminated in blue-white light until the screen decides it’s safe to show you the animated campfire again.)

Oh, oh – but I’ve discovered that there is in fact an “off” button. It’s hidden under the “Safety” sub-menu, hidden at the bottom of about three scrolls. Once you hit it, it will ask you to confirm – do you really want to turn the car off? The dialog screen feels to have a touch of incredulity, not quite believing that you’d really want to do this thing. On the order of formatting your hard drive, or ziplining without a safety harness. Honestly, I half-expected it to respond to my confirmation with “Sorry, Dave – I can’t do that.”

But no, I confirmed “Power Off” and everything went dark and silent.

Aaaaand psych! About three minutes later, all on its own, it woke up, fired up the “Wakey wakey” screen and climate control and went along as if nothing had happened. I turned it off again. Disabled Bluetooth, just for good measure. Three minutes later – Pop goes the weasel! – it was back. Gack. It was like trying to put a toddler to sleep. Am I supposed to tell it a bedtime story?!?

I’ve given up – I’m just going to burn the electrons to leave it in camp mode and hope I still have enough to get to the next charging station tomorrow morning.

But robocar toddler tantrums aside, it’s been a lovely day or two.

When I last left you, I was rolling downhill along the scenic Crowsnest Highway, leaving the thick coastal fir forests for the Okanagan Valley. Long, deep, north-south lakes cut during the last ice age. The surrounding hills a dry chaparral studded with wildflowers, the valley floor below packed rim to rim with orchards and wineries. Gorgeous territory.

I was headed north, to Kelowna, to drop in on family friends Daphne and Burt. Now, I have to explain that Devon’s folks have a somewhat extended definition for family. You’ve heard of “polycules”? Well, the Wiels have a famicule. Burt and Daphne are…letsee, my wife’s brother’s girlfriend’s mom and her husband. Which means we’re family to each other, and I’m damned glad of it. They’re delightful – thoughtful, interesting, kind, and Daphne can still run “us kids” into the ground on any given hike.

Daphne and Devon on a previous visit

They graciously invited me to stay the evening and fed and entertained me with engaging conversation about everything from farm fenceline maintenance (Burt used to be a farmer in Alberta) to submarine surveillance (also ex-Royal Navy). I was itching to explore some of the trails further south along the lakes, so I ungraciously begged off a morning hike with Daphne (okay, okay, I knew she’d run me into the ground again!) and headed off.

Rain until I stepped out to try a trail called “The Grind” up Giant’s Head in Summerland – mad wildflowers everywhere – then sunshine until I made it back to the car. Osoyoos? Sun, with a bit of wind, until I was back in the car headed for Okanagan Falls. Then down it came until I made it to the campground along the Okanagan River. Cleared up long enough for me to take a lovely dusk stroll along the riverbank.

Oh look – it’s raining again.