Settled in Seattle

If you'd have suggested a year ago that I'd be driving down Interstate 5 into Seattle to meet up with Caroline's Aunt and cousins, then I would have laughed you out of the room....
The main excitement was crossing the border into USA. We found our way easy enough to Sumas, which is half in British Columbia and half in Washington.
We were in line and drove forward to hand over our passports.
"Where you going?"
"Seattle for 3 days sir, then to Anacortes, returning to Vancouver for a flight back to UK next Sunday"
Nothing more was spoken for a few minutes, he then handed me a piece of orange paper and pointed to some examination bays. "you'll get your passports back over there"
So we drove as directed where another Border Officer directed us to leave the keys in the car, leave bags, mobiles and everything and go over to an office and see a third Border Officer, who asked a series of questions about our reason for entering USA and where and when we flew into North America.
He started to look like he wished he hadn't asked, as Caroline went through our schedule... He was relatively good humoured about the process and smiled when we told him that Caroline was a psychiatric nurse and I was retired.. "Really?"
We then had our finger prints recorded and photos taken. We even joked about my inability to follow his instructions.. "probably because you're retired"
After all the formalities were completed, passports returned, we returned to see if our car had been stripped due to the sniffer dogs being attracted to warm cheese...
"which car is yours?"
"the grey one here"
"OK, stand over here both of you.... don't worry, I won't bite"
I hand him the orange piece of paper...
"OK...".. he gave a wry smile.. "on your way"
We jumped in the car and strapped our belts up and headed down the rest of the main street on Sumas... decked with Stars & Stripes and not a sign of anybody... was it a ghost town?
I continued driving, and adapted ourself to different driving conditions. The speed limit in miles per hour, the road sign distances in miles and the price of GAS was per gallon. It seemed like we had stepped into the Imperial States of America.
And what was even more strange... after less than 30 minutes of being in the USA we had gone through 3 'roundabouts'.. and people said that they didn't do that in the States??
The sun kept shining and the the air con was being well used in the car.
We got onto Interstate 5 and headed south. The traffic density increased to fill more and more lanes.
We follow some instructions and the Sat Nav also confirmed our direction...
The Silver Cloud Inn.
We checked in, showered and got the shorts on.... seems like summer is here again today.