Day Five: Banff, AB to Great Falls, MT
Distance: 396 miles
It was really hard to leave Banff the next morning. Victor and I agreed that we would love to come back someday and stay for more than one night, but in reality I know we both have long lists of other places we want to visit, so we’ll see what happens. I don’t think either of us will forget the beautiful landscape anytime soon.
The mountains gave way to flat fields shortly after we left. Unlike the NC mountains, there was no transition from mountains to hills, to smaller hills, to flat land. The mountains jut dramatically into the sky, and you can see them for miles away.
We made our way toward the US border, passing the time with an audiobook and some podcasts. It was nice to relax and enjoy an uneventful cruise through the farmland after the stress of the previous day. I’d had my nose buried in my Kindle for a while when there was a sudden, loud THUNK. Victor pulled the car over.
I had noticed small rodents darting across the highway all morning, (prairie dogs, maybe?) but this impact was definitely caused by something bigger. I looked at Victor and raised my eyebrows.
“Yeah. We just killed a big ass bird.”
He got out to see if there was any damage to the front bumper. Nothing major, thankfully, but the bird was lodged inside one of the crevices. We obviously couldn’t bring him along for the rest of the trip, so Victor grabbed the paper towels from the trunk and fished out our dead stowaway.
The bird blended into the road so well that he couldn’t see it, until the very last second when the bird’s head popped up, and by then it was too late. I agree, the poor guy’s (or girl’s) feathers did strongly resemble the texture of the highway. RIP, friend.
It wasn’t long before the NSX nearly claimed another life. Less than 30 minutes after pulling back onto the highway, a badger came running out of the grass and into our lane. He was big enough that a collision would have surely resulted in some damage to the car. Victor honked the horn a few times and he turned around and scurried back into the grass. To add insult to injury, Victor absent-mindedly stuck his hand out the window a few minutes later and a butterfly immediately smashed into his palm. He pulled his hand back in and rolled the windows up.
Another hour or so passed and we pulled into the border crossing station in Sweetgrass, MO. I’ve never crossed a border by car before, so I don’t know if our experience was typical, but I’d rate this border crossing as 0/10, would not cross again.
We pulled up to the booth and the attendant snapped at us about having the car’s temporary tag in the back glass instead of on the back bumper of the car. Victor explained that the tag was made of paper and would disintegrate in the rain. She seemed pretty mad about that for some reason (had this lady never seen temporary tags before?) and when Victor explained that he was importing the car, she practically yelled at us to pull around into the parking lot and bring all of our paperwork inside.
Inside we were greeted by an officer who immediately slid a bunch of paperwork across the counter.
“Fill these out,” he demanded. “If you already have them filled out, fill them about again because you probably did it wrong.”
Victor obliged and passed them back across the counter. The officer flipped through the folder where he had all the car’s paperwork and took some of it back to his desk. He returned a few minutes later and informed us that because the car was a foreign import, we would be charged a tax to bring it into the US. I already knew I wasn’t going to be fond of this guy, but here’s when things got really sour.
Before he purchased the car, Victor researched the importing process extensively. The Border Patrol’s website states that if you import a car that was previously registered in the US (as this one was), and you had all the necessary paperwork to prove it, there would be no tax to import the vehicle back into the US. He had called that exact Border Patrol office weeks before to verify this information was correct. The officer on the phone looked up the rules and confirmed that there would be no tax to bring the car to the US.
Victor explained this very politely to the officer, even citing the name of the person he spoke to on the phone.
“If you actually read the website, then you would have seen that that rule only applies to domestic vehicles. Your car was manufactured in Japan, so you’re paying taxes today. I know you think you did your research, but this is my job. I do this for a living.”
Victor explained again that he looked up this specific situation AND called and had everything confirmed by an officer in that very office. The website didn’t state anywhere that this rule only applied to domestic vehicles. The officer insisted that he misinterpreted what he read and informed us that we would be paying taxes or we wouldn’t be bringing the car into the US. I figured I should occupy myself before I opened my mouth and got us in real trouble, so I pulled up the Border Patrol website on my phone and found the exact paragraph that was in dispute:
I showed this to the officer. He read it and informed us that he was getting his supervisor involved, then walked over to his desk and made a phone call. We stood quietly at the counter while a group of officers congregated around his desk. I figured this wouldn’t end well.
Eventually the officer came back and informed us that last summer, the law had changed. The duty-free import only applied if the vehicle was returned within 3 years of being exported (he seemed to have given up on his foreign vs domestic manufacture argument). Victor argued that that change was not reflected on the website anywhere, and again, an officer in that very office confirmed what the website said.
“Look, I have no control over the website. I’m just a little Border Patrol officer in Montana. But the law is the law, I have it in an email from my supervisor if you want to read it yourself.” He said it really sarcastically, which pissed me off.
“Actually, yeah. If you don’t mind, I’d like to take a look at it,” Victor replied. Good, because if he had not asked to see it, I would have.
He printed out the email and passed it across the counter. He walked very deliberately back to his desk, sat down slowly, and pointed to his chair, “Take your time, I’ll be right over here when you’re done reading that.” I flashed him a huge smile and replied in my best Valley girl voice, “Perfect, thank you soo much!” Below the counter where the officer couldn’t see see, Victor poked me in the leg and muttered something about not getting us thrown in jail. Whatever. I know their training includes all kinds of intimidation tactics and really, the guy was just doing his job, but still. Rude.
We both scanned the email, which was basically a memo informing officers that as of April 2016, vehicles could be re-imported duty-free as long as they had not been out of the country for more than three years. So, yes, the officer was right, however I still thought we had a case.
I caught the officer’s eye and smiled again, this time twirling my hair in my hand, “Excuse me? I think we’re done reading this now?” I never read Sweet Valley High but that’s how I imagine the characters would sound.
He came over and pointed to the date in the memo. “As you can see, it’s right here. The law is the law, and your car is way out of the 3 year limit, so I’m going to calculate your tax right now, and you guys can just wait here until I’m done.”
It’s true, the car had been out of the country for 6 years. But when something like this is put on the books, any transactions that had taken place before the implementation of the new law are usually grandfathered in. The memo was very dense and full of legalese, so it wasn’t clear whether it was intended to go into effect retroactively. If anything, there was definitely a lot of room for interpretation in the way it is written. Whose authority is it, exactly, to make those interpretations? I offered my opinion to the officer.
“Look, the memo says exactly what I already told you. If you don’t understand, I’d be happy to have my supervisor come over and explain it to you.”
“Oh, if he wouldn’t mind, that would be really helpful!” I gladly accepted his offer. Before he left, the officer reached out and grabbed the memo out of Victor’s hand.
“Actually, do you mind if I hang on to that?” he asked. The officer informed us that this particular law wasn’t “for public consumption,” so no, we couldn’t have a copy.
He went back to his desk and made a phone call, but he spoke quietly so I couldn’t hear what he was saying. I’ll assume it was something along the lines of, “I’ve already been an ass to these people and I’d look really dumb if I was proven wrong at this point, due to my being an ass, so let’s just force them to pay this tax no matter what. On account of I’m such an ass.” Unfortunately, we’ll never know what was truly said.
The supervisor came out and asked Victor to explain everything from the beginning. He did, and the officer said he didn’t have the authority to make a decision in our case, but he would escalate this to his supervisor in Great Falls. It looked like we’d be stuck there for awhile.
The officers made phone calls and sent emails while I read an entire magazine about the hazards of a career in Border Patrol (did you know that rock attacks are a thing? Apparently, people sometimes just go to the border and throw rocks at Border Patrol. Also, there’s a whole scuba division that retrieves sunken drug boats and other contraband, pretty cool!). Finally, the original officer came over with all of our documents.
“I’m gonna give this my stamp of approval today and let you guys be on your way. Just so you know, we are opening a case about this and it will be updated on the website. Sorry for any troubles you’ve had.”
I told Victor to do a burnout in the parking lot, but he refused.
A few hours later we pulled into an AutoZone in Great Falls, MT. Victor bought a tire pressure gauge (the one in the car was inaccurate) and the correct CV clamp tool. He realized the day before that the boot wasn’t actually broken, but the clamp had loosened up enough that it was leaking 26 year old grease, which had pretty much turned to liquid by that point. I’ll let him explain exactly what he did here.
Victor here. This is apparently a common issue with NSXs – the CV grease turns to the consistency of melted ice cream over the years, making sealing it inside the boot next to impossible. On top of that, the original clamp (which I’d replaced the last time I had the wheel off in Golden) loosens over time, leading to a mess which looks like a torn boot, but isn’t. I’d managed to fill the (still intact) boot with new grease and put a new, tighter clamp on with a pair of needle nose plyers, but the old grease was still leaking out by the time we got to Great Falls. The plan was to open it again in Denver, clean out all the old grease, and pack it with new grease. This should get us home until I have time to rebuild the axles properly.
Also around this time I realized that the rear tires, which had plenty of tread on them when we left, were wearing at an alarming rate. There are two alignment specs for the NSX – the original, 1991 version, then a revised 1993 version. The 93 spec came after a class action lawsuit was filed because NSX owners owners were only getting 5-7k miles out of a set of rear tires. After some digging through the paperwork that came with the car, it appears that my alignment was somewhere between the two, causing the rapid tire wear. I called ahead to Denver and had Discount Tire order some new tires, since they’re a weird size (265/35/18) and they’d be hard to find otherwise. Now back to Page.
We stopped for tacos (they make everything better) and then finally checked into our hotel room and called it a day.
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