This maybe a question for Former Lancastrian, but any advice gratefully received.
We (myself, wife & 2 kids (3 & 6) expect to arrive in Canada in mid-August.
We are already landed PR (FSW) - May last year.

We plan to fly Heathrow - Vancouver - Castlegar.

Question 1 - on arrival at Vancouver (as PRs) can we clear immigration through the Canadian arrivals channel rather than the visitor channel?

As this time we are arriving to settle we need to declare Goods to Follow at customs:
Question 2 - If we arrive on a flight that lands around noon (PST), with the last Vancouver - Castlegar departure at 1440, do folks think we have sufficient time to complete immigration, customs formalities, cart 2 kids and excess baggage to the domestic check-in, navigate security again and make the departure time - or will it be very tight time-wise?

I am conscious we will have tired kids, but obviously there will be additional costs in excess baggage (& hotels) if we fly the domestic leg the following day. Notwithstanding carting everything to a hotel for the night and back again!!!

Thanks in anticipation!

Do you have valid PR cards?
If you do then you should be able to use the ABC kiosks as residents even though technically you are not as you didnt establish a residence when you landed.
If no PR card then you join the rest of the sheep inline. Have GTF in a carry on as opposed to a checked bag just in case bag doesn't show up.
Time wise you may or may not have sufficient time as its not an exact science on how many others are waiting to be cleared or processed.

FL - thanks
Yes we have valid PR cards - so that is good to know.

I realise that there is an element of lottery regarding question 2 - it's just to get a feeling and even then things can go wrong - delayed flights etc etc

Thanks again and if anyone has personal experiences of this kind of scenario i would welcome your comments!

There's a map of the entire airport that has 'walking' times between the various terminals. Bear in mind that with two tired children and a heap of baggage you are likely to take twice as long! http://www.yvr.ca/Libraries/Maps/YVR...13_3.sflb.ashx

Is there an earlier flight you could get into Vancouver? My concern would be what other airlines are arriving around the same time - if there are any from Asia or India you could face queues and potential delays. I would also be concerned with the possibility of flight delays getting into Vancouver.

The recommended minimum transfer time for Vancouver is 1 hour 20 minutes, with 2 children and a lot of bags I would personally double that. Whilst I have not done this particular transfer, I have horrible memories of racing from one terminal to another in order to get the only flight that week and only making it because the flight had been delayed. Shudder.

siouxie
Thanks - we realise it's a lottery really - could go our way - might not!
We will probably night stop - in the big scheme of things - a few extra dollars here and there is nothing compared to what has been spent getting to this stage!

Off topic I know, but when we flew into Calgary as two very tired looking adults with three very tired looking kids and a pile of luggage, a very nice lady with a massive golf cart offered to take us to the queue........ well not me as there wasn't enough room........ and I had to lug my wife's luggage as well as mine as there wasn't room for that either..... I'm sure the rest of my family enjoyed the trip to the queue