Oh, add to that the time we had to turn up at Calgary Children's hospital when our daughter had a seizure. It went something like this:

Hospital person: Can I see your Alberta health card please?

Us: Er, no. We're from the UK.

Hospital person: No problem, that will be $650 please before we will look at your daughter.

Essentially $650 to get in the door, and then another $250 for treatment. They billed us for the $250, but they wanted the $650 there and then.

Insurance will cover such visits, but you have to pay up front and claim back later. Thank goodness we had a credit card.

I agree with others saying don't bother with Vancover if it's Nova Scotia you want to move to. I visit NS every year so I can give you a rough idea of costs, you might find deals etc so this is just approx. Flight to NS £600 (with Air Canada), car hire £500 (for 2 weeks), budget $80-100 a night for hotels (you'll need more though if you plan to spend the majority of your stay in Halifax), about $50 a day for food/petrol/sightseeing etc. Hope this helps

I dunno, it kinda makes sense. IF she ends up being like most Nova Scotians she'll end up leaving to move west anyway, so at least she'll have an idea of what she's moving to.

True, but she can always check it out at a later date, it's just if she's doing a research trip & is planning on moving to NS it's going to cost her a lot more to visit Vancover too