I'm green with envy...here, people have been jailed for illegally importing R12!
We have a peculiar government mentality here, and an even stupider segment of the populace that backs them up. In complete disregard of the fact that every air conditioner and refrigerator is full of R12, the stuff has been illegal to sell or import for years now, but it's OK to keep it in your car's system - just next to impossible to buy, so we
have to convert if it leaks.
I once checked on the price in nearby Maine for an R12 recharge, and it would've been about the same as converting to the then popular 134A, so I didn't.
My local shop replaced mine with something called 'AC-Freon R414B (59)' this past spring. I'm scared to know what the hell that is, but it's worked well for me over the summer, which of course, wouldn't have been as warm as even New England was. I don't know why 134A is no longer in vogue here.