I cannot abide FB. In response to inquires from my friends, Facebook refused to let me write more than three FRIKKING COMPLETE SENTENCES (I was 'using too many words', it complained). So unless folks want updates like 'I'm fine', you'll have to come here. Sorry, but don't blame me - my ever-so-slightly verbose nature is not the problem.
After taking the time to point that out, I'll go on to say that the only news from the Canadian side is that I'm leaving town tomorrow for a week in the sopping wet dog-hair timber referred to as 'the woods' by townies. Tony told me not to bring trekking poles because I'd lose them in the post-logging regrowth and I'll need both hands to push through it. It reminds me of some of those burned areas on the west side/Madison, sections of which hold the distinction as the only terrain ever to bring me to tears. We'll be venturing out from a Parks Canada government cabin to count snowshoe hare tracks, in exchange for laughable compensation (why does this scenario seem oddly familiar . . ?).
Anyhew, don't look for any verbage from me for a spell. I secretly hope I’ll be able to report a soggy lynx sighting upon my return.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Saturday, February 13, 2010
I made it
Grant me, O Sacred Heart, a steady hand and watchful eye, that none shall be hurt as I pass by . . .
I officially, profusely and wholeheartedly thank Saint Christopher (the patron saint of travelers) and the dude in Bozeman who steered me to the best set of windshield wipers I’ve ever used. Without those two personages, along with the influence of some of the oddest weather since white people started keeping records, I doubt I could have succeeded in my cross-continent journey. Indeed, if I had known beforehand what kind of country my route was to take me through, particularly the jig through the mountains of New Brunswick which was necessary to skirt the practically roadless region of northern Maine, I would have probably not attempted it.
Despite that promise of snowy and ice, I was instead greeted exclusively with two other elements during the trip: water and mud. I was going to take a picture of my truck at one point because so spattered in mud and slush was it that the vehicle no longer appeared white; I carried a roll of paper towels and a bottle of window cleaner.
Alas, the last two days have been characterized by 100kph drives through spitting cold rain, and so the truck appears clean again.
While my friends in Atlanta and my sister in Dallas had to deal with more snow than has ever been recorded thereabouts, and I arrived in the snowiest, cloudiest, windiest city in the Dominion of Canada without having shifted in 4WD once. Now that I’m here, though, I’m sure I’ll be slipping around town tomorrow.
It has been almost a decade since I packed up my life and drove from Florida to Wyoming. Before that, it was Texas, Oregon and California. I have to admit that the whole frikkin’ process seemed a lot easier back then. But there is no denying that this day marks the widest distribution of my life to date. And that ain’t too bad for a guy who didn’t have a passport until 2007.
I officially, profusely and wholeheartedly thank Saint Christopher (the patron saint of travelers) and the dude in Bozeman who steered me to the best set of windshield wipers I’ve ever used. Without those two personages, along with the influence of some of the oddest weather since white people started keeping records, I doubt I could have succeeded in my cross-continent journey. Indeed, if I had known beforehand what kind of country my route was to take me through, particularly the jig through the mountains of New Brunswick which was necessary to skirt the practically roadless region of northern Maine, I would have probably not attempted it.
Despite that promise of snowy and ice, I was instead greeted exclusively with two other elements during the trip: water and mud. I was going to take a picture of my truck at one point because so spattered in mud and slush was it that the vehicle no longer appeared white; I carried a roll of paper towels and a bottle of window cleaner.
Alas, the last two days have been characterized by 100kph drives through spitting cold rain, and so the truck appears clean again.
While my friends in Atlanta and my sister in Dallas had to deal with more snow than has ever been recorded thereabouts, and I arrived in the snowiest, cloudiest, windiest city in the Dominion of Canada without having shifted in 4WD once. Now that I’m here, though, I’m sure I’ll be slipping around town tomorrow.
It has been almost a decade since I packed up my life and drove from Florida to Wyoming. Before that, it was Texas, Oregon and California. I have to admit that the whole frikkin’ process seemed a lot easier back then. But there is no denying that this day marks the widest distribution of my life to date. And that ain’t too bad for a guy who didn’t have a passport until 2007.
Monday, February 8, 2010
On The Road
“Where ya goin’ na, eh?”
“Whoa! You’re a long way, na?”
Loose translation: ‘What the hell are you doing here?’
Polite to a fault but less conscious of personal boundaries, more than a few Canadians have done a double-take at my Montana plates and followed up with questions. When I tell ‘em Newfoundland, I might as well say I’m driving to Mongolia.
Leaving the ol’ GMGM, I plowed through eastern Montana, North Dakota and a confusing amalgam of Minnesota, Michigan and Wisconsin, slowing only as I approached the world’s friendliest border at Sault Ste. Marie. Trying to get information about the Sault was an experience that I’ll have to parody more in the future. More than half a dozen people in the UP, some within 150 miles of the place, proclaimed that they’d ‘never been that way’ or proclaimed no knowledge of the town. I was waiting for a grizzled old man with an eye patch to step out of the shadows and growl, ‘Aye, fair traveler, there be dragons to the east.’
Given the whispers and wide-eyed gasps, I was prepared to drop off the edge of the earth. Instead, I arrived at a border station staffed by bored CBSA agents (the place was almost completely empty). I successfully convinced a uniformed CBSA kid that, yes, I am actually a 39 year-old American going to school in a region of Canada about which he’s probably heard only vague rumors. I then spent a few shamelessly relaxed days in the care of a friend from days past. Tina and her husband Paul fed me, showed me the local sights in the Sault and generally helped me ignore the huge, overwhelming risk that I’m engaged in.
I headed out from the Sault through Ottawa, Montreal and Quebec City. Ottawa and Montreal were, to this small-town rube, intimidatingly large cities while Quebec City was about the same size as Austin (500,000) when I lived there back in the day. It also probably didn’t help that my only familiarity with Ottawa was seeing Mac Hudson fly over its skyline in the Guardian suit (if you’ve never heard of John Byrne or Alpha Flight, just skip that reference). By Monday the 7th, I was out of Quebec and I could once again read highway signage.
I’ll pass through New Brunswick and Nova Scotia on Tuesday. Once I get to Sydney, NS, I’ll leave terra firma for the rock (via a 6-hour ride aboard a superferry). After a few additional days of driving, totaling 8 or 9 days, I should arrive in St. John’s. Not bad time for covering a distance measuring 45% of the planet’s diameter.
In conclusion, then, I have traveled through some of the least populated areas in the United Sates and some of the most populated areas in the Dominion of Canada. And it wasn’t all that easy to tell the difference.
“Whoa! You’re a long way, na?”
Loose translation: ‘What the hell are you doing here?’
Polite to a fault but less conscious of personal boundaries, more than a few Canadians have done a double-take at my Montana plates and followed up with questions. When I tell ‘em Newfoundland, I might as well say I’m driving to Mongolia.
Leaving the ol’ GMGM, I plowed through eastern Montana, North Dakota and a confusing amalgam of Minnesota, Michigan and Wisconsin, slowing only as I approached the world’s friendliest border at Sault Ste. Marie. Trying to get information about the Sault was an experience that I’ll have to parody more in the future. More than half a dozen people in the UP, some within 150 miles of the place, proclaimed that they’d ‘never been that way’ or proclaimed no knowledge of the town. I was waiting for a grizzled old man with an eye patch to step out of the shadows and growl, ‘Aye, fair traveler, there be dragons to the east.’
Given the whispers and wide-eyed gasps, I was prepared to drop off the edge of the earth. Instead, I arrived at a border station staffed by bored CBSA agents (the place was almost completely empty). I successfully convinced a uniformed CBSA kid that, yes, I am actually a 39 year-old American going to school in a region of Canada about which he’s probably heard only vague rumors. I then spent a few shamelessly relaxed days in the care of a friend from days past. Tina and her husband Paul fed me, showed me the local sights in the Sault and generally helped me ignore the huge, overwhelming risk that I’m engaged in.
I headed out from the Sault through Ottawa, Montreal and Quebec City. Ottawa and Montreal were, to this small-town rube, intimidatingly large cities while Quebec City was about the same size as Austin (500,000) when I lived there back in the day. It also probably didn’t help that my only familiarity with Ottawa was seeing Mac Hudson fly over its skyline in the Guardian suit (if you’ve never heard of John Byrne or Alpha Flight, just skip that reference). By Monday the 7th, I was out of Quebec and I could once again read highway signage.
I’ll pass through New Brunswick and Nova Scotia on Tuesday. Once I get to Sydney, NS, I’ll leave terra firma for the rock (via a 6-hour ride aboard a superferry). After a few additional days of driving, totaling 8 or 9 days, I should arrive in St. John’s. Not bad time for covering a distance measuring 45% of the planet’s diameter.
In conclusion, then, I have traveled through some of the least populated areas in the United Sates and some of the most populated areas in the Dominion of Canada. And it wasn’t all that easy to tell the difference.
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