Traveller

I left with the sun behind me, barely risen. It was early, yet I was wide awake, and yet had been for most of the night. I always feel like that before a new journey, a new adventure. Even something as mundane as driving takes on new dimensions when it's pushed to new limits.

I go over potential routes, shortcuts, stopping-off points, rest areas, and points of interest. The route is laid out once, twice, three times. But I never end up following it anyway. Secondary highways are my guilty pleasure. Little to no traffic. Nothing but farmsteads and median lines.

Gas is always a concern, and it's times like this that I'm reminded that my current vehicle, though trusty and powerful, cannot last in these new times. Gas is too expensive to be filling up every three or four hours.

It's always amusing to pull up to gas stations in small towns and old settlements. Often times the gas pumps were installed in the 70's or 80's, and still operate a manual switch. Most people are completely perplexed by the simple machinery. What hath the digital age wroth? Cannot we pump our own gas?

Whitecourt was a new experience. Divided highway that seemed to run forever. The nearest vehicles were a hundred clicks behind me and a hundred ahead. The only landmarks were bumps in the road, and the odd industrial mega-complex. The further north I went, the more garish they became. I suppose, in their drive to promote business, many of the more remote towns allowed big industry to set up shop wherever they could find the room.

I don't think they understood that seeing a belching, steel monster upon entering a town for the first time is not a good way to promote tourism.

Desolace followed. Unending fields, trees, valleys, and of course, the road. Despite my assumption that I was going somewhere remote, the road stayed constant, and in good repair.

Six hours in, fatigue was starting to set in, but the worst was over. Valleyview, then Nampa passed on my way to my destination. Finally, I arrived in Peace River, an unexpected jewel, hidden on the riverside. Grimshaw, upon the other side of the river, lay a mere half-hour away, but it would be here where I'd have my first proper meal away from home.

A weekend of laughing and drunkenness ensued. I'm reminded in my sobriety that good friends, despite distance, are always friends. We all grow old, but in a way, that just makes our old jokes even funnier. And allows for some new ones too.

The time to go came too soon, and again, I was packed and on the road. This time the sun was on my face, a final good-bye before it too was swallowed up by an endless wall of fog, starting around Ponoka and dogging me the whole way home.

I was thinking the weather was about to fail when, just before the city limits, the fog broke, and between to jaws of clouds, the sun sat, red and blazing, staring down right on me as I rolled in home.

What a trip.