journey east

June 2, 2006

I'm not sure how far we travelled today. I'll look in the morning.
GT and I had a 9:30 departure from North Vancouver and a 6:30 arrival at the campground in Yoho. We stopped along the way: in Kamloops for coffee and GT had to pee; in Revelstoke for chili for me and a sandwich for GT at Tim Horton's, and we got two donuts, and I had to pee this time, and we needed gas, and GT and I both needed something to drink; in Golden for beer, ice and socks. The socks were for GT.

Funny he would wait until Golden to mention his sock deficiency. It was late in the day and choice in Golden was probably not going to be great. I predicted a Saan department store, and sure enough we found one on the way out of town. We were the only customers in the store and were matched one-to-one by staff.

Finally, around 6:30 in the evening we arrived in Field and set up camp at Kickinghorse campground. Derek arrived shortly after we did. We pitched our tents and tonight I will christen my MEC Wanderer2. I wish Meaghan was here.


On the fifth try we got a fire going. The wood in the lot was a little damp, so having a fire log helped as a last resort.

It's late now. In the tent listening to train running the CP line west to east. It's started to rain. The pattering of drops at the fly magnified like a drum. Minutes pass and the trembling of the engine pauses - passing into the first corkscrew of the spiral tunnel at the base of Mt. Stephen.

Our third annual excursion coincided with my permanent departure from Vancouver. I've made the trip to Field many times and didn't feel inclined to take any photos along the way. The one above is one of two taken that day. For my entire trip east there were only two other days I didn't take photos. One would be in a few days, while camping in Yoho, and the other on the long haul to Winnipeg.

GT is a good person to travel with. No hassle. He slept a good chunk of the way up. I still giggle at the thought of letting the car drift onto the rumble strips at the road's shoulder while screaming "we're all gonna die, we're all gonna die." I never actually screwed up the courage to do it. GT is a pretty reasonable person, but when faced with death who knows what a man is capable of. Now I wish I had done it. The car upholstery is Scotch Guarded.

Along the Coquihalla highway we saw a black bear sitting on a hill at the side of the road. It was watching the traffic from just the other side of a wildlife fence. Although cruel, it would have been a great opportunity to test the effectiveness of our bear spray.