Rain. Mountains. Maniacs. Oh My!

*** continued from previous post ***


By now the traffic from the boat is long gone, blasting at a break-neck speed to God knows where. I couldn't worry about them. We had our own place to go, and we were WAY behind schedule.

Nothing to do but get back on the road.

For the next two hundred miles, (or 8 thousand km in Canadianeese), we wind our way through some of the most beautiful scenery in the world. Nothing compares to the Canadian Rockies. They are unimaginably beautiful. The size, the sheer granite cliffs, the peaks reaching into the clouds lend an aura of antiquity that is rarely experienced elsewhere.

I would have probably enjoyed the scenic grandeur much more had the deluge from the Sky God not returned with a vengeance. But it gets better because what party would be complete without rain's other two friends? Fog and mist. Certainly not this one. Rain, fog, mist, and horribly, horribly wet roads. Oh! Did I mention through all of this splendor of nature that we were on the Trans Canadian highway which evidently is THE ONLY FRICKING ROAD IN CANADA???

So, if by enjoying the scenery you mean traveling at 80 miles an hour through mountain passes with heavy traffic tail-gating you at every turn while riding through a lake, then yeah - this was a stroll in the park.

You have to understand that I was concentrating so hard on keeping the bike upright and on the road that much of this portion of the trip is a blur. So, if I'm a tad scant on details you'll have to forgive me. At some point in the future I may be able to access the memories through hypnosis, but I seriously doubt it.

To give you the flavor of this leg of the journey you only need three words, a mantra so to speak. Learn them and repeat them for the next 4 hours.

Rain. Mountain. Maniacs.

Yet, as I've come to learn, every dark cloud may have a silver lining, but it also has a much darker - and definitely evil - core. In fact, I've come to understand that the 'silver lining' much ballyhooed in lyrics and prose is actually a tin-foil hat for the cumuli-nimbus bunch. Dark clouds are, straight off their rocker, toys in the attic, monkeys in the fridge, bees in the glove box, fundamentalist Christian women with eyes open WAY to wide banging on your front door because you just happened to leave your 8 foot 'Christ on a Stick' neon "WWJD? He'd pick up some harlots and PARTY LIKE HELL" sign turned on and it's causing a row at Easter Services - bat-shit crazy.

These Canadian clouds would just not stop hammering home their point. Whatever that was. Oh yeah. . .it was "LET'S KILL THE GUYS FROM THE STATES. LOL". Frickin' clouds typing in all caps and using leet. I hates 'em.

I thought of home. It was nothing but a distant memory.

Right then I knew one thing for certain: if we survived this vacation Mom was going to kill me.

And honestly, I couldn't blame her.





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And so ends chapter 4 of this tale. Hope you're enjoying it so far. :)

David


*** the journey continues tomorrow with Chapter 5 - 'The Road To Hell Is Paved With Canadians ***