On the Road Again (heading east) #6

It was almost 4:30 when I felt rain drops. Fortunately at about the same time as I was starting to stuff my sleeping bag into my pack, I heard Allen starting to move around in the truck.Two or three minutes the door opened and I got in. We said good morning and we were off. I barely had time to run my fingers through my beard before we were on the highway. At some point during the all too brief night I had looked up and noticed some stars. I was excited in that it meant that the sky was clearing and that the smoke was gone. However my excitement was premature and by the dawn's early light it was clear that the smoke would visible for most of the day. I decided to bypass Canmore and head straight through to Calgary.

By just after 7:00 I was standing by a bus stop somewhere in the outskirts of Calgary waiting for a bus that would take me downtown. As it happens so often when I leave a driver, my goodbye to Allen was brief and I suspect did not adequately thank him for the great ride.But I had a bus to catch and he had a delivery to make. I think he was planning on dropping of the equipment and then heading back to Vancouver as soon as he could. With any luck, he could have been home by late that night.

I have in the past, expressed somewhat unfavourable opinions of the Calgary bus system and the drivers. Perhaps I should apologize. It is a great system once you master it, and I have. I got downtown, got on the right C train and then got off at Rundle Station. The number 48 bus got me to the the east side of town and I was ready to hit the road again. But I was not ready psychologically. The trip had been too fast. I had not, because of the smoke been able to say good bye to the Rockies. For me being in Calgary heading east means that my summer is over. Being  in Calgary means that I have to grow up a little bit and get back to that other world I inhabit for nine months of the year. I, quite frankly, did not like it.

It is a relatively long walk from the last bus stop in Calgary to the outskirts of town. Fortunately the road passes by a mall and so I stopped for breakfast. At McDonald's! It seemed to be the only place open. It is quick, the food, especially after not having eaten for 30 hours, tastes OK and I knew no one would care or even notice if I cleaned myself up in their bathroom. Besides I needed time to acclimatize to be on flat land. Still I was on a roll and I did not want to waste the luck that had been coming my way, so after doing the best I could with my appearance and eating the breakfast far too quickly, I was off again.

The weather was gray and somewhat dismal. People on the train had been complaining about the smell of smoke and newspapers had the forest fires as the lead story. It was a lot better than in Rockies, but it was still quite noticeable. The dull looking skies matched my mood. The road construction that has been going on for years, and which has sometimes made it difficult to get to the Trans-Canada has been almost finished and so it was much easier walking.

By just after 8:30 my thumb was stuck out on the side of the road. Part of me was rather pleased with myself. I had, on the way west, got through Calgary with no problems and now I had gone east with similar ease. I had gotten some great rides without a lot of waiting and 24 hours after leaving Whistler I was on the other side of Calgary. It looked as if my trip east was going to be as fast as my trip west.

My first ride was to Strathmore which is less than a hour from Calgary. But it was a good start. My driver was an older man driving a big pickup. He worked near Fort McMurry and was just down visiting family. For most of the time we discussed/argued gun control and other issues that frequently seem to divide the country. I certainly understood his point of view although I may have shaken his gun control stance just a touch when I mentioned that a significant proportion of murders happen with families and were done using a gun. There was not enough time to cover all that we could have.While some of my friends on the west coast might have thought him a bit of a "red neck", he wasn't. He was just another Canadian who had a point of view. He was willing to explain those points of views and he was certainly ready to listen to mine. I enjoyed his company. By 10:15 I was on the other side of Strathmore waiting for a ride.

It was cool with a nasty wind so I put on my bright orange waterproof wind jacket. I don't like wearing it as it is completely water proof and therefore I sweat in it. But it does keep me dry and warm. I stood in that spot for a long time. Almost for three hours. Three hours compared to other years was not really a long time but this year the traveling had been so good it may have be the longest up to that point that I stood in one spot. But finally a car stopped. It was a older but mint condition Mercedes.

My driver whose name was Josh was a doctor who specialized in palliative care. He was going to Medicine Hat and wanted to talk to someone to help the time go by faster. For a ride to Medicine Hat, which was two and a bit hours down the road, I would have talked about anything. And we did. In fact we talked about so much that I can't remember much of the conversation. I think that is partially because the good doctor was a bit scattered - we bounced from topic to topic - never really finishing a conversation. Perhaps he was a bit starved for company or perhaps he was just one of those folks who needed to bubble over - talking about a myriad of things.

I am not even too sure what his history was. He seems to have moved around a lot and worked in a number of medical fields. But we talked about the great car ( that he had bought second hand off the proverbial lady who had only driven it to church), his kids, his job, schools and whether they worked or not and  of course my life on the road. In spite of the chaotic nature of the conversationl it was entertaining and fun. With all due respect to my other drivers and friends - it had been awhile since I had had a semi-academic discussion. So it was fun to have to think and talk about things a little more clearly.

There were a couple of times when he touched my knee - all within context of making a point but I was a little bit uncomfortable. After the second time I happened to mention that I was somewhat tactile senitive and he never did it again. That may have just been a coincidence. He copuld have been one of the folks who like to touch. He was glad to drive me to the east end of Medicine Hat which meant that I did not have to either walk through the city or to figure out their bus system. By just after 3:00 I was ready to look for another drive.