2019 On The Road Again #2

The list of actors on the train could have been taken from a poor version of an Agatha Christie type novel. There was a rather noisy dad with his 10-year-old daughter It was quite clear that he was not the primary parent of the little girl. He had that semi patronizing tone of voice where the words sound as if he was caring, considerate and inclusive, but the subtext was - " I really do not know what to do with you but you had better listen to me". At some point, early on in the trip, he was talking to his girlfriend on his cell phone. He was trying to convince her that she and he should move into together. If I had been her I would have run as fast as I could in the other direction. One of his comments was that if they lived together, they would not fight as much! He also promised to pay his share of the rent but his name should not be on the lease. Father and daughter were on the train until Winnipeg.

There were eight adolescents who were dressed in reasonable nice/non-camping clothes who were being supervised by two older young men. They were generally well behaved and respectful to others in the car. They did not, however, interact with anyone else. The counsellors seemed to have a large container with food and I don't remember any of the young people drinking anything other than water. I think they were off to some sort of adventurer camp where, perhaps as junior counsellors, they were going to teach some water sports etc. They got off at some town a few hours east of Winnipeg.

There was a middle age mom with a 10-year-old boy who seemed well behaved. A couple of times this mom spoke to the above dad and was rather sweet to the young girl. She seemed to be quite well organized and from what I could see, never had a disagreement with her son. They too got off in Winnipeg.

There were as well a number of middle age or older couples who we very quiet and other than the usual trips to the bathroom or the take out place - seemed to spend their time dozing or in a few cases playing games on their cell phones. There were two women in front of me who had met on the train. One was perhaps in her mid-20s and the other was quite a bit older. They chatted a bit about television, cable etc but certainly they neither talked loud enough for me to hear whole conversations nor did they talk that often.

There were three young women travelling together who seemed to be very excited about getting to Winnipeg in time for the fireworks. I think one of them was local and the other two were visiting for the weekend. Of all of the people in the car, they were the most animated.

There was also a woman travelling with her two children and her husband. I noticed her because she cut in front of everyone in the food line up and willfully ignored mine and other person's suggestion that we were lining up for a reason and that she needed to wait her turn. It may have been that her English language skills were poor but I believe that in most part of the world people lining up means the same thing. Even when she did join the line at the end, she kept on going up to the front to ask a question of the cook.

All in all, it was a boring trip - the scenery was, as always, amazing. Everything was green and lush looking. The creeks and rivers were full to the brim, the lakes glistened in the sunlight and even the little towns we went through looked almost inviting.