OH, CANADA!!

Kirby and I used to go to Calgary pretty regularly when we worked for a different company, but for the last 4 1/2 years, we haven't been to Canada at all. This week, we got a load going to Creighton, Saskatchewan. We picked up the load in Baton Rouge, LA. We had no idea where Creighton was located until we got our handy road atlas out, and then we got quite a shock. Creighton is about 600 miles north of the US border. We immediately went to weather.com to see if we were going to have a problem with winter driving conditions (otherwise known as snow). The forecast said Monday's temperature would go from 2 up to 8 degrees. Thank goodness that was celcius. Several celcius to fahrenheit converters are available on the internet, so we ran the numbers and felt much more comfortable with a temperature range of 35 up to 46 degrees. The weather forecast actually called for snow on Monday morning, turning to rain, but thankfully, it was only cloudy while we were there.

Off we went, crossing the border from North Dakota into Manitoba with no problems. Our paperwork had a bar code on it and the Canadian border person scanned it and asked us a few questions, then sent us on our way. We had a little snow as we drove through Winnipeg, but nothing sticking to the ground, so we were just enjoying the scenery and heading north (or nord as the Canadian signs say).

It took a while before we realized that the scenery for the past hundred miles or so hadn't changed from a two lane road with no shoulder, lined on both sides with pine trees. Apparently, Canadians have very large bladders because they don't seem to realize that people appreciate a rest area every once in a while. We went through two or three small villages during the next 500 miles, but none had room for a truck to pull over to get food or fuel. Lucky for us, we always carry some sandwich fixings and lots of bottles of water. Unfortunately, we don't carry extra fuel for the truck.

The good news is, the farther north you go, the more frozen lakes you get to see. That sort of breaks up the monotony of a two lane road with no shoulder, lined on both sides with pine trees. Until about the 25th frozen lake, then that becomes the new monotony.

By the time we arrived in Creighton, we were down to about 1/4 tank of fuel. We can usually go about 150 miles on that much fuel, but we were 600 miles from the border!! It was a bit of a dilemma. At one point we thought about simply settling down in Creighton, because not only can you not get fuel in Canada, you can't get a cell phone signal to call for help either!!!

Then things really got bad. We saw a service station that had diesel fuel, so we pulled in. But we learned that you had to be a member of the co-op to fuel there. No one in Canada was being co-operative. On top of learning that we could not get fuel, we were also told that the sand plant to which we were supposed to deliver our load was actually not in Creighton, but another 80 kilometers north (that's 50 more miles!!!). Now we're thinking "this is not funny anymore."

We travel the extra 50 miles. Our turn off was clearly marked. We made the turn. Now we are on a dirt road. I am not kidding. It was 10 more miles on a dirt road. We arrived about midnight, so we got into our cozy sleeper to spend the night and wait to deliver our load. However, being low on fuel, we didn't want to leave the truck running for 8 hours. Remember that weather forecast?? It gets cold in that bunk when the outside temperature is 2 (even if you keep telling yourself it really is 35). I think that's the first time I ever saw Kirby sleep with a jacket on. Finally, the sun comes up and we check in and we deliver our load. We're almost as good as the post office - "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds."

We have just enough fuel to get back to Creighton, but now we have new information about a place where we can actually get fuel with American money. Armed with a credit card and directions to Petro-Canada, we squeeze into the station with our big truck. But wait, how many liters of fuel does it take to go 600 miles at 7.5 miles to the gallon??? We're back in algebra class only it's metric!! We must have made a pretty good guess at the fuel, because our low fuel warning light came on as we crossed back into the US.

It was quite an interesting trip. I'm sure we would do it again, now that we know what to expect. I did take some pictures with a disposable camera, but I haven't had them developed yet. If they turn out OK, I'll post one. More than one isn't necessary, because they are all alike. It's a two lane road with no shoulder, lined on both sides with pine trees, and occasionally you get to see another frozen lake.