The Trips that weren't

My summer work term is almost done and I find myself dreaming of another grand adventure before returning to the books. Before I could think clearly I turned to Kayak.com (for all my flight planning needs) and started plugging in locations. Looking at the flight prices, the destinations, the layovers ... the shit I would get to fly over!!! I could go to Dublin? Paris? Casablanca?
Reality soon set in, realizing that I really don't have the time or the money or the people to go to any of these places. It reminds me of how much time I spend dreaming of conquering new territory. With that, I present the trips that weren't.

1. Greenland
What I wanted to do:

I really wanted to friggen go to Greenland. This is probably one of the ones I worked the hardest on.
Greenland is literally just a quick swim away 230KM (land to land) from Canada to mainland Greenland. So as you can clearly see above, I would bus to Montreal and then get a flight to either Labrador City or Iqaluit (Whichever is cheapest) where I would take one of those charter planes that take all the people that want to visit Greenland to the beautiful territory.

The Problem
There aren't charter planes worth of people who want to visit Greenland. As such, there aren't charter flights to Greenland. In fact, there is no way of getting from Canada to Greenland. None. Nothing at all. Here's what I would have had to do.

Bus to Halifax, take ... hang on ... take Iceland Air to Reykjavik (Capital of Iceland) and then take Air Iceland (note the subtle change in airline company) to Greenland. The awkward thing is that the flight from Iceland to Greenland is as expensive as the one from Canada to Iceland. Also it only flies every two days. WHY IS THERE NO DEMAND TO GO TO GREENLAND!!?

If you google "Ferry to Greenland" the second link is this one where a guy asks if there is a ferry from Nova Scotia to Greenland. One helpful response on the same page is "The old ferry didn't carry vehicles, and you had to wear a hat with horns sticking out, and carry a battle ax. It's damned unfortunate that there isn't a ferry today, considering the staggering amount of business and social interaction between the thriving metropolitan areas of Greenland and northern Newfoundland."  (there's no such thing as a stupid question). That being said, there is no ferry from North America or Europe (or Asia surprisingly) to Greenland. I thought I remembered finding one when I made my MS paint picture but I guess not.

Lastly, the only real "feasible" option to get to Greenland is to take a cruise line from Iceland or Norway. Apparently cruise lines have been in and out of the market for years. The popular line now is the Hurtigruten (I feel like if I were a bullie I would threaten people with hurti grutens). I looked at that for a bit, but this doesn't really look like my idea of a cruise:

Woah... this isn't where I parked my car

Also, $5500.

Canadian Bussing Extravaganza

The original plan for my cross America bus trip was for it to be across Canada. I think the real reason I deteriorated away from this plan was because of the NHL playoffs and my chance to see the Predators play. 

The trip took many different forms, but the one stood out as being way more awesomekward than the rest

What I wanted to do

Bus from Fredericton to Montreal to Ottawa to Thunderbay to Winnipeg (take a train to Churchill and back) to Saskatoon to Edmonton to Yellowknife to Whitehorse to Dawsons City, to Kamloops to Vancouver and fly home. 

This was going to be awesome. I was going to discover Canada and the bus would take me through many little towns and I could really get to know the country I live. Also, while I am doing it, why not just nip on up to Churchill Manitoba, the polar bear capital of the world. 

The Problem

That's not how busses work. Mostly. Also taking a train to Churchill is a bitch. The route I would have to take only had 1 big difference. Can you spot it? 

Yeah you can't take a bus from Yellowknife to Whitehorse. You would have to double back down to Edmonton.  One of the most fun things about planning my bus trips was just looking through all the itineraries and seeing just where the heck the bus would take you. Examine this portion of the trip from Edmonton to Whitehorse for example: 

Edmonton -> Whitecourt -> Valleyview -> Grande Prairie -> Dawson Creek -> Fort St.John -> Wonowon -> Buckinghorse -> Fort Nelson -> Toad River -> Watson Lake -> Whitehorse. Or on a map: 

And that's probably about 30% of the stops. The rest are listed but there are no breaks. It's simply to drive into town and check out the gas station and see if it's still standing. 

To be honest, parts of me think that's pretty sweet. Check out all these little communities in a way you never would. But there is something about three days on a bus that just doesn't work for me. Further, they schedule if for you to arrive in Yellowknife at 11 PM and in Whitehorse at 4:25 AM. What am I going to do until Sunlight? Play a lose-lose game of try not to get knifed? 

Finally the last snag is that the train to churchill and back takes three days. Which is just really too long. I mean it would be sweet to do, but it's a trip on it's own. You don't simply ride a train for three days to step out into downtown churchill, squint your eyes to find a polar bear and then leave disappointed. 

Discovering Newfoundland & Labrador

I've flown to St. John's for soccer nationals once but I really didn't get to see the island of Newfoundland or any of Labrador. So I devised a trip that I knew would be amazing. It would be hard to see all of Newfoundland in the 8 day time period I was planning. But surely I could see a lot of amazing stuff. 

The Plan

First and foremost, the plural of ferry is ferries, not ferrys as my ms paint job suggests. Secondly: Fredericton to North Sydney, take the Ferry across drive up the NFLD Pinky to cross the gulf of St. Lawrence on another ferry and then drive up to Labrador City, down to Baie Comeau where I would take yet another Ferry and head back home. 

I wasn't disillusioned on this one: I was going to drive it. You can't do Newfoundland and Labrador on a bus. And I mean that literally: There is no city-city bus service there. I thought this trip was pretty reasonable. Until I started to look into it.

The Problem

Most of the Labrador highway is made of gravel. I didn't know a lot about the drive. I asked some questions on a forum because I knew it was a pretty deserted area and was worried about gas. Here are a couple of quotes from some of the feedback: 

"girlfriend's sister and boyfriend drove from Lab City to Grand Falls-Windsor in the middle of Newfoundland and that alone took around 3 days"

"There are flatbed tractor trailers loaded high with logs and a good rule of thumb for the entire route is to assume these trucks own the road. In essence, they kinda do as there are spots where they simply can't stop for you even if they wanted to."

"this road is surprisingly straight BUT there are several dips that will take you by surprise if you go too fast. Seriously, I've gotten a Dodge Neon airbourne on that [Paved] road and it wasn't on purpose"

Rental companies don't actually allow you to drive their cars on them. And although a somewhat short distance, driving apparently takes forever. Further, sections of the highway will be randomly closed/washed out. They also strongly suggest against driving at night since moose love hanging out there. Big moose too. 

Urg. Why can't they just pave all the roads in the country? Low population or not, what exactly is the government even spending it's money on? This is garbage. 

Thanks for the read!

Photo Sources:

http://www.scantours.com/greenland.htm

http://chezbeeperbebe.blogspot.com

http://www.artistic.ca/dteed/labrador.htm

ttp://www.gov.nf.ca/

http://www.globosapiens.net/jorgesanchez-travelogue/

Getting to Know New Brunswick (Part 4 of 4)

Part 3/4 can be found here

Monday was New Brunswick day and to Celebrate we planned on conquering the highest elevation in the Province. 

We woke up in Inkerman and had way too much to eat at the bed and breakfast. There was just too much good stuff. Unique stuff too, that they insisted we tried long after we were full. I said one last goodbye to the puppies and we hit the road.

Retracing our drive from the previous night, we went passed Grande-Anse to Bathurst where the car was refueled. An hour and a half on a dreadful road later we arrived at Mount Carleton National Park. Last time I was here was the early spring when the park was closed, the roads covered in slush and we almost drove the car into a lake. A story I might try and blog here at a later date. But today was beautiful, and we set on towards the mountain. 

The first hour and a quarter of the hike followed a stream. It was mediocre terrain: not really insane but not a stroll in the park either. It was a gradual hike. A little background for those not familiar: Mount Carleton is the tallest mountain in New Brunswick however Mount Sagamook is just down the road and although ever so slightly smaller it is a much more challenging hike. Sagamook is the one we attempted in the spring. 

Anyway, about an hour and a half in we finally find a fork in the road: Easy route to summit, dangerous route to summit. I was happy to see Laura's enthusiasm for the difficult route matched mine and we headed right. 

What had been a gentle scale turned into a narrow path with rocks crowding both sides. No big deal. Pfft, if this is why this is the difficult way than this is a joke. 

It wasn't. We were out of the trees into a clearing where it became obvious that rocks with green circles lightly painted on them would be our only guide to the top. That being said, the view was starting to shape up. And the occasions where we would turn around to view our progress we got to marvel at the sights. 

                 

                 

                                

Thankfully it started raining as well. Which made us wet and the rocks slippery. It was actually pretty difficult, in a aerobic challenge kind of way, to get over these rocks. The worst part is when we got to the top, of what we thought was the mountain, we were greeted with this:

Despite what the picture suggests, we had to first navigate down and then back up. So close yet so far! You would think they could put a suspension bridge here no? Whatever. At least that hut is probably a McDonald's or something to get some food.

We took a break to bask in our misery, and continued on the final surge. It was no problem for us who had already conquered so much! Unfortunately the hut was not a fast food joint (wish this were the USA :( ). We had to rely on our own food for some re-energizing. We did however run into a special new Brunswick day promotion where we got a coupon for a free shirt.

At the end of this video you can see what we had to climb up

The way down was very easy, it was almost a walking trail. It was downhill and actually quite dull. At the bottom we went to find our t-shirts, I got a fluorescent green shirt and Laura chose a white one. We also went for a quick swim to wash off. There were no crabs in the lake so I even got in for a bit. 

On the drive home we encountered a messy messy storm. Laura kept pointing out the lightning to me, but true to form Lighting is quite fast and by the time she showed me where it was I had missed it. We stopped in Plaster Rock to get some food but the Power was out to the city. Lucky we didn't need gas (as most of the people at the Irving did) because we would have been spending another night away. Perth Andover had power but not really anywhere to eat. In the end I just snacked on whatever was remaining from our several grocery trips and Laura bought a sandwich. 

We got home at 9, and I am quite satisfied to say that I discovered a lot of New Brunswick. Worth it. Very happy about the vacation inside the province. 

Oh wait, some idiot also tried to take me off the road. So I am driving, like just past woodstock right, and  I am in the passing lane probably doing 120 or something reasonable. Anyway I notice that I am passing two cars and the first of which is probably doing 45 KM/H. The car behind him will have to hit the breaks and leave cruise control if I pass. So being the canadian citizen that I am I slow down to let him pull out and pass. But he doesn't do that. Umm ... okay, your call bro. So I speed up, hoping to pass both of them before he has to hit the breaks. So I am in the passing lane, the car doing 45 is still doing 45 and the other guy just has not noticed the speed of this car. He is literally about to drive through the guy. Absolute last minute he looks up and sees that gramps is right in front of him. OH SHIT, Swerves into the passing lane which is currently being occupied by me. I slam the breaks and swerve off the road and he narrowly misses the front of my car. I pass him a bit later and he still seems oblivious to everything. What a douchebag. Worst trip ever. 

Getting to know New Brunswick (part 3 of 4)

If you missed part two, it can be found here

Sunday was a polar opposite of Saturday, which was great because driving 10 hours in the rain everyday wasn't exactly what I signed up for.

After a quick breakfast at our econo lodge in Miramichi we hit the road but didn't make it very far. We stopped at the French Fort Cove park in Miramichi and planned to walk off some of the XL Donair I decided to order the night before. We did the water loop which was whatever. On the home stretch we did get to see some ducks though! The ducks were pretty cool, and very apathetic to our presence. We watched them for 5 minutes, then moved on only to find more ducks which we watched for another 5. As we were leaving the two groups of ducks met up to go on one of their duck adventures.

After the ducks we navigated our way back to the highway heading North up the east coast. Thirty ish minutes of driving lead us to Tracadie where we were just in time for the "Festival de L'eau"! A must see. The main road was blocked off and flowing with pedestrians. The entire village was out for the occasion. Lining the sides of the streets were numerous vendors of a wide range of shit collectibles for sale. There were also many artists trying to sell their CD's. Sadly we did not support their economy and left empty handed. Laura was quite impressed with the bouncy castle set up. Of course there was a weight restriction and we weren't allowed on them... if there was ever a reason to be anorexic ...

So, onwards north. We pass Inkerman, where we would eventually be staying, and continued through Shippagan. We screeched to a stop at the Ecology park in Lameque. Probably one of the most disappointing stops on the trips not as bad as Cape Enrage. We were in the mood for birds, but unfortunately all we got were plants and mosquitoes.

hmmm....

OH LOOK! There it is! Nice find Laura. 

There was plenty of opportunity for birds to present themselves. But sadly we saw more wildlife in the Miramichi park ... and that was free. Laura did see a Bunny though. She was very happy about that. 

Try and find him...

I present to you... nothing at all!

Past Lameque we were getting closer to our destination: the Island of Miscou where we were promised a real lighthouse. We took the single road in Miscou for a long time, getting discouraged as we drove. Was the lighthouse a lie? OH Sweet! It's Lighthouse Road, that's promising! 

Disappointing. 

Off the main road we saw a sign for "Beach". Why not, it was a beautiful day. Expecting a small area of sand and no one there, we were surprised to see that it was actually quite packed. Well ... packed in Miscou terms anyway. The water was nice, but completely overwhelmed by crabs, which I hate, so I politely volunteered to watch our stuff while Laura swam. I tried to take a picture of the giant crabs, but our camera couldn't zoom out enough to get one fully in the shot. 

After an Hour we took off, continuing our search for this lighthouse, that I was now convinced didn't really exist. But, wrong again. The road finally ended, and I think this is one of the few places in the world where you will see a highway turn into a parking lot. Seriously, exactly as it sounds. But, alas, the Miscou Island lighthouse

And the view from up top was pretty good too.

Well that was done, and since the road ended it looked like there was nothing left to see in Miscou. Time to head back to Inkerman to check into our Bed and Breakfast. 

I'm not going to lie to you, the primary rational in selecting this B&B was that it advertised "Two Golden Retrievers". I was not disappointed. Their names were Rousseau and Nanny, and they greeted me at the car!

These guys were awesome. I bartered with the owners to trade the two of them for Laura -- no dice.

Surprisingly, there wasn't much to do in Inkerman. So we decided to visit Caraquet for supper. I got my second Lobster roll of my trip, and Laura decided to really indulge in coastal food by ordering a Lasagna ...

To end the night, we caught the Sunset in Grande Anse. It was a wonderful ending to the day. We went to sleep shortly after as we had a mountain to defeat in the morning! 

/End of Part 3

Getting to Know New Brunswick (Part 2 of 4)

If you haven't read Part 1, you can take a look at it here first

Excessive rain greeted us in the morning threatening to ruin a day of driving and beach stopping. The goal was to get out of the B&B for 9 so we could be in Fundy before High Tide. However a slow breakfast lead to a late start. The rainy conditions and unsurprisingly awfully maintained road from Saint Martins to Sussex upped the driving time more than necessary and by the time we got to Alma it was still raining, 50 minutes away from high tides and not worth getting out of the car.

We went onwards to take the back roads into Moncton. Stopping on the way at Cape Enrage, probably the most disappointing part of our journey. We had to fork over 4.50 each to get in. There was a zipline that cost 17 dollars to do and looked very very dull (in my opinion). There was also a lighthouse that you couldn't walk up or anything. It was simply to look at. The view was fine I guess.

We did absolutely everything we could to get our moneys worth before getting back in the car and gunning it out of Cape Ensuckrage (mature joke!). We entered Moncton through the Riverview road which left me completely disoriented. Took me about 30 minutes to understand where I was and find the highway to Sackville, where we found the beginning of our new "road" for the trip: The Acadian Coastal Route.


Again the now torrential downpours made this road difficult to enjoy. Hydroplaning was frequent. There were a few planned stops on this drive, at beaches and the such, but because of the rain and the lost time we just motored all day through New Brunswick's Southern Francophone communities. We drove through Kouchibouguac National Park, but again didn't stop.

Finally at around 8 30 PM We picked up some Pizza in Miramichi, where we would spend the night at the Econo Lodge. Now I must say this hotel wasn't anywhere near as sketchy as some of the hotels I stayed at on my USA trip, but it was definitely odd. We didn't have any toilet paper. The overhead lamp was just barely still attached to the wall and one of the door locking mechanisms was ... well it wasn't going to be locking any doors that's for sure. Oh well, at least we weren't there for long.

At about four AM, the room above us livened up and we're making some sort of drug deal or something. Really inconvenient timing.

I promise, part 3 is much better, as we only had one hour of necessary driving before we could enjoy the day!

/end part 2

Getting to know New Brunswick (part 1 of 4)

Anyone who saw my "in the last year" post understands that I get around pretty easy. I barely have standards. But earlier this summer I thought that for all I have seen, I have not gotten to know my native province and the only one I have ever lived in. So, this past weekend we decided to drive around the NB coast. Seeing many of the communities that we always blow by on the highway. Here are some bits and snippets!

Day 1

We left Fredericton at 4 30, for the touristy town of Saint Martins - a place I had only kind of heard of but that Laura was enthusiastic about.

We rolled in about an hour and a half later. I had no idea what was in Saint Martins. Honestly, all I knew about it came from this video.

But apparently this Saint Martins is not in the Caribbeans and renowned for it's beach right next to the airport. Sigh, oh well.

Instead we found the Fundy trail foothills, which is code for the poorman's fundy national park. We decided to check it out anyway when all of a sudden OH SHIT CAVES!

I squealed the car to a halt and we both jumped out (Dukes of Hazard style) and headed to the caves. The large wet rock beach screamed sprained ankle and our run turned into cautious stepping. We also had to navigate across a fast flowing, large stream to get to the caves. All challenges that were easily overcome though and we were soon two of few who had found their way to the depth of the cave.

We decided to make the most of our effort to get to this side of the stream and we went for a wander around the area. Unfortunately the tide was just about in, so there wasn't much to see. We did make our way over some interesting seaweed and some over medium sized rocks. It was more thrilling than it sounds.

By this point we were quite bored had conquered all that there was to conquer and decided to head back to the car. It was time to find our lieu de residence for the night and get some food.

Saint Martins was surprisingly booked solid. I was able to squeeze us in to this fancier than we deserved bed and breakfast right in the heartbeat of downtown Saint Martins. We were greeted by a startled elderly British lady who was surprised to see clients under the age of 40. She was a great women who showed us to our room for the night.

Oddly, these are the blurriest pictures of the trip. The ones of an immobile room. Oh well.

After settling down we went out to grab a quick bite to eat and actually hit up the fundy foot trails. Only to find out they were closed. Nothing of value was lost.

We called it a night as we had a big day of driving and "adventure" ahead of us.

/end of part 1

The best 365 days of my life.

June 21st Leave for Bangor
June 22nd Leave Bangor for Johanesburg South Africa
June 23rd Arrive in South Africa
June 24th Italy vs Slovakia
June 25th Spain vs Chile (Pretoria)
June 26th Wildlife Reserve

June 27th Argentina vs Mexico (Round of 16)

June 28th Brazil vs Chile (Round of 16)

June 29th Fly from Johanesburg to Bangor
June 30th Arrive in Fredericton after 21 hours of flying, 3 hours of driving. Get a ticket at the last set of lights before my house for going too late on a yellow. Damn.

"When the universe looks on with indifference, laugh, and shout back "Fuck you!". Remember that to fight meaninglessness is futile, but fight anyway, in spite of and because of it's futility."

August 18th Visited Montreal to see a good friend. Found out I was too short to be a professional male model
August 23rd Returned from Montreal
August 24th Said Goodbye to the first car I was ever allowed to drive. Bertha, you are missed.

August 28th Leave on American Trip 1. Spend night in Buffalo (18 hours of driving)

August 29th MBL Game in Cleveland, Spend night in Chicago (10 hours of driving)
August 30th Sears Tower, Full day in Chicago

August 31st Drive Chicago to Hot Springs South Dakota (15 hours of driving)
September 1st Mount Rushmore, Spend night in Yellowstone National Park (13 hours of driving)
September 2nd Yellowstone Bisson, First KFC Double Down ever, Night in Missoula Montana (9 hours of driving)
September 3rd Arrive at the Gorge Day 1 of DMB (10 hours or driving)

September 4th Day 2 of DMB at the Gorge. Got wasted and sang Bloodhound gang at obnoxious volumes

September 5th Day 3 of DMB at the Gorge, Leave for Seattle
September 6th Fly out of Seattle, headed home.

September 7th Move into New Apartment with first roommate Eric Sloan
September 10th Celebrated my first Beer and Kraft Dinner Friday
September 21st Elected President of Speed Skate New Brunswick

October 7th - 11th Octoberfest in Calgary, last big ST SpeedSkating meet of my career
October 18th KFC introduces Double Downs to Canada
October 22nd Attend a Political Science pub crawl on a whim, meet my Girlfriend for the next 7 months (and counting)

October 24th First date. Forgot to tell her it was my birthday
October 30th First SSNB Board Meeting in Moncton

November 15th Have my first Big Mac ever.
November 18th Made it "Official" with Laura

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be."

December 17th - 19th Long track Competition in St. Foy for CWG trials

December 31st Spend New years in Style: playing video games at home with the lady. Booyah.

January 7th-8th-9th Long Track Masters Nationals in Halifax. Manhandled Steve at Skating

February 11th, 12th, 13th Attend CWG in Halifax as President of SSNB

February 14th Googoo dolls concert for valentines day

February 15th Attempt to Return to CWG's but crash car on the drive up. Oops.

March 3rd Leave for England
March 4th - March 12th England, see Two English Premier League games. Wonderful trip with my sister(in spirit) See a Castle. London.

March 13th - Purchase a BlackBerry. First new phone in 5 years
March 27th - Attended the CIS finals at the Aitken Center

"Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid."

Trip 2

April 13th Get Kijiji Ride Share from Fredericton to Montreal
April 14th Train from Montreal to New York City
APril 15th Bus from NYC to Washington DC and then to Raleigh North Carolina
April 16th BUs from Raleigh to Nashville Tennessee
April 17th See the Predators Playoff Game in Nashville
April 18th Fly from Nasvhville to Pheonix AZ
April 19th Shuttle from Pheonix to Flagstaff to Grand Canyon, double back and stay the night in Williams AZ

April 20th Round trip to Grand Canyon on the train.

April 21st Return to Flagstaff. Board night train to Los Angeles
April 22nd Spend time in LA and Hollywood before heading to Anaheim for Playoff Game (ANA vs NSH), make it onto a History will be made video

April 23rd Take Train from Anaheim to Portland.
April 25th Spend day in Portland, visit worlds largest Forrest inside city limits

April 26th Travel to Seattle.
April 27th Spend day in Seattle, visit the needle, walk along River. Have coffee from worlds oldest starbucks
April 28th Fly to Calgary, abandon flight in Vanconver, go to NSH vs VAN playoff game

April 29th Bus to Calgary

April 29th, 30th Hang out in Calgary
May 1st Return home, happy to be back.

May 14th Re-elected as SSNB President

June 11th - June 12th Rimouski
June 15th - June 18th Calgary for Speed Skate Canada AGM


The most amazing year of my life. Thank you to all who were involved.