Hello lovely readers, I’m back!
Flying in the face of all of my doubts, both the car and the relationship survived the road trip. Word to the wise: If someone says lets drive a classic car 5000 KM, it’ll be fun! And then proceeds to pack a suitcase full of spare parts and tools THIS IS A TRAP.
Okay, okay.
A fun trap full of adventure and panicked moments spent petting the dashboard of the car whispering ‘it’ll be fine, it’ll be fine” with rising levels of desperation, but a trap none the less. You see, at the outset of said trip I was promised the opportunity to antique my way across Canada and finally get a chance to see all of the things you don’t get a chance to see when making the trip solely as a means of transportation and not some grand adventure. What did I actually get to see? Every Napa and hardware store between Sussex, New Brunswick and Okotoks, Alberta. On the bright side, I now have the formulaic layouts of Home Depot, Canadian Tire, Wal-Mart and Bumper – to – Bumper memorized for future maximum efficiency.
Let me list to you the ‘hiccups’ we experienced along the way:
- Supplier included the wrong caps for the fuel injection system, had to wait until after the bank holiday to purchase new ones – 3 day delay
- Discovery of an improper join on the fuel line – 1 day delay (but well worth avoiding assured disaster on this particular safety nightmare)
- Header gasket leak – 1 day delay
- Blown breaks… at 2 am, in the dark, on a VERY steep hill (thank goodness for being able to gear down)! – 3 hour delay with some lovely reading by a lake
- The sad death of a power steering pump – 1 day delay
- The absolute annihilation of a muffler whilst passing a semi, followed by a 5 hour drive at maximum decibels because this is northern Ontario at 5:30 PM and everyone has rolled up the sidewalks. No delay, but for the next two days all we could say was WHAT? because, you know, the ears were still ringing
- Only to be followed by the discovery that said muffler was WELDED into position by the previous owner (who wants to use those nice little gaskets for easy replacement anyways?) – 6 hour delay
- And finally, one over-heated engine thanks to a radiator packed full of those fat, juicy Manitoba bugs at 8:00 PM on the Sunday before I was meant to return to work
Yes, that is The Ember in the Ashes sitting on the dash…
By day two of this adventure it was pretty clear that things were going all kinds of sideways, so we tossed the original plan of secondary highways, quaint antique shops, and taking nerdy pictures next to the World’s Biggest Nickel and the Birth Place of Winnie the Pooh were tossed out the window (or maybe they were sucked out, the didn’t seal properly which lead to more than a few humours moments of scrambling to get the beach towels in position whilst staying in motion down the highway because more water would leak in if we were stationary).
It wasn’t all disaster though, I managed to convince the fell that we HAD to make a few stops along the way. Granted, I think he was caught really off guard by the fact that I hadn’t yet had a meltdown despite being a week behind schedule without any sightseeing, so he was happy to oblige. We hit up Fundy National Park, the Tobermory ferry crossing on the Chi-Cheeman, Kekabaka Falls, the Worlds Longest Covered Bridge, and few random waterfalls that I saw last minute as roadside attractions along the way.
Needless to say, there was hardly enough coffee to keep me peppy and functional through this adventure. By the time we got home I needed some time to get over our vacation, hence the extended hiatus, and now I’m finally ready to get back it. Because through all of this I was able to read a lot! Since my useless shaky hands are no use at vehicular repair I got to kick back and dive into my #RedHotYASummer. It was fantastic. I took 11 books with me, and ended up reading 19 thanks to a back country gas station with a book swap outside the ladies room (I don’t think I was every so happy to be broken down).
Not knowing how things were going to shape out with the trip, followed closely by the start of a new academic year at my uni, I have only signed up for a moderate number of blog tours. Thankfully, this will leave lots of room to share the joy from my road trip reading.
And the best part? We’re already talking about taking the Mustang down the California coast next summer.
Carry on my friends, carry on.
Title: Birth of The Mortokai
Author Bio – Currently residing in London, England, D.G. Palmer writes in the Spec Fiction genre, using his imagination to create vivid worlds and captivating characters.
MiniMac Reviews 