Volume 6: Pete in Canada Part 14. Beaver Las Canada. 1 Continent, 2 Blokes, Infinite Weird Sh*t

Day 31 – Calgary to Banff

Today we were to do what the Canadian forefathers of the west were famous for; the road trip. In their days it was fill the wagon full of beer and get some fresh horses, in our day it was fill the car with beer and get some petrol. Today was the third time we would visit Budget rent a car, and the third time we were given a different price. We were served by some young smart ass named Ashman or Askman or as he was soon to be referred to, Asshole. He said it was going to cost us $2900 for the privilege of driving one of their fine automobiles to Vancouver. Young and incompetent; very good friends and never far from each other. Young Assman went so far as to say he had a legally binding contract with us as soon as he printed our application. I gently reminded him that no such contract would exist until we had signed it, whilst I refrained from telling him if I wanted a unilateral decision I would head south of the border. Brad’s frustration was starting to boil over as he tried to inform Assmonkey that the boss the day before had given us the deal for $1700. So frustrated was Brad that he asked me to take over all negotiations before he said or did something which might damage the deal, like jump the counter and beat Asswipe senseless while I held him down. Assbandit forced us to literally paint him a portrait on canvass before he acknowledged that the ugly four-eyed store manager even existed, before he eventually called her to confirm the price (of all the days she had to take off, this had to be the day!). Assmuncher on the verge of killing the deal, finally closed it not before some “additional charges” somehow bought the cost to $2300. That almost inflamed tensions again, but I just wanted to get this road trip started so we signed the papers, let Assclown make us wait another 10 minutes as he pulled his pud out back, and we were eventually on our way in our new Pontiac.

The first stop of the day was of a course liquor store on the outskirts of Calgary where we picked up 54 cans of beer, comprised of a 30 pack and a 24 pack which came with a nice little beer cooler. The beer was Molson Canadian and would become the official beer of the Beaver Las Canada trip.

I’m guessing it was about a half hour out of Calgary when we started following a truck which was now slowly delivering its load of small stones across much of the Trans Canada Highway 1. It was like we’d entered an asteroid belt, with stone flying all around us. One hit the windscreen and bounced off, but before I could say “Lucky that didn’t do any damage” another one hit high in the middle of the windscreen and created a big crack. Brad slowed to let the asteroid belt on wheels drive off to create a safe distance. It was a few moments later as we inspected the damage that I coined the phrase “F*#k it! It’s a rental car!”, a phrase that would be used many times when the car was a chance to be damaged. The amount of grief that Budget had given us that morning almost made me happy damage had been done to the car, and that that $600 of “additional charges” would all be mostly consumed by them paying for the damage as we’d purchased full insurance.

Soon after we were greeted with our first view of the snow capped Rockies. They almost all of a sudden just appear out of the ground and rise a few 1000 metres into the sky. In short, they were as equally spectacular as Asshole had been unhelpful at Budget. Simply awesome. Just as we begun to enter the Rockies we decided to get some breakfast at what was traditionally lunch time, at a small truck stop. As it was after noon I asked if they were still serving breakfast to which the nice middle aged waitress told me “Oh yes. We’re famous for our breakfast”. Having been in 4 provinces in the last 31 days and not once hearing mention of the famous breakfasts being served at this little truck stop, I chose not to pop her bubble by informing her of this news and instead went about ordering some bacon and French toast. It was during breakfast I would also create a new word; “Meducation”. Meducation is the coupling of menus with educational information. On the back of this menu I read about the history of Dead Man Flats. Of how some bloke named John had invited his brother, Francois, to come live with him. Either John or Francois (the problem with Meducation is if your tucker is good you lose concentration, and for me this was my first breakfast in about 30 days) complained of constantly hearing sounds in his head together with feeling great pain. One day, John I think (man, this bacon is good) got an axe from a neighbour and then went about treating his brother like a tree in the Amazon and promptly felled him. In a great win for society, John got off all charges after convincing the court he was insane (no doubt the clinching evidence was when he said he thought Kyle Sandilands was talented). Another interesting story involved the Stoney Indians pissing off whitey. The Stoney Indians liked to poach beaver from Piegon Lake (yes, of course you call a lake full of beaver Pigeon Lake) much to the annoyance of the white Europeans. One day a Stoney Indian bloke about to be caught in the act, thinking on his feet, promptly left his feet and pretended to be dead. The cop on the scene then left to get help. After the cop left, the Stoney Indian simply got back up and then walked off with his bounty of beaver. So there it is, a story about a pig and a beaver poacher at Pigeon Lake.

We reached our destination of the Tunnel Mountain campsite midafternoon, setup our tents and then went about checking out Banff Town. It reminded me much of Aspen and the movie “Dumb and Dumber”. As you looked down Banff Avenue you could see a mountain towering in the distance, John Denver was definitely not full of sh*t. We checked out the information centre to get some sort of idea of what to do in the surrounding region. It was around this time that it started to rain lightly which got Brad looking for some sort of rain protection. Inside the “not for profit” information centre they were selling umbrellas for $22. Heaven forbid they wanted to make a profit as I’m tipping you wouldn’t have got much change from a $100. After taking in as much information as possible, we got some supplies to eat for a barbeque and headed back to the camp ground.As we were in a national park where all animals are protected, I was happy to find that there were no bears resting in our tents. As is always the way, the rain held off until we got the fire started. The rain eventually cleared around 7:30pm so we got the fire going and cooked while the getting was good. It turned out to be a pleasant, relaxing dinner, with the entertainment coming from watching a bug get drunk and die on the top of my beer can.

We decided to have an early night, the first night I would get to test my new compact sleeping bag. The compact size meant it was great for a traveller on the go and I thought the fact it was rated to 4 degrees would easily get the job done. I suppose it was when I awoke the first time to put on socks that I had an indication this was going to be a cold night. When I awoke for the second time, this time put on a jacket, I didn’t need any more convincing it was a cold night. However, my body thought the brain needed more convincing so spent much of the night waking me multiple times in a rigorous shiver. I was shivering so much you would have thought I had Parkinson’s disease. I had to pee 3 times during the night, surprised each time it came out without freezing midstream. It was also a fairly scary experience as I wasn’t sure the pee from each previous release would attract a bear, so I spent each 30 second period with my eyes darting around hoping to not see a bear charging at me.

It was a very cold night, a night where it might have been wiser to just pee in my sleeping bag and enjoy the brief period of warmth.

Day 32 – Banff

Today, in between my cold weather induced Parkinson’s, I was awoken by a train horn at around 5:30am and came to the realisation that the majority of train hold ups committed in the old west had nothing to do with robbery but angry locals looking to beat the train driver to a bloody pulp after months of interrupted sleep. It must’ve been around 8am when I gave up trying to sleep and decided instead to thaw my body by having a hot shower and my customary early morning bog. Still shivering out of control like someone trying to do the bendy pen thing with their hand, I was somewhat surprised at the ease at which my sphincter let the pooh out of what was something resembling an out of control camera shutter.

With my body temperature back above that which freezes water, we had breakfast and headed back to the information centre to get some ideas about hiking trails. I struggled to stay focused as I was distracted by the rhythmic nature in which Brad would ask a question, and the information centre woman would reply to each question with a “Good question” and 2 thumbs up. It’s always satisfying to have your question initially answered with a “good question” as it suggests an intelligent question, but the excessive use by this woman meant it lost most of its meaning. I was tempted to chime in with “Where can I take a dump?” to see if that extracted the same 2 thumbed response, but instead chose to be polite. She suggested the Tunnel Mountain track wasn’t too taxing so we headed there.

At the start of the track we found an excitable English couple who’d just walked past an elk. Brad and I got caught up in the excitement and walked down the Mountain a few hundred metres to find an elk in a world of his own eating grass. He looked a little horny (my god that’s an incredibly good play on words!) so we kept our distance, took a few pictures and then headed towards the Tunnel Mountain peak. It was named Tunnel Mountain as the Canadian Pacific Railway was going to put a Tunnel through it. However, after they sobered up and walked another 50 metres they discovered they could actually drive around it. Apparently there must already be a "No Tunnel Mountain" in the region, so to avoid confusion they stuck with Tunnel Mountain. My body struggled to walk the 2.1km, 400+ metre elevation, with my frozen lungs absorbing oxygen as successfully as I absorbed any information in high school in which I had a hot female teacher. The struggle was worth it, with nice views of Banff Town and the nice piece of architecture that is the Fairmont Banff Springs hotel further south which overlooks an inviting looking golf course (you’re not allowed to walk off the hiking trails in this national park for fear of disturbing the habitat, so thankfully the local bears and elk have taken to the game of golf like a fish to water so their way of life has been enhanced by the building of the 18 hole masterpiece).

As last night had given me insight into how fish fingers feel after being placed in your freezer, we walked around town to find a camping store so I could get some sort of inner for my sleeping bag. I thankfully found something that would do the job, and was served in the camping store by the first of many Aussies we would discover out west.After that pleasant stroll we decided to check out the hot water springs at the foot of Sulphur Mountain. As these were billed as natural hot water springs I imagined a natural caved waterhole, but instead discovered they were basically just human paved swimming pools. After reading my Lonely Planet guide it said that the springs were now filled with tap water due to a drought in the province, something they fail to mention at the entrance. Tap water is so versatile it’s a shame it doesn’t get the kudos it deserves, from being able to fool people they’re bathing in a natural hot spring, to convincing yuppies the world over that it came from a different source when put in small plastic bottle.

Not overly impressed by the hot (thanks to a kettle) springs, we headed back to the campsite for dinner. Today was my first drive in the left hand drive car, and after a day in which I reached for the gear stick numerous times only to find a door instead, I was happy to finish the day without any fatalities. As we gathered some firewood we met a bloke from Vancouver there with his son and dog doing the same thing. He said his job back home was working at the Vancouver airport scaring birds away (no he doesn’t just strap himself to a pole and put straw done his shirt, that only works with crows) due to the fact the geniuses who built the airport built it in bird wetlands. As most plane engines don’t work too well after they’ve sucked a bird through them, you’ve got to wonder what mental juggernaut decided on the airport location. His job sounded like a lot of fun, with different ways of scaring birds varying from setting off firecrackers to just plain shooting them (any job that deals with explosives and firearms has got to be fun).

After dinner Brad was keen to go out, but my small bout of cold induced Parkinson’s the night before meant I was tired and now had a headache. I hopped into my tent with my newly acquired sleeping bag inner and enjoyed a pleasant night’s sleep. Brad drove into town and had a few beers at the Rose and Crown where he met an English couple. He told them we were camping and how cold it had been, so they offered him one of the 3 beds in their hotel room. He politely declined and foolishly came back and slept in his tent some time after 11pm.

Day 33 – Banff

I was awoken this morning I thought initially by the signal to open the gates of hell. As it was, it turned out to only be an Elk letting out one of its unholy whistles. It’s a noise hard to describe, but one which I believe Satan would use if he had a novelty horn on his car.

With no sign of Satan, today we made the 50 odd kilometre drive to Lake Louise. Along the way there were electronic signs on the side of the road warning of “Intense Traffic” conditions. If 10 cars spread over 500 metres is deemed intense, then the person responsible for that sign would have an absolute mental breakdown driving in Manhattan. We survived the intense traffic and were surprisingly unflustered by the time we reached Lake Louise. Lake Louise has been known by many names over the years, including Lake Emerald and Lake Little Fish by the indigenous population until whitey came and kicked their ass. Lake Emerald was probably the most descriptive name, with the lake getting it’s green colour from Boy George and Cyndi Lauper rinsing their hair at the lake ever summer (okay that’s not true, but a far more interesting story than watching a glacier spend a few millennia grinding rock into fine powder called rock flour which is then washed into the lake by glacial melt water with the resultant silty water absorbing all colours of light except the turquoise that reflects back to your eyes). As you stand looking at the lake from the Fairmont Chateau you can see Mt Fairview to the left. I would’ve thought Mt Shithot View would’ve been more appropriate, but Mt Fairview remains its name, no doubt named by a man whose Tombstone now reads “Here lies the man affectionately known as ‘Captain Understatement’, a man who never failed to understate the significance of any occasion”. Thankfully, he wasn’t the person to discover Niagara Falls or they’d be called “A bit of running waterfalls”.

The signage around the lake tells of how much whitey appreciated the guide of the indigenous people when he first reached the lake, so much so the locals were replaced by guides from the Swiss Alps inside of a decade leading to an architectural impact in the region (I don’t know much about Swiss architecture, but if the Fairmont Chateau is anything to go on they love building excessively huge hotels by large lakes).

To further our educational experience, we made the long hike to see the Upper Victoria glacier. Along the 5.3km track, on a steady incline that took us to a further 365m elevation, the track was littered with large specimens of faecal matter. They were quite large, meaning a large animal would have had to have dropped them. Was it a bear? A hungry bear looking to pass me through its intestines? A gigantic mountain goat? It wasn’t until we reached the teahouse a long stones throw from the glacier that I released the dung samples were from horses. The teahouse near the glacier had been run by the same mother and daughter for 45 consecutive years who lived onsite, receiving periodic supplies by some bloke on horse back (or as he was known to the locals “Lucky”. One can only imagine how toey these women would’ve been, Lucky would’ve needed a walking frame after dropping off his supplies he would’ve been so shagged out). As for Brad and I, we had to settle only for some scones and hot chocolate when we reached the teahouse. The elevation was clearly starting to effect Brads thinking as he passed over the menu. On the beverage list below lemonade was peachade, leading Brad to ask the girl serving us “What’s in the peachade?”. With an almost “Are you for real? Oh you are for real” look on her face she not surprisingly replied peaches.

After taking in the view of the glacier we headed back down the track which was so much easier as it was all pretty much downhill. We had dinner at the campsite and decided to catch the bus from the campsite into town sometime around 10pm. Whilst waiting at the campsite we got talking to 2 blokes from Nova Scotia who were heading for the town of Kelowna to do some fruit picking. As the talk revolved around employment one of the blokes (yes, forgot their names too) told of how he’d seen some homeless hippy in town with a cardboard sign that read “Down on luck” whilst he sat in front of a store that had a help wanted sign. It’s amazing how much your luck can change if you’re willing to work hard. We all agreed the guy was a dick while they finished their beers off, while Brad and I finished off our Jack and coke cleverly disguised in our coke bottles as there was no alcohol allowed on the bus. It’s amazing how talking about how much of a dick someone is, you almost always seemingly get someone trying to prove they’re more of a dick whilst in the conversation that someone is the biggest dick. This dick was some tripper who ran across in front of the bus as it came up the mountain to our stop. Then as the bus stopped the dick came running from out of the bushes and pushed in front of all 4 of us waiting to get on the bus. Somehow this dick didn’t have the $3 to catch the bus, a fact made all the more amazing as the dick had tried to catch the bus earlier this day but didn’t have the $3 then according to the bus driver. The bus driver wasn’t impressed and didn’t let him on the bus. As for us, we struck up an instant rapport with the driver as we all acknowledged the dick as being the biggest dick we’d all seen in a while. He also turned out to be originally from Nova Scotia which helped and the novelty of having 2 Aussies on the bus made him even happier. By the end of the bus ride we were all best mates, especially after he let us drink on the bus, so the Nova Scotia blokes said he should come out and party with us after he finished his shift. It was supposed to be a polite throw away comment as the bus driver would’ve be in his mid 50s. So the surprise of seeing this 50 year old moustached bus driver, still in uniform that included a hat, at the Hoodoo nightclub around 2am was almost enough for me to swear off drinking for a while as this site blew my mind to the point where I didn’t know if reality was being blurred with alcohol inspired illusions. Turns out that bus drivers don’t pull chicks, so he made his stop and as there was no one willing to ride, was gone after about half an hour. As for me the night was just as successful as I began dancing with a girl who informed me “you can do better than me”. Inspired by that advice I went looking elsewhere but it turns out I couldn’t do any better.

Got back to the campsite about 4am, drunk and without a woman with self esteem issues, so went to sleep.

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