We left the Rockies on a tight deadline... six days to make it to Montreal to meet Nic's parents and live in an apartment rather than a tent or car for a couple of weeks. With the mountains retreating in our rear view mirror, we headed into the flat, green prairies. Canadians always say this is the most boring part of the drive, but I don't know, I quite like it. Flat land, big sky. Kind of like home. (Apologies for the photos. This is the only one we got before the camera went dead!)
So you can picture it. Us and the fridge, out on the open road, not a care in the world. Then... out of nowhere, tragedy struck. Well, it wasn't quite so sudden. But I rounded a bend into the Alberta town of Drumheller (home of some of the best dinosaur fossils in the world as it happens) and it was like forcing the steering wheel through gravel to make the turn. Luckily this happened outside a servo so we hopped out and had a look. As the budding mechanics among you may have already guessed, we were out of power steering fluid. So we filled that up (the cashier told me they'd only got bottles of the stuff in last week! What luck!) and all seemed to be going well, except for the fact neither of us knew why Fridgey had suddenly aborted his whole supply of power steering fluid. Then... we saw it.
Drip... drip... drip.
It was slow, but steady. And it was 7pm on a Friday night, in a place where mechanics don't work weekends. We spoke to some friendly locals who knew stuff about stuff, and they told us as long as we kept filling Fridgey up with he power steering juice and never let him run dry, we could keep driving. Armed with about 10 litres of the stuff, we headed into the night.
After sleeping in what we thought was remote farmland, we woke up to find we were practically parked in the driveway of the only house for miles. With the music from Deliverance ringing in our ears, we left early trying to make it to Saskatoon before midday before the mechanics shut up shop for the weekend. So... at this stage we were stopping about every 40 minutes to fill our child up with steering fluid. He was guzzling the stuff down... but it was manageable. After stumbling upon a food festival in Saskatoon, we shelved the mechanics idea and fed out faces, and decided to push to Winnipeg before we sought out help. We went all afternoon, and surely but steadily, Fridgey's - and our - endurance began to wane. We were freakin' tired, had the sticky goo of power steering fluid everywhere, had pieces of dirt and gravel all through the funnel we were using to get the stuff where it needed to go... and at about 10pm as we were huddled under our lantern trying to find the spot the stuff needed to go while fighting off the most mosquitos I've ever seen, we determined we couldn't go on like this. We were now stopping every 20 minutes... for about 5 minutes to refill the fluid. It was probably going to take us an extra day to get to Montreal at this rate. After a horrific Super 8 experience in Portage la Prairie, which we treated ourselves to after not showering or having slept in a bed for a while, we rolled into Winnipeg and to the truth of our situation. $800 was the verdict from the mechanic. Leaking rack and pinion that couldn't be plugged. We needed a new one. And to find a part. If only everyone liked Volvo's as much as we did we wouldn't have such a problem (I'm such a Volvo groupie now. It's sick).
We went to have lunch in the park to mull over this revelation. You know that sick feeling you get down in your guts when you learn you have to shell out a whole whack of money. Well, we had that. And, we didn't know how long we'd be in Winnipeg. Yes, Winnipeg. For all you Australians, Winnipeg is like the Adelaide of Canada. It's bloody freezing in winter (think -30), in the middle of nowhere, and is the butt of all jokes. But Canadians, I have news for you. You're all wrong.
Winnipeg freakin' rocks! We loved this city. We soon forgot our worries in their beautiful city park, where we stumbled upon a sculpture garden where we lay in the grass listening to live jazz. We rounded another corner, and there was a game of cricket in full swing! We went into the city next and stumbled on an awesome Fringe Festival and the old financial district of Canada, where all the country's trade used to be based. Beautiful old buildings, and cool cafe and bars. And then all these wicked plays and music sets to see for free.
Now I should tell you, you know how all places have that little catch phrase on their number plates? Well in Manitoba, it's "Friendly Manitoba." Kind of lame, I thought when we first crossed the Saskatchewan border. But it turns out it's true! Probably the most true of all the little province's catch phrases me thinks. Up until this point we'd had a guy stop to help after he saw us with our hood up on the side of the road, a man pull up alongside us when we were trying to find a park downtown to tell us his business was round the corner and to just park there in the "private parking" section, the mechanic had given us a free quote and a 20 minute diagnosis of fridgey for free on a Sunday.... and the Winnipeg friendliness was about to hit us again that night, when we were waiting in line to see a play at the Fringe Festival. We got talking to the people in front of us.. and after watching the show (a traveller relaying his adventures through Africa and the meaning he'd garnered from them. Awesome stuff) they told us to ditch the idea of sleeping in the car, and come stay with them for the night.
We drove back to Ruth and Fort's place and arrived around 11pm. Despite Ruth having to work early the next morning, she fixed us snacks and drinks and we sat around talking. We learned they'd lived in South America working as missionaries for a couple of years, which they loved. They also took street kids in sometimes to stay... in other words, they were all round top people! Good Christians minus the preachy crap, which is just good really.
We had a great night's sleep, a great breakfast, and quickly started ringing anyone who declared to be a "Volvo specialist" in the Winnipeg Yellow Pages. Finally, we came upon the Adam's Brothers. We liked the sound of them on the phone, so headed downtown to take Fridgey in.
I can't really put my finger on it, but it was kind of like walking into the set of Happy Days. There was the number's man Fred at the front desk. Then there was "the fonz": Dick , who was the fifty something year old gold chain wearing owner, who kind of just walked around the place milling with customers and reassuring everyone their volvo was beautiful and was going to be okay, throwing in the odd entertaining story as well free of charge. There were old retro Volvo posters all over the walls, and everyone told us how beautiful and amazing our Fridgey was. (West coast cars are cherished across the rest of the country, because it doesn't snow out there. No snow = no salt on the roads = no rust). While we were bursting with pride for our child, they told us not to worry about him and that Dr Mike was on the case. Five minutes later, a short thin man with greying hair walked in, wearing a set of professional blue work overalls with a Volvo logo on one side and a "Dr Mike" badge sewn on the other.
"Oh yeah, it's the rack and pinion. But we'll just take it from this other '87 sedan we've got, it'll be out by end of today."
Then Fred took over, furiously tapping at the computer.
"So with that, plus labour... plus the new blah blah, here's what your looking at."
The quote was about $100 less than what anyone gave us over the phone.... about $700. So with Fridgey in good hands, we spent the day sightseeing. We returned in the afternoon to find him sparkling clean and leakless. We mentioned the problem of him not going into fourth gear and Dr Mike fixed that too.
So Winnipeg: pretty cool place! We left that afternoon and floored it through North Dakota where Nic left his sunnies (again) at a roadside diner, through Minnesota, then Wisconsin where we camped for the night, Illinois and Chicago where we got stuck in a three hour traffic jam, Detroit for an awesome Mexican meal in a questionable neighbourhood, southern Ontario where we slept in the car at a highway rest stop... and then dodged trucks and terrible rain to make it to Montreal on schedule! And that chapter everyone, will have to wait 'til next time.
