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Sunday

Meredith and I left Fredericton with plenty of time to spare. By 1pm we were passing through Moncton. We stopped at the Silver Fox to phone Glen and check in on his progress. He indicated that everything was in order and that he would be leaving shortly. Shortly after 3 we were in Truro at Canadas national meeting place, Tim Hortons.

We were 2 hours early, but we figured we would give ourselves some room for the unexpected, better safe than sorry.

Here is a hot tip for travelors to Nova Scotia. EVERYTHING is closed on Sunday. Including the liquor store. I didnt know what to do about the predicament so we went to the Truro Information Center as I was hoping to find out about a thriving local bootlegging industry that was capitalizing on this oversight. The girls there were very helpfull, they directed us to Exit 13A where there is a brewhouse there called the Keltic Brewing Company that sells beer at the back door. The prices were similar to the bootleggers back home.

And then we waited, and waited and waited. Meredith was getting a bit worried that we would miss the boat, but I assured her that everything was in order.

Campbell rolls in around 6:45pm with a spider web of ropes tied through the windows and around the wind surfer on top of the 86 Pontiac 6000 wagon. Apparently the roof rack decided to give it up while he was driving down the 4 lane from Halifax to PEI. Unfortunately the wind surfer was tied to the roof rack at the time. Luckily he didnt kill anyone and the tidy little bundle landed in the median.

One thing I learned on this trip is that Campbell should have a restriction placed on his registration that does not permit his car to leave the Halifax Municipal Limits.

At any rate, we hastily transfered the contents from my truck to his car and headed for North Sydney. Glens car has a range of about 260km on a full tank of gas. This damn near factored in as we passed up a refueling opportunity at the Canso Causeway. There was no other gas stations open for the next 50 km. Against all odds we made it to the ferry terminal with lots of time to spare so we paid our fare at the toll booth. At that location the Pontiac failed to respond to the turn of the key. Glen looked puzzled.

Fortunately we werent the first ones to ever experience such an untimely break down and they hailed assistance on the radios while the lineup grew behind us. We were not allowed to get out of the vehicle to check it out ourselves.

Glen indicated to the lineup that we were going to be a moment, but that everything was OK (with an index finger pointed straight into the air, followed by a thumbs up).

A few minutes later a big Dodge Ram swung around in front and a man and a women began to attend to Glens inert car. The poor girl pictured here cut her finger trying to get the hood open, while her coworker was enroute with cables.

As it turned out, the negative battery terminal was loose. Glen had recently done some work to the car in which he had the cables off of the battery. He did recall that when he reinstalled the cables he didnt have a wrench handy at the time so he finger tightened them.

So we boarded and parked the bent but not broke car and went to the bar for a couple of drinks. Chatted with the one man band entertainer for a bit.

We walked the top deck to get some fresh air and had a seat to relax for a moment and take in some sea air.

The dorm sleepers were great. Meredith pleasantly dealt with the days events. Luckily she is able to see the humor in things, as opposed to getting frustrated. So we all had a few of laughs on day one and were ready for whatever sleep we could get.