K and my unforgettable motor trip last month had less to do
with the big race, the 44th edition of the Nova Scotia Marathon
along the exquisite blue coastline of Canada’s most picturesque province.
Rather, it was a marathon of stories, of moods, of laughter, of drama, of
infinite surprises.
Consider:
Lunch at Dinosaur State Park, Rocky Hill, Conn., next to the
butterfly bush garden with a butterfly caution sign
On an jammed but fast-moving interstate north of Boston,
with the car windows open because K and I both detest A/C, a rogue wind
literally ripped the only map we had that took us from Massachusetts to the
Maine-New Brunswick border, and whipped it out the open passenger window. It
did not land on a windshield of one of the cars behind us. Thankfully
Under a shade tree in the Shaker Village near Gray, Maine,
we whiled away an hour in adjacent Adirondack chairs. We admired a cat – and we
don’t like cats
Hours later we realized from looking at the $#@&&^
Mapquest journey printout that a significant part of our trip required that we
take a car ferry, upon which we had not made a reservation. Heretofore, we
thought there was a bridge between New Brunswick and Nova Scotia that linked
Saint John to Digby. That would a 49-mile-long bridge. The longest in the world
is the Quindao Haiwan in China at 26 miles.
“Good afternoon, yes, can I help you?” the chirpy sales
clerk at the ferry service said to K, calling from her smartphone.
“We’d like to book a spot on your ferry,” K said.
“Do you have a car?”
“Yes.”
“What date were you looking at?” the clerk beamed. It was
late on a Friday.
“Tomorrow morning?” K asked sheepishly.
Amazingly, on a Saturday morning in late July, the height of
tourist season, they had space. Not much. But enough
Two miles inside the Maine-New Brunswick border we stopped
at a visitors center that was minutes from the border. K wasn’t keen; she
wanted to put some serious miles behind us. But we had no maps, and the car …
In the past couple of years or so it has been reliable, and a week before had
been given the all-clear by my trustworthy mechanic, but it was emitting a
strange smell. Like burning rubber.
In Maine it was 5:55 p.m., but in New Brunswick, we lost an
hour; it was almost 7 p.m., closing time at the visitors center when we left
with stacks of maps and brochures.
In the parking lot I had a thought before getting back on
the road … I checked the oil. To my utter dismay the dipstick was bone dry. K
and I stood dumbfounded, alone in the empty parking lot, staring at the thing.
Now what do we do?
“Car trouble?” said a middle-aged man, the manager of the
visitors center, in a heavy French accent. I guess the open hood and our long
faces were a dead giveaway. He had driven up behind us without our noticing.
“Yes, oil, we – ”
“Here, maybe this will help,” he said. The man must have
anticipated our problem because before approaching us he had grabbed an extra
quart of oil that he had in his trunk.
After I put his oil in my car engine, the man gave us
complicated-sounding directions, half-French, half-English, to the nearest auto
repair shop. We blinked at him million-mile stares, and he said, “C’mon. Follow
me.”
We did, of course. The Canadian Tire was open for business.
Brady, at the emergency bay, put her up on the hoist, and then, shaking his
head while wiping his hands with oil that seemed to be just about everywhere on
the underside of the car, delivered the news: the rear engine mount seal was
gone. The engine wouldn’t stop leaking. Eventually it will have to undergo a
car-killing overhaul, but here, try some heavy oil, it won’t leak as fast, you
know; yeah, four quarts at first, and use this seal repair additive, check the
dipstick every one hundred miles or so, and hope for the best. Good luck
K and I drove on toward Saint John. At the first fifty
miles, I checked it. The oil level was holding firm.
Starved, we looked for something, anything open at 9 p.m. in
Fredericton. Out on the Trans Canada, there’s a 24-hour Tim’s, of course. But
we needed a real meal. Spotted an A&W, shrugged, the drive-thru would have
to do, but in trying to turn in was so tired that I missed it. Instead, we
found ourselves in the parking lot of the Hilltop Grill, a steak and fern bar.
Live music on Saturday, but it was Friday and there was still some action.
Here, K would have her first Moosehead ale on tap. I daresay, after the day we
had, the memories this trip will deposit in our brains, it won’t be her last. I
can’t remember when it was I enjoyed an ale on tap as much as that first sip of
Moosehead with K on the night road to Saint John.
Next: Running for Your Life: Nova Scotia Mood, Part Three
