The Great Canadian Road Trip starts with an idea. It can be minor. It can be grandiose. Stemming from passion, inebriation, intrigue, intent, but all for the experience. It often doesn’t happen overnight – plans can be fractious and fickle. Joiners can jump on and off the boat at a pace that rivals trepidacious border jumpers. The route will change. There will be speed bumps and squabbling. There will be blessed stretches of open road and dreary emotional dips when fatigue hits hardest. Through all dark clouds the sunshine will break. It will all be worth it.
Whether a short weekend jaunt up to a cottage or a lengthy journey across the country, The Great Canadian Road Trip is a rite of passage. In a country bound together by patriotism and good manners we’re unnervingly divided by distance. The cost of a domestic flight and the time it takes to get from Moncton to Moose Jaw can deter our wanderlust, substituting national pursuits of discovery for more affordable forays to South Florida.
But I digress. There will come a time where all good Canadian boys and girls will bite the proverbial bullet, load up the car with their favourite lads and lasses and lumber on across this great nation. The frequency of such an escape is not often enough. Pulling ourselves out of the city and participating in this patriotic pilgrimage is a rare albeit requisite task. Whether you’ve made the time for yourself or if you’ve got nothing but time, all you need is an automobile.
Osheaga 2013 was the impetus for this year’s open road adventure. In five brief years, Osheaga has turned into one of the largest music festivals in Canada. It made the auditory salivary glands of me and my mates moisten. It was more than an everybody’s doing it kind of impulse. We had to go!
Over 80 acts of varying fame and interest, Osheaga would become the reason to get through the summer grind. Patio weather and pitchers don’t exactly weigh on one’s weekends, however, on the scale of one to ten, this road trip this was a hard 10 – a necessity for me and about a dozen of my closest cronies. It was late enough in the short Canadian summer to cap off the season, and early enough to snag some of the fleeting heat before winter wrought its evil wrath.
Toronto to Montreal is a short haul compared to some of the lengthy stretches in between Canadian majors. I remember rollerblading from Toronto to Vancouver with a blind friend of mine for charity in the summer of 2009 – unconventional in our method of transportation, it took 111-days to traverse the 5,000+ km stretch across the Trans Canada Highway – often finding ourselves hundreds of kilometers away from the nearest Podunk town. The 542 km in between our two largest cities can be covered in an afternoon. But it doesn’t have to be.
Sticking to the main roadways is the bane of the weekend road warrior. Allow your vehicle to meander off the beaten trail and explore some of the more natural surroundings. Carve out a lane on a gravel road and stop by a farmhouse for one of those ‘authentic’ snapshots. Climb up an escarpment and scrape your knees on the rough Canadian Shield. Use a foreigner’s eye and become a tourist in your own territory. There’s an endless amount of adventure that can be found in the unknown.
As we tried to carve out our initial plans for the trip we had nothing but a common goal. Differing schedules, preferences, and commitments, however split up accommodations and arrival times. Logistically speaking at least four cars were required. I was happy to be in my fully loaded Chevrolet Spark with all the XM Satellite Radio my curt attention span craved.
Like a music festival, a road trip is but an outlet for enjoyment. It’s a way to connect with something much bigger than oneself alongside like-minded people. Though there is a degree of defined destination, striking a balance between impulse and implementation is critical. Like getting to see that new band that’s all the rage or being wowed by the gusto and showmanship of one of your all-time favourites, the feelings are both unpredictable and incalculable. At every intersection a decision must be made.
With each bend in the road and every new view comes a renewed perspective. Each new act is accompanied by an alternate emotion. Inevitably we’ll lose our way. We’ll separate from our core crew. But as the crowd roars in unison after a blistering solo and then relaxes contentedly as the lights cascade down the wires on set, everything somehow comes together as gentle finger picking lulls us into unified lethargy.
The mentality and the movement, the aura and the appreciation that befalls best friends comes full circle at the end of the night. The final destination on the long and abstract route is becoming clearer in the distance. As pairs and partners emerge from individual sets to converge on the hill it’s a finale fit for a fairytale. What started as an idea is now an ideal end.
As I wrap one arm around the shoulders of my kin and another around a close buddy I look around at the tens of thousands of simultaneous smiles that surround me. Standing tall and routed like our great forests, we’ve become part of the natural landscape of the festival. Mumford and Sons asks for a moment of silence so they can Light a Fire. My heart burns with happiness. I look out on the perfect vista of visiting locals – a foreign feeling in a familiar place. We made it, after all.
The Great Canadian Road Trip starts with an idea. It can be minor. It can be grandiose. Stemming from passion, inebriation, intrigue, intent, but all for the experience. It often doesn’t happen overnight – plans can be fractious and fickle. Joiners can jump on and off the boat at a pace that rivals trepidacious border jumpers. The route will change. There will be speed bumps and squabbling. There will be blessed stretches of open road and dreary emotional dips when fatigue hits hardest. Through all dark clouds the sunshine will break. It will all be worth it.
Whether a short weekend jaunt up to a cottage or a lengthy journey across the country, The Great Canadian Road Trip is a rite of passage. In a country bound together by patriotism and good manners we’re unnervingly divided by distance. The cost of a domestic flight and the time it takes to get from Moncton to Moose Jaw can deter our wanderlust, substituting national pursuits of discovery for more affordable forays to South Florida.
But I digress. There will come a time where all good Canadian boys and girls will bite the proverbial bullet, load up the car with their favourite lads and lasses and lumber on across this great nation. The frequency of such an escape is not often enough. Pulling ourselves out of the city and participating in this patriotic pilgrimage is a rare albeit requisite task. Whether you’ve made the time for yourself or if you’ve got nothing but time, all you need is an automobile.
Osheaga 2013 was the impetus for this year’s open road adventure. In five brief years, Osheaga has turned into one of the largest music festivals in Canada. It made the auditory salivary glands of me and my mates moisten. It was more than an everybody’s doing it kind of impulse. We had to go!
Over 80 acts of varying fame and interest, Osheaga would become the reason to get through the summer grind. Patio weather and pitchers don’t exactly weigh on one’s weekends, however, on the scale of one to ten, this road trip this was a hard 10 – a necessity for me and about a dozen of my closest cronies. It was late enough in the short Canadian summer to cap off the season, and early enough to snag some of the fleeting heat before winter wrought its evil wrath.
Toronto to Montreal is a short haul compared to some of the lengthy stretches in between Canadian majors. I remember rollerblading from Toronto to Vancouver with a blind friend of mine for charity in the summer of 2009 – unconventional in our method of transportation, it took 111-days to traverse the 5,000+ km stretch across the Trans Canada Highway – often finding ourselves hundreds of kilometers away from the nearest Podunk town. The 542 km in between our two largest cities can be covered in an afternoon. But it doesn’t have to be.
Sticking to the main roadways is the bane of the weekend road warrior. Allow your vehicle to meander off the beaten trail and explore some of the more natural surroundings. Carve out a lane on a gravel road and stop by a farmhouse for one of those ‘authentic’ snapshots. Climb up an escarpment and scrape your knees on the rough Canadian Shield. Use a foreigner’s eye and become a tourist in your own territory. There’s an endless amount of adventure that can be found in the unknown.
As we tried to carve out our initial plans for the trip we had nothing but a common goal. Differing schedules, preferences, and commitments, however split up accommodations and arrival times. Logistically speaking at least four cars were required. I was happy to be in my fully loaded Chevrolet Spark with all the XM Satellite Radio my curt attention span craved.
Like a music festival, a road trip is but an outlet for enjoyment. It’s a way to connect with something much bigger than oneself alongside like-minded people. Though there is a degree of defined destination, striking a balance between impulse and implementation is critical. Like getting to see that new band that’s all the rage or being wowed by the gusto and showmanship of one of your all-time favourites, the feelings are both unpredictable and incalculable. At every intersection a decision must be made.
With each bend in the road and every new view comes a renewed perspective. Each new act is accompanied by an alternate emotion. Inevitably we’ll lose our way. We’ll separate from our core crew. But as the crowd roars in unison after a blistering solo and then relaxes contentedly as the lights cascade down the wires on set, everything somehow comes together as gentle finger picking lulls us into unified lethargy.
The mentality and the movement, the aura and the appreciation that befalls best friends comes full circle at the end of the night. The final destination on the long and abstract route is becoming clearer in the distance. As pairs and partners emerge from individual sets to converge on the hill it’s a finale fit for a fairytale. What started as an idea is now an ideal end.
As I wrap one arm around the shoulders of my kin and another around a close buddy I look around at the tens of thousands of simultaneous smiles that surround me. Standing tall and routed like our great forests, we’ve become part of the natural landscape of the festival. Mumford and Sons asks for a moment of silence so they can Light a Fire. My heart burns with happiness. I look out on the perfect vista of visiting locals – a foreign feeling in a familiar place. We made it, after all.