End of North America

Yellowstone National Park, WY, USA - With a week of nothing planned I decided to cross the border in my wreck and make my way down to Yellowstone. I drove through Washington, Idaho and Montana and experienced my first -10°C weather. Yellowstone closes for the winter and I was there 4 days before it closed. It felt pretty much like just me and the animals because the park was practically empty. I made two days of it and slept in the car next to Yellowstone Lake in the -12°C weather as it snowed overnight.



I saw a lot of elk and a few buffalo and also a bald eagle but the bears, moose and wolves still managed to elude me. I also checked out the hot pools and Old Faithful before heading back into Montana.

Bozeman, MT - I spent a night here and went to the movies and then went to the Rocky Mountain Museum the next day. Montana is home to most of the dinosaurs discovered in North America and I got to see the largest T-Rex skull ever found.



Missoula, MT - I arrived on a Saturday afternoon and with accommodation being pretty expensive here I decided to go on a ride-along with the Missoula police’s night shift. I again was paired up with a young cop, Ben Woods, and had another fairly quiet night with a couple of arrests for warrants and breach of probation and we broke up a party of college kids. When it quietened down one of the guys who was on the SWAT team took me to see their gear and I tried some of it out which was cool. Then after dealing with a young drunk who was trying to get on a freight train it was over again and I carried on north.



I then had a few uneventful days and crossed back into Canada to drop off the car. Then back on the Greyhound and with a week to go I went to Calgary where I met up with my Melbourne friend from camp, Sarah. She had a friend over from Oz also named Sarah and we rented another rent-a-wreck (which was way better) and headed to Banff.

Banff, AB - One month on from when I was first in Banff, it was a lot colder with snow everywhere. Like I did last time in Banff, we spent both nights out on the town and during the day it was so cold so we went to the hot springs for an couple of hours.



Calgary, AB - Back to Calgary for the weekend and we went out to a club called Garage where we were treated as VIPs because Sarah’s cousin goes out with the DJ/owner. We got free drinks and got access to the VIP area. The next night we had a night off and went to an Italian restaurant for dinner and then went and saw Borat at the movies. Very funny.



Edmonton, AB - With only a few days to go we headed north, into the cold. It was so cold that I could put my beers outside for about 30 minutes and they were near frozen. We woke up the next day and it was even colder with blizzard conditions. We headed off to the West Edmonton Mall (the largest mall in the world) but only made it 50 metres because of a puncture. What made the fact I had to change a tyre in snow at -12°C worse was that the rental didn’t have a tyre iron to undo the nuts. After a couple of hours wasted organising tyre repair we made it to the mall where we played mini golf, went on the indoor rollercoaster and did some shopping. We checked out the indoor water park but it cost too much so we gave it a miss. The next day we went ice-skating in the mall before heading back to Calgary.



Calgary, AB - That night we went to the ice hockey to watch the Calgary Flames play my favourite team the St. Louis Blues. We got nose-bleed seats cos the others cost too much but we saw the game fine and there was a great atmosphere and I got to see a fight. Unfortunately the Blues lost 3-0. The last week was a great way to finish up in Canada, thanks girls, and my next leg was South America.

Final weeks in Canada

Kelowna, BC - After an awesome road trip, I decided to head east again. I ended up in Kelowna for a couple of days with not much to do so I went to the local RCMP (Police) Station and asked if I could do a ride-along. They said it was no problems and I went for a ride from 7pm 'til 5am on the Friday night. I was in a car with a young cop, Richie LI, who had been in the RCMP for a couple of years and we drove around all night. It was a fairly quiet night with only fairly minor jobs coming in so we spent time moving crackheads on. We even went to the pubs at closing and everyone behaved. Richie said there were fights every weekend but we had none at all. We had a couple of breaks during the night at Tim Horton’s (fast food restaurant) and had donuts and coffee. How cliché. Kelowna is about the size of Whangarei (my hometown in NZ) and has about the same crime rate and crimes.

It was cool to see the differences between our police and theirs. We are so backward in some ways, like they have computers in the cars, fast prisoner processing so they can get on the street faster and sealed off back seats in their patrol cars but they are also caught up with a lot of red tape due to the culture of being sued. They cannot be involved in vehicle pursuits and their drink-drive procedure takes 4 to 6 hrs.

It was a good night out and it was cool to be back on the road again, going to jobs. As I finished the night up we drove passed the scene of a sudden death of a taxi driver in the middle of the street 50 metres from my hostel, which was about the most exciting job of the night.

Big White ski resort, BC - The next day I was picked up by some guys from camp and I went to stay with them for a week in Big White. There was Tim and Jess, Ryan Mander, Paul Beakmeyer, and Richard and Brendan Kropp. They are all doing the ski season there but I was there about 3 weeks before it started. However, it did snow all day on the 3rd day I was there which was cool.



I just chilled all week and went for a couple of walks up the mountain in the snow. It was good to catch up with the guys and Jess. Hope you dudes are having an awesome season. I also watched the St. Louis Cardinals (the team I support) win the World Series which was awesome.

Nelson, BC - After spending a week relaxing I hired a rent-a-wreck from Kelowna and headed to Nelson in the south-east of BC for 3 days. Nelson is well known for its mountain bike tracks so I decided to give it a go. I hired a bike and took on one of the moderate to hard tracks in the hills around town. After 2 hours of uphill riding/pushing I made it to the trailhead which was covered in snow then rode down the tracks for a couple of hours, caning myself a couple of times. The other days I went for some walks around town and into the surrounding hills.

Roadtripping western Canada

Vancouver Island, BC - I went on a tour to Vancouver Island for the long Thanksgiving Day weekend. We left on the Friday and went up to Horseshoe Bay where we caught the ferry to Nanaimo. Once there we travelled across the island to Tofino. The next day I went whale watching with some of the guys on the tour. The day started off nice but then packed up and got very cold and rainy. We saw 2 grey whales and a bunch of sea lions and went to some natural hot springs for a dip.



Upon our return to Tofino we had a few drinks and then hit the only pub in town. It was an interesting experience to say the least. The next day we headed to Victoria via numerous small coastal towns. In Victoria we went to a Jamaican restaurant for dinner then went out on the town. After a wander around Victoria for the day, we then caught the ferry back to the mainland.

Canadian Rockies Roadtrip - On the Tuesday, I then jumped in on a roadtrip with a bunch of randoms to the Canadian Rockies. A Kiwi girl, Kelly, got a cheap rental minivan and 7 of us headed for the hills.

Roadtrip crew: NZ - Me, Kelly, Rebecca; AUS - Michelle, Mick; ENG - Lisa, Max

GOAL: To see wild bears, moose, beavers, wolves.



Kelowna, BC - Our first stop was Kelowna where we went for a wander along the beach front and then went into town for drinks. I introduced everyone to the drinking game, 'circle of death', and after 2 games of that and a game of 'I have never' we were well acquainted with each other and boogied down until closing.

Lake Louise, AB - We made it into the Rockies and got into town fairly late so we had a meal and then chilled out in the hostel for the night. It is here that I tried and fell in love with a Canadian meal called poutine. It is hot chips (fries) topped with curds and gravy. It is very nice. We went and had a look at the very picturesque Lake Louise before we made our way to Calgary.



Calgary, AB - Upon our arrival we located the only hostel in town and noticed that it was surrounded by crackheads and bums so thought better of it and decided to stay in a motel. After dumping our stuff we went out to dinner. Mick and I went and had Alberta steak while the others went to an Irish pub then we met up at Cowboys bar. On the Thursday night we were there, they had 25c beers for sale. The cups were only about 200ml but the beer was home brew and so cheap that a round of 4 beers for each person was only $7. Needless to say we were quite under the influence very quickly.



Then the DJ started playing line dancing music so we all jumped on the dance floor. The crowd was all in their early to mid twenties but they all knew each line dance. The group of us foreigners made great fools of ourselves as we hopelessly attempted to follow the steps as everybody else did everything in time. It was great fun though, for the half hour of country music then we rocked the rest of the night away with the girls getting some 10 to 2 action from randoms.

The next day we all split up and did different things in Calgary. Max, Bex and I wanted to see a movie but the cinema in town didn't open until 6:00pm, so we spent several hours walking around aimlessly and buying scratchy tickets. Max and I lost on all our tickets but Bex won twice, winning $26. On our way out of Calgary we stopped and watched some Friday Night Football for a short period of time. It really is a slow game to watch.



Banff, AB - Into Banff for a couple of nights. We went and had a few quiets at an english pub and some games of pool and the next day we hiked up Tunnel Mountain and had a look over the town and out to the surrounding mountains. After a drive around town we got the cards out again and started up another game of circle of death before hitting the town again and dancing 'til close.


Check out the name of the loop on the sign

Icefields Parkway to Jasper, AB - We were supposedly going to have an early start however we left for Jasper at about 12:30pm along the Icefields Parkway, a very picturesque drive up the Rockies. It was very pretty with big mountains, glaciers and turquoise lakes. It was supposed to be our best chance of seeing the wildlife we were to eager to catch a glimpse of. We saw no animals the whole way up until we got just out of Jasper and saw some elk (wapiti). Very much a consolation prize to the animals we were really after. That night we DIDN'T go out cos it was a Sunday and we had an 11 hour drive the next day to Whistler via Kamloops.



Whistler, BC - After a long day's drive in 2 hour driver shifts we made it to Whistler before dark. Luckily there aren't many traffic cops on the highways outside of the towns and we made the trip in good time. Being our last night of the road trip and not achieving our goal of seeing the animals we wanted, we went and celebrated/comiserated in the way we knew best and went to the pub.



The next day we trekked back to Vancouver where Lisa flew back home and Kelly went to her place. The rest of us stayed at the same hostel for a couple of days before I left to head east again.