INTERNET BUDDIES AND DETOURS

Well, I have remarked before, in various ways and means, that if anybody told me when I was, say, thirty years old that I would be pen pals, via computer, with a bunch of people I had never met, I would have told them they were smoking cheap dope.  Bur here I am, with my sixtieth birthday in the rear view mirror, with hundreds of “pen pals” with whom I have had many pleasant interactions, over the Internet.  I have typically “met” them via a forum for firearms enthusiasts called Canadian Gun Nutz.  But also others, including a couple fishing forums on the WWW.  When I travel, I try to meet some of these folks face-to-face, and over the years I have met certainly dozens, and probably hundreds of people in this manner.

So when I was about to embark on this trip, I contacted a bunch of folks to see if they might be in the general area through which I was travelling.  If the stars align, I make detours to meet them.  This year I wanted to meet a couple fellows who live along the Trans-Canada Northern Ontario “SCENIC” route, as in the one that is twisty, hilly, full of potholes and in many places also under construction.  But what’s a few extra hundred miles on the truck (and my body) when I am going to meet interesting people?

When I last posted to this blog I had returned from my walleye adventure, arriving onshore around 8 am if memory serves me, in the hamlet of Missanabie.  First planned stop was in Wawa, to meet gun buddy Charlie, aka “Chas” on Gun Nutz.  I have met Charlie before, as well as his wife and his late father, and I was looking forward to sharing a coffee and a chinwag with him enroute to Fort Frances.  Well, as I have previously alluded, technology has been an issue on this trip.  My cell phone, which pre-dates the Paleolithic Age, does not have any reception just about anywhere and certainly none in Wawa.  I have a Bell phone card, which one can use with a pay phone (or other land-line phone, for that matter), and the rates are very reasonable indeed.  Of course, pay phones are about as plentiful these days as hen’s teeth, and when one finally locates a phone there is generally no phone BOOK.  So I have Charlie’s phone number in my computer memory, but no wifi available, no cell coverage and no pay phones.  EUCHRED.  (For those who do not understand that last word, it is southern Ontario card game slang for SCREWED, more or less).  Sorry Charlie!

That day I got as far as Nipigon, where I crossed the famous new bridge that stalled cross-country commerce for some time last winter.  You know:

Engineer:  “Trust me, I have done the calculations and checked them several times, as have several of my esteemed engineering colleagues.”

MTO Person:  “But this is Northern Ontario, which gets colder than a whore’s heart, have you allowed for this?”

Engineer:  “Who are you, a non-engineer, to question my brilliance?”

And we all know how THAT worked out.................so anyways Nipigon has a nice grocery store with very nice staff, and I stocked the larder a bit.  Including the purchase of two store-made beef burgers with blueberries and maple syrup, yum yum!  I had booked a gorgeous campsite in the Stillwater Park just outside of Nipigon (and where I had also stayed in 2011) and got settled in there in the late afternoon.  I enjoyed a glorious shower, did a load of laundry, and decided to cook my fresh asparagus and burgers on an outside camp stove rather than inside the camper.  Being that my campsite was along a stream and heavily wooded, I thought that I would rather have the bears interested in my external cooking smells rather than inside the camper.............

The asparagus was really fresh and I ate a goodly portion of it, before I cooked my burgers.  So they were JUST about cooked when my propane cylinder ran dry.  Now of course I have three or four spare propane cylinders onboard, but heck that would be a PITA to find and install a new one, so I just covered the burger so that they would finish cooking.  And a wee bit of pink in a ground beef burger is a good thing, right?  <<<<<AHEM>>>>>> for anybody who may in the future decide to eat somewhat undercooked store-made beef burgers with blueberries and ,maple syrup, my advice is to just eat some EXLAX and get it over with.  I departed the campsite early the next morning, somewhat thinner than I had been the day before.

So on I went to the town of Atitokan to meet Darryl, aka madtrapper143.  Shortly after I got there, we were joined by Corey the Cowboy and his father Brian, who is also on Gun Nutz but did not remember his handle there.  We had a grand visit, and both Corey and Darryl knew one of my next intended victims, Chris aka gunrunner 100.  Darryl said he was fairly sure that Chris lived out west of Fort Frances near Emo, which would be perfect because another fellow I wanted to meet lives there.  Darryl and Brian agreed that the Emo Motel would be a good choice of location for me that evening, given that they would almost certainly have both vacancies and reliable Internet.  Another buddy, Joe aka MadDog, was supposed to be working at Fort Frances with his asphalt plant, and there was also a fellow in Emo I hoped to meet, and so there was at least the possibility that a bunch of us could get together for a bite and a beverage at Emo that evening.  PERFECT!  Especially the reliable Internet part, which has been highly problematic for me thus far.

So off I headed to Fort Frances, where I found that most of the town streets are under construction.  The highway west detour was well signed at the beginning, although I did see multiple vehicles peeling off on another turn rather than following the detour signs............... and eventually I lost the detour signs and instead was following the truck route.  Until I ran out of truck route signs.  So I proceeded along on the last road that had been part of the truck route, went through another area of construction, and suddenly found myself looking at an AMERICAN FLAG and an American Border Patrol agent.  There was no place to turn around and I was about to enter the US of A with multiple firearms, a boodle of ammo, and a bunch of alcohol on board.  I was, to put it mildly, in something of a lather.  I explained my predicament to the Border Patrol officer, who thankfully was quite a reasonable fellow but still found it rather unusual that a fellow who looks like a terrorist, that being the hairy, bearded, disreputable-looking author of this blog, would “accidentally” be crossing into the USA.  I made sure to tell him that I had firearms, ammunition and alcohol on board, because I was hunting and fishing my way to the West Coast of Canada and back.  I was by now sweating like a fire engine in heat, certain that at a minimum I would be sent to secondary inspection and at worst arrested for entering the USA with guns ammo and booze.  The guy took pity on this old geezer and told me EXACTLY how I should proceed to get back into Canada, which would involve paying a toll fee and clearing CANADIAN customs.  I was delighted to pay eight bucks to cross back onto Canadian soil, and the American officer had gone out to ensure I did as I was told.  He waved and shouted “Come back soon!”  WHEW!!!!  Good guy!!!  But I had some trepidation about the Canadian Border Crossing Agent.  Some of those folks have been known to eat a daily ration of corn flakes with urine, to give them a proper demeanour to deal with Threats To Canadian Security By Scumballs Crossing The Border.  And as previously noted, I do not look like a Sunday School teacher returning from a Bible Camp.............. 

“How long have you been out of Canada?”

“About five minutes, SIR.”

Long pause.

“Please let me explain, sir, this poor confused old guy got turned around and ended up in the USA, which I had no intention of visiting and no I do not have a passport.”  I thought I would be rather more circumspect about my cargo of guns, ammo and booze, since Canada Customs agents are not known for their comfort level with any of these.  So I hoped and prayed that I would not be referred to secondary inspection in Canada.  My prayer was answered, and soon thereafter I was back in Fort Frances, to which benighted city I shall never ever return, a pox on their houses!  At the far end of town I located a walmart and a single pay phone, which was in use, BUT I waited to use it and contacted Joe.  Turns out he was part of the construction mess and was staying back in the middle of town.  I explained to Joe that wild horses would not drag me back there, so we agreed that we would miss each other this time.  It was about a hundred degrees in the heat and sun outside the walmart and I was still somewhat rattled by my brief sojourn on foreign soil, so instead of phoning Chris I carried on to Emo, some thirty kilometres west.  After all, that was where I was told he lived, AND I was looking forward to an air-conditioned motel room with reliable Internet.

I got to Emo and fuelled up the truck, then tried to use the pay phone at the gas station, which the gas monkey had told me he wasn’t sure if it worked.  It didn’t.  So off I went to the Emo Motel, where I located a pay phone that was functional, and called Chris.  Turns out he lives just outside Fort Frances, as in thirty km back to the east.  No problem, says Chris, I will see if I can pick up Joe and meet you there at the motel.  PERFECT!  But just in case, I told Chris, don’t leave for five minutes while I confirm that there is in fact a vacancy.

You all know where this is going, based on the title of this chapter..................

NO, there was no room in the inn.  And at this point I had still not recovered from my adventure at the border, and somehow FORGOT about Rick, who lives in Emo.  (Two minutes away as I later learned)  So I called Chris back, who suggested that I could park my rig at his place overnight if I did not mind driving back half an hour.  AND he had a cold beer at his house.  SOLD.  Some time later I met Chris, who does not look at all like his avatar on Gun Nutz, and after following him into the back-country we arrived at his home.  I was very thankful to park my rig, and enjoyed an evening of getting acquainted and fondling guns.  Chris is a really great guy, we have a lot of common interests and background, and it was quite serendipitous that we had this chance to enjoy some time together.  And at some point I finally remembered that I had not called Rick in Emo, DUHHHHHHHH.  I phoned him and arranged to meet for breakfast at, you guessed it, the Emo Motel.

I had a good night’s sleep out in my rig, and bade Chris and his lovely wife Jody a fond farewell the next morning, then re-traced my route of the previous afternoon to Emo.  There I met the fellow known as manitoubass2, or m2b2, from the Ontario Fishing Community website.  Rick lives on the Rainy River First Nation, and back when I was first planning this trip, we were going to spend a few days together, fishing and cooking.  Both of us enjoy both activities, and we were looking forward to sharing some information about both.  Timings were perfect, Rick was going to be on days off from his work with the new gold mine in the area......................and then his shifts got changed.  That change of shifts meant that he would be working twelve hour shifts, plus an hour commute both ways, on the days I would have been there.  AND he has seven kids.  Fourteen hour work days plus seven kids equals no time at all to host itinerant vagabonds.  And so I booked that walleye trip at the lodge, which added a great amount of flavour to this blog, for which I am sure all of us are thankful.  And then Rick’s shifts got changed again, but by then I had booked the lodge.............

Meeting Rick was like meeting somebody I had known for years.  We had a grand breakfast and chinwag, then exchanged gifts – I gave him a jar of canned moose, and he gave me a bag of smoked sturgeon.  He took a photo of us, and if I can figure out how to remove it from that website I mentioned, I will post it here.  And we made plans to get together again, but next time with fishing rods.  But if I go there I will bypass both Fort Frances AND the USA............

And then I was off to Manitoba to visit some very good friends, with THREE objectives:

1.        Enjoy a good reunion with Geoff and Andrea.

2.        Experience some reliable Internet to catch up on e-mails and maybe write a blog entry.

3.        Murder some gophers

And I will describe how I accomplished all three, in my next edition.  Until then..............keep yer stick on the ice (whatever that means)

Doug