Over the next two months, hundreds of thousands of Canadians will launch land yachts on driving treks that will criss-cross the country from coast to coast. As an added bonus, with the completion of an all-season road link between Inuvik and Tuktoyaktuk in the Northwest Territories, some may even drive to Canada’s third coast on the Arctic Ocean.
Obviously, there are many things that go into a summer road trip. Where to go, who to take and when to go are key. What to drive is important too considering the vehicle is responsible for carrying passengers and their supporting cargo haphazardly stuffed into or onto a car, truck, cross-over, van or motorcycle.
Last weekend, I had a chance to check out the vacation exodus firsthand as Lisa and I drove two vehicles from Toronto to Halifax. It was a work assignment but, with a long weekend virtually free of truck traffic, the drive gave me the opportunity to see Eastern Canada on the move a la vacation mode.
As I put in 20 hours of wheel time in a Black Edition 2019 Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross, it was easy to spot Lisa’s turbo-blue 2019 Audi TTRS that stood out like a sculptured piece of road art. With a 394-horsepower, five-cylinder turbocharged engine that rockets the TT from zero to 100 km/h in under four seconds, this is one sleeper of an Audi not to be messed with.
Since truckers like holiday weekends too, there were few transport trucks to manoeuvre around. But vacationers were out there by the thousands, driving the full gamut ranging from family sedans and crossovers to motor homes and pickups hauling RVs and boats with bicycles, canoes, even Harley-Davidson motorcycles strapped to them.
Canada was in holiday mode and, even in a two-hour traffic jam east of Montreal, drivers and passengers had smiles on their faces as if to say “we’re going on vacation and leaving our problems behind.”
A road vacation is not just about the driver, that celebrated stalwart of any road trip who keeps everyone safe while supposedly being pampered by passengers with road snacks, affection and stories.
To get family members into a road trip may take a sales job though. For children of all ages, it means a temporary goodbye to celebratory sleepovers, beach parties and getting together with the gang at someone’s house to ponder endless weeks of summer vacation. Getting stuffed into the family vehicle and hitting the road to visit sites they’ve never heard of or a gaggle of relatives they hardly know will obviously be inhumane treatment.
Sweeten the pitch with a string of enticements. Planned visits to en route attractions like Montreal’s La Ronde amusement park where rides on that wicked wooden roller coaster “Le Monstre” initiate feelings of bravado and terror but reward with bragging rights back home.
These days, young and old have their own personal entertainment devices and, with low priced data plans and many vehicles equipped with internet hot spots, it’s easy for passengers to go on a driving holiday and not see anything. Fight that by packing board games, magazines, real paper maps and travel books to get passengers involved with what is going on outside. Measuring a road trip by the number of movies watched may be amusing, but so much is missed.
As I smile back at a young couple in a Jeep Wrangler sporting a rooftop camper creeping along beside me in a construction zone, I recall the annual 1,000-kilometre run from Moncton to Montreal when I was a child. Sleep was scarce the night before we’d cram ourselves into the family sedan with nothing but our own stories, lame road games and an a.m. radio for entertainment.
The trek, mostly on two-lane roads, usually featured a flat tire or two. Sometimes a water or fuel pump would go on one of my parents’ Buick Specials or Mercury Montereys. Dad always drove while Mum handed around gobs of potato salad and a stack of roast beef or egg salad sandwiches from the on-board cooler for lunch. She did dinner magic over a two-burner Coleman stove at a roadside stop. There were no drive-thrus because they didn’t exist. Restaurants were places other people ate at, but we didn’t care as we swatted mosquitoes over mac & cheese.
We had to keep the windows up most of the time because Mum would have had a fresh hairdo for the occasion. There was no parental bribery. Our idea of an attraction was to drive by a river dam or for Dad to snap the Buick into passing gear to get by some laggard on the twisty, pot-holed route through New Brunswick.
As life progressed, the road trips got bigger and more complex like the Great Escape American Vacation where I hauled a 23-foot travel trailer through 31 states in 31 days that took weeks to recover from.
If there is a road trip on your summer agenda, cherish it and make it a positive experience for all. There’s nothing like the freedom and flexibility a motor vehicle provides when it comes to opening the eyes of young and old about what is out there.
With the summer weather finally upon us and our country open to experience, make getting there as much of the fun as being there. Oh Canada!
Follow Garry on Instagram: @garrysowerby
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