Well, yes, a change of plans indeed. Read up to find out if you haven't found out already!
We left Fort Nelson early this morning, headed to our destination-- Edmonton. I got in the drivers seat for the first time on this trip, with the hopes that it could be a simple drive being that I haven't driven a vehicle with a trailer before, let alone in the mountains!
Fort Nelson started out easy, roads were fairly clear. We were making awesome time. The mountain pass that I endured was pretty easy, and when we got to the "summit," it was absolutly flat. We stopped at a rest stop called Sasquatch Crossing (with hopes we might see Sasquatch...), picked up lunch and continued on. This day was going to be a long one. Creeping further down in to British Colombia, the roads got a little more slick as the temperatures got colder.
It my stretch of driving all the way to Dawson Creek, we saw 3 rolled over cars in the ditch. One had recently happened, the fire department was letting us pass through a few cars at a time. A little gut wrenching, a reality check for sure.
Dawson Creek was our stopping point for our dinner break, went to Walmart, let the dog out and switched so Luke could endure the night driving in to Alberta... I suck at driving in the dark! On we went... From this point, the drive was pretty dull, other than the mountains, but definatly not like yesterday.
It got dark fast, and about 4 hours to our destination took another break before hightailing it to Edmonton. And then...
We hit a moose.
Mom took over as the last driver for the night – probably the last four hours, arriving into Edmonton around 1:00 am. Up until this point, the driving was strenuous – the roads were fair, a bit wet since the temps were getting into the 30’s, the roads and signs were getting hard to see and the semi drivers were absolutely crazy!!!. There were quite a few areas they called “Moose Row” where the moose roam freely, even on the highway! Alyssa was on “AP” duty (animal patrol). This is your job if you are riding shotgun… At about 10:00 pm, three hours out of Edmonton, we hit another Moose Row. Alyssa was on high alert again. We came over a hill only to find two moose right in the middle of the highway! I locked up the breaks as I noticed the first moose dead in the middle of the fast lane, and the other was moseying her way across the road. We, unfortunately, didn’t come to a stop quick enough and clipped the front right side of the truck at her rear, hitting her like we just slapped her in the butt a bit and kept walking away. Severely shaken, we pulled over to the side of the highway and looked up only to see the semi that hit and killed the first moose driving away in the distance, just leaving the moose in the middle of the road!!!! As we were pulled over, another pick up came speeding down in the fast lane nearly loosing control themselves! They were able to pull over to check on us, and as we were talking, a semi came cruising in the fast lane, hit the dead moose in the highway and came to a screeching halt – right in the highway! The moose was wedged under the semi and couldn’t move any further! What a scary event to end the day!
We decided we had had enough for the day - the speeding, crazy semi drivers, the hard driving conditions and all the animals were just too much. Off to find the first hotel we could find and call it a night – we would see Edmonton tomorrow.
From now on, we will not be night driving, thus pushing out ETA further back in the week. Better safe than sorry.
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