Nova Scotia, Eh? - May 16
After the long ferry, I awoke, tried to go back to sleep, realized that my body hurt too much from sleep on the floor and actually got up. Soon after, we docked and were unloaded. I was immediately greeted by a man telling me about his shuttle service to Halifax that was almost $15 cheaper than the bus that I had planned on taking that would leave one hour later. Since there were no cars worth seeing in Cape Breton I decided to go for it. Luckily it wasn’t a scam and I arrived in Halifax some hours later at Bob’s place. Bob is a neighbour of mine back when I was living at home. I can’t remember exactly when him and his wife showed up on the street but we’ve at least known of eachother for more than probably seven years. It is extremely lucky for me that he happened to be sent here for work because he was able to put me up for a few days. I met with his friend Bill at the coffee shop across from the apartment and dropped my bags off.
Bill was leaving today so he packed and we went off to get some food, Bill paid. Nice guy. I’m getting quite good at accepting small gifts like this at this point in the trip. Before I would refuse a few times and probably try to pay behind the person’s back if I could swing it. Now it’s more of a “You don’t have to do that.” as I take out my wallet, fully intending to pay but also testing the peron’s resolve, and eventually a “Well thanks, I appreciate that a lot.” We then met up with Bob at his work, headed to the airport, dropped off the second vehicle and then Bob took me for the next extremely Canadian activity of my trip. Axe throwing. Yeah, you read that right. Genuine axe throwing with his work mates in a place that both has axes and a liquor license. How they pull it off I will never know.
Good thing for me at this place is my background in golf, my beard, and the black toque I brought with me. All of these things helped me with technique, appearance, and… well actually that’s about all there is to it. I managed I few wins out of the Canadians vs Kiwis tourny they had going on. I even managed to be part of the top 8 but got knocked out because they wanted even numbers of Canadians and Kiwis. No biggy. It was a great night out and I’m incredibly lucky to have a friend here in Halifax to stay with while I sort out the rest of my trip. Thanks Bob, I definitely owe you one.
Let’s Buy a Car - May 17
I woke up about two hours after I had told Bob I would wake up. The combo of floor sleep and beers seemed to call for a few extra zees. After waking up I made my borrowed classic breakfast of oats and bananas and got on my computer to find myself a vehicle. I managed to phone probably about 20 different people looking around and I think half of them were already sold. Way to keep up with that, everyone. A few were too far for me to be able to see, but a few others were just right so I arranged a couple of meets for the evening. I also managed to sort out some financial things while I was at it and do some research on how to insure a car out of province as a resident of BC in NS. It was a productive few hours. Feels good.
I got a some sushi for lunch to satisfy a craving and hopped into MEC for a quick look at the pricing for camping gear. I plan on buying a tent, sleeping mat, and sleeping bag just in case I feel like being outside of the car on any given night but the price wasn’t agreeing with me too well. Lucky for me there is a 10% deal at MEC if you buy that combination of items a the same time. I figure I will have to spend about $500 for the lot so I didn’t bother purchasing anything until after I find the car. I don’t want to be too close to broke when I get back home.
After that I got some groceries and spent the rest of the afternoon making pasta and guacamole which I can’t seem to stop making. Mexico lives on inside me. As the time approached I saw my first vehicle, a Jeep Cherokee which looks almost exactly like the Jeep that Jacob Gulliver bought a little while ago and, although I thought it would be funny to get it, I was not overly impressed with its condition. However, it was a candidate. A time after that and I managed to get the second vehicle driven to me for a viewing as well. I must be charming or something. This one was a Saturn SW1 Wagon. More of the style of car I was looking for. Something with good MPG, space for sleeping, and a few seats in case I want to take a few passengers to subsidize my gas costs.
I spent about an hour with the car and the owner, Roger, and decided that one, it was a great looking car with low KMs for its age, two, the owner seems like a trustworthy guy who owns a bicycle shop that also sells guitars, basically the coolest gig and who plays in four bands, and three, I need a car and I don’t want to spend many more days on finding one. Just like that, I handed over a deposit to get the car taken down from Kijiji and to seal my promise to purchase this green machine as soon as possible, barring the insurance fiasco that I can only assume with follow tomorrow. None the less, I’m incredibly excited for the road trip portion of the journey to start and I’m stoked to see what this car can help me do. Check in later for some post deal photos!
Adding a Member to the Trip - May 18
After waking up a little earlier than the day before I made my oatmeal with banana with vigor, excited to finish the car deal. Once I got settled, I grabbed my phone and called ICBC to get the insurance done. There was only one snag: there is a four hour time difference between me and BC. Right, forgot about that. I spent the next two and a half hours watching a John Mulaney comedy special and wasting time. Even though I could have spent it doing important/useful things. It seems I’ve slipped right back into my old habits of procrastination. I should work on that.
After the wait, the numerous amount of phone calls began between insurance companies, Nova Scotia DMV, called Access Nova Scotia by the way, and a few people I had emailed about cars to let them know I had found one. I came to the conclusion that I needed to venture outside to get everything sorted. Since I had no luck getting ahold of an actual Access Nova Scotia branch, I had to take the bus. The bus takes about an hour to get out of downtown and I sorted out what I needed from the seller in order to get registered. While at the branch, I purchased my ICBC binder insurance policy and then got another bus to the business of the owner of the car to grab the title, keys, and to take care of some paperwork. One more bus later and I was out at the Access Nova Scotia again. I had no issues and I left with a temporary license plate and a big smile on my face. One more hour long bus later and I found myself at a closed TD bank, crap. I called the car owner and he was conveniently able to re-route me to another TD branch so I could withdraw my money. One more short bus later and I was at his business, we closed the deal, shook hands, and my grin grew two sizes that day.
I’m incredibly excited to introduce you all to Ivy, my new-to-me Saturn SW1. It’s dark green, hence the name Ivy, given to it from the previous owner, the wife of the man selling the car. This car is a dream so far. From what I can tell, though I’m no expert, it’s in great shape, engine sounds fine, radio works, A/C works (bonus!), steering wheel works, it can move forward on it’s own, and I’m confident it won’t fall apart in, I don’t know, say 8,000 kilometers. Just enough to get home.
Today was a big win for me. The money for the motorcycle I just sold to my friend, Trevor, just came in, I bought I car for my travels, and I’m just such a happy camper. I amped to go out and buy a few things for the trip and get things started. Canada, get ready for us!
Supply Run and Peggy’s Cove - May 19
This morning I planned out my day pretty well. I downloaded a bunch of maps from Google so I wouldn’t get lost on my way to Staples to print out my proof of insurance, Walmart to grab gear for the trip ahead, and Peggy’s Cove for my first sight seeing trip of around Halifax. Everything started out great. The Staples was close as hell so I printed my stuff and walked out like a boss. I then saw that Citadel Hill was within walking distance so I decided to do that too. A few photos, a walk around the canons, some old timey gun displays, and a trench later and I hopped back in the car to get my ass to Walmart. I’m going to cut this part of the story short because it’s fairly embarassing. It took me three tries to figure out how to get to Walmart because I don’t have a smartphone right now. Basically, the turn off for the street I kept missing was less than one metre after the turn before it, something I didn’t get from my PDF saved map on my laptop.
Anyway, I’m in Walmart and I grab a bunch of necessities like cigarette power adapter for laptop and phone charging, clips with tape for hanging curtains in the car if I need to sleep in the thing, rubbing alcohol to clean the areas for the clips, shop towels for messes, a casette adapter for music/podcast purposes, and three stickers for the letters I, V, and Y.
Yeah, I gave her a nametag.
After a quick lunch I then headed out to Peggy’s Cove. I stopped off at the Nova Scotia insuranc place again to learn if the title I have for the car will do me well for the rest of the trip. Turns out I might have some trouble when my registration runs out. I will cross that bridge when I get to it. I arrived at Peggy’s Cove a little under an hour later and it’s is definitely a cove. Lighthouse, rocks, water. What more could you ask from a cove. Nothing. That’s what. Job done. I spent some time taking photos of the cove and tons of inuksuit that some people had made shortly before sitting down to read a bit of my newest book by Charles Duhigg on how to be productive because I still procrastinate as an adult, sometimes to a debilitating level.
Here are some photos of the cove and some inuksuit.
I headed back to the apartment after a chapter and started to research how I was going… yeah I went on Reddit. That procrastination thing wasn’t a joke. Once Bob got back he sat me down to tell me how I was going to execute the rest of my trip with this car. This guy has Canada down pat. He told me all the places I should go, how to get there, what to see, what to eat, and how to do it all. My list of suggestions became the shadow of a figure of a real plan tonight. It was cool listening to him and it got me excited for the rest of my trip. Gonna be dope!