Dear Glowie,
It can be a five hour trip on the Coquihalla to Vancouver, and two hours more by the older route. This, of course, doesn't take in stopping for lunch or rest periods. Also it doesn't take in bad weather. Ben is a good driver but he has always had a tendency to begin to drive too far to the right. It is good because he will never run into on-coming traffic which is always on the left, but it isn't good when you have no shoulder and a sheer drop. This highway is the Trans-Canada highway. It was an enormous feat to build a highway coast to coast across this vast land which has so few people considering the amount of territory involved. Of course, much of our country has been difficult to inhabit, and that is why it is so empty. Also, there has been a drag to the south from the USA where people earn more money. Therefore, our population is about 230 million or so.
Today David is renewing his Canadian driver licence and going to our family physician and the eye doctor. He and Ben went out together this morning. As soon as he has his licence he can go out on his own. There are still a few little things he needs to have repaired on his car. It seems some mice made a fine nest in the trunk and may have chewed on a main electrical connection. We had mice in our camper where they chewed a cushion. Also in the Saturn, where the repairman took three handsful of seeds from the air system. I think all three vehicles, Davids and ours are going to smell strongly of mothballs next spring!
We have beautiful, sunny and cool autumn weather right now. Leaves of trees have not changed colour yet.
There is a passenger train that runs from Vancouver to Kamloops. Kamloops is at least two hours away from us by car. Large trucks have taken over the work once done by railroads. Often the trucks pull train cars that have travelled part of their journey by train. They also pull containers that will end up on lake or ocean going vessels. The big trucks took over so much of the work of the railroads that lines have been shut down or tracks removed. However right now Canada lacks 200,000 truck drivers, and trains are ecologically lighter on the environment, so I suspect that trains will gain in popularity for transporting goods again. As far as passengers are concerned, now train travel over most of the western part of the country, and even coast to coast, is mainly enjoyed by people who have the time and money to do it and want to see the scenery. Canada's heavily populated southern part is very long and relatively narrow. Cars and planes are used much more often because they are much faster and vast amounts of time are saved. In southern Ontario and toward our capital city of Ottawa, and western Quebec there are very fast and modern trains. In the city of Vancouver and other cities there is fast and modern overhead train type transit. For the vast spaces in between there are cars, trucks and airplanes.
I love train travel when it is for enjoyment. There are some small lines with historical old steam trains on them which work just for pleasure. There are clubs that keep them going. We sometimes take our grandchildren on one near here that runs along an old railway track for an hour or two. It is called "The Kettle Valley Railway." Those who staff the trains are dressed in period costume and sometimes entertain on old instruments common with travellers in the 1800's when the west was opening up due to gold fields and being settled by western European immigrants. It is very interesting and a lot of fun to travel on the old trains.
Warmly, Mary
