Tales from St Anthony Part X -- Are you Trippin'?

We finally have a car.

After more than a month of wrangling our modus transportus has been upgraded from Shank's Pony to a 1999 Mazda Protege, which can mean only one thing -- ROAD TRIP.

I see you, caribou.

A gaggle/swarm/hive of caribou

For most people registering a car is a fairly simple task and involves the following steps:

1) Roadworthy; 2) Purchase; 3) Insure; and 4) Register.

With the first three under our belts and our hip pocket decidedly lighter for it, we headed for a motor registry office able to fulfill the transfer and registration.

Six hours and close to 450km later we arrived at the cavernous lair doubling as the motor registry. 

Having averted car sickness up until that point as soon as we entered I felt I had been swallowed by a wormhole that spat me out into the hull of a Vietnamese fishing junk used to traffic humans.

I was not however a people smuggler but more a smuglee.

The looks on my fellow sallow-faced inmates at the fore confirmed we were all on the same boat, their joyless eyes conveyed that feeling of being sixth in line to twirl the revolver's cylinder in a game of Russian roulette when all five people are crowding around you all very much alive and all very much wearing grins.

Without the need for guns we escaped triumphantly with registration papers held aloft and to prove we were still strong of spirit and mind we decided to test our resolve and headed for that other pit of human depravity – Walmart.

People in stressful situations talk about the ‘breaking point’ as if it is something you can see coming however I would argue the opposite, that you never see it coming, it just turns up and you are left stunned sifting through the emotional shards scattered on the well-lit and overcrowded aisle sandwiched between the dairy section and its 500 gram blocks of mild cheese on special for $4.59 and despair.

To put the adventure into context, St Anthony has admirable shopping options but there are just some things you can’t get here, items such as couscous or cloves draw looks of confusion, so when you reach a major centre like Corner Brook you have to make sacrifices and head to places like Walmart.

Our bid to extract ourselves from harm’s way worked against us and in no time we were being bashed from all angles by crazed shopping-trolley wielding housewives and teenagers who follow the “more is better” approach to make-up and their clearly uninterested boyfriends.

We had stumbled into the one place you do not want to get caught in Walmart – the clearance aisle.

Much like getting in between a bear cub on its mother, the clearance aisle brings with it a sense of rabidity, so with the coast clear we rushed to the neighboring pet aisle, which apparently is also where two Australians can get in the world’s way.

We escaped Walmart and discovered with glee that our B&B was just around the corner – so after meeting the owner, an interesting story in itself, we plonked our belongings in the room, had a quick shower and headed for a bar that had beer on tap – another thing that St Anthony lacks.

You forget just how nice a beer from a chilled tap tastes.

All dolled up we headed for a lovely tapas bar with live music and a wine list and the rest is history.

Our first road trip was a huge success – 1000km in 12 hours of driving. A registered car, Em now has a Newfoundland licence for the next six years (the minimum amount of time you can get a licence here apparently), we had beer on tap, bought cloves, met some lovely people and avoided all the moose the Northern Peninsular could throw at us.

Tales from St Anthony Part I -- Finding the viking within

Dear People of the Interwebz,

We have found a tiny sliver of Nirvana in our new home of St Anthony and if that wasn't good enough I may have landed on my feet already with word that I may get the chance to work as a viking in the summer tourist season, but more on that later.

Tomorrow's yarn will be about the place but firstly let me fill the gaps, the plot holes if you will and give the briefest of rundowns of the 7000km journey across Canada.

Two planes, one car, two days of solid travel.  

Maybe that's too brief ... okay how about this then?

A teary farewell at the airport with Em's parents was immediately squashed by a delayed flight but it worked out well for us because we too were delayed by a rather precarious situation thrown up by airport security.

Unconcerned by releasing an already cranky beast from its cage, the officer requested we remove Sir Richard from his travel kennel so they could check for explosives.

My response of: "You're kidding? Let him out here in this crowded airport - are you mad?" was met with a shrug of the shoulders and a curt "it's the law".

Coat in one hand and a firm grip around the scruff of his neck quelled his desire and chance of escape, the officer's swab revealed nought in the way of explosives which of course was not at all unsurprising, Sir Richard's bomb making ability curtailed by a lack of opposable thumbs and a brain the size of a pea that flits between just three things -- food, sleep, poo -- not necessarily in that order.

That's not to say Sir Richard's plans for world domination are any less fervid, they just don't include terrorism. 

After the baggage handler threw out his back picking up the cage (he weighed in a grand total of 11.5kg), we headed for security which was an absolute breeze, the flight itself highlighted by turbulence and a viewing of Ninja Assassin, an altogether tofu-like experience -- bland yet surprisingly filling.

A game of Scrabble later and we dropped into Toronto like a brick and thanks to our earlier delay walked straight onto our connecting flight to Deer Lake which gave rise to an interesting scenario: screaming baby versus burly Newfoundland men.

The baby won by virtue it was still on the flight by the time we got to Deer Lake at 2am.

Note to oneself -- the wicker cowboy hat I bought for road tripping purposes apparently has a different meaning in Newfoundland. 

While I enjoy the protection it affords me from the elements, over in these parts I have been told by locals at least that it is a sign of someone who has just returned from the oilfields. 

Being that I unloaded the luggage carousel with four bursting bags, one a cute little pink plaid number and a cat, I am unsure of where the other men thought I was from.

Nevertheless we packed the lot into the awaiting van and headed 45 minutes into Corner Brook checking in at about 3am. 

At 5am our friend Mark turned up and by 11am we hit the road, a taxi driver told us the trip would take about 4.5 hours, Google Maps said closer to 12 hours, we got there in a touch over 7 hours but we did stop a couple of times on the way.

Stay tuned for the next edition when I recount our first couple of days and my chance to live a dream and become a Viking.

How much noose would a hangman lose if a hangman loosened noose? Departure T-minus 25 days

Axe murderers are, on a whole, interesting characters, John Pelley is no different.

I came across his name researching each of the towns between Corner Brook and St Anthony, the story of the Cow Head double axe attack piquing my interest and after a quick trawl through the Google-box machine's tangled tentacles of information, I tracked down court documents and at least three different accounts of events surrounding the murder of Joseph Rendall and Richard Cross.

For those worried about the morbidity of my interest to my defence a) I am Australian hence I almost certainly come from convict stock myself and; b) I am a writer who has just found a muse in Pelley for an upcoming piece.

The synopsis of the story is thus (the full story can be found here at the great CanadaGenWeb.org:

Joseph Rendall and Richard Cross were mates, actually they were almost family, Cross's sister, Sarah Cross Singleton was engaged to be married to Rendall.

Pelley was a strange kitten with a shady past, some said he had murdered his wife in Ireland before fleeing across the Atlantic to escape capture. Whether there is any truth to that no-one knows but it adds an extra dimension to the story.

All three men were trappers around the remote Cows Head region. Rendall and Cross worked together and Pelley worked alone and when they all met one fateful day, Pelley was the only survivor, the other two had their heads cleft in twain.

Sarah, who was a maid for ex-Navy officer John Paine, became alarmed when neither men came home so she and Paine travelled 28 miles to find them eventually coming across Pelley who was was camped out at Rendall's lodging.

Pelley denied ever seeing Cross and said Rendall was hunting however the pair found enough evidence to suggest they had met their end in the foulest way possible. A pool of blood next to Cross's shoes were one giveaway, another was Sarah's fiances mittens, which she had knitted, were hanging up to dry. At that time of the year you would have been a fool to brave freezing conditions without mittens, or a head.

Anyway, the maid and her boss fled and came back with a lynch squad who captured Pelley who denied any knowledge of the murders. The lynch mob built a fire and threatened to burn Pelley alive so he recanted his tale and told them where to find the body.

They hauled him back to St John's where he was hanged.

See, what an interesting story. Anyway the story opened up more questions than answers like:

What did your average Newfoundland hangman do when he wasn't readjusting spinal columns, how much did he earn and was his line of work profitable and I even tried to find out the answer to the eternal question: How long is a piece of string?

If you are talking about a hangman's rope it's between 1.2m and 1.8m.

As long as his Mr Hangman's (come on, he deserves an honorific) profession wasn't based on a per head basis, 1809 was profitable with just one customer and as far as I can work out from court documents I traced down, the hooded figure made five pounds and five shillings to end one John Pelley's life.

According to my research five shillings would have purchased 2lbs of refined salt or three tongues or five pounds of marmalade and nine shillings would have got the faceless judicial executioner 10 dozen Portuguese anchovies.

That's a tasty combination right there.

Up until September 5, Mr Hangman had very little to do, he had very little to do the nine preceding years and six years after and while there is an argument hangings were enough discouragement for those who disagreed with those tiny things called judicial norms, it can certainly be argued that the gibbeting of criminals was icing.

The gibbet isn't anything special, just a couple of pieces of timber but it was more of the ornament hanging from it - the dead criminal in chains or a body-shaped iron cage and in some cases when they really wanted to make an example of someone, the authorities would coat the body or its parts in tar.

The man who signed the death warrant was visionary traditionalist, Governor John Holloway, an allegedly compassionate man, and the first Governor of Newfoundland to issue a proclamation against mistreating the native Beothuk people and offering rewards for information about atrocities. He also allowed Newfoundland's first paper to be published.

Swings and round abouts I guess.

The mechanics and mathematics of buying a car, traveling with a heavy cat and shipping our life across Canada -- T-minus 29 days

"Are you okay," my wife asked last night.

"Mmm, mmm, yes" I replied in the midst of my first 'official' freak out complete with heart palpitations, bending intestines and cold sweats.

I'm not sure what set me off but for a few moments last night the thought of moving to Newfoundland made me queasy but my wife's calming hand on my arm and reassurances that "everything is going to be alright", set me at ease.

I think we are going to take turns in having mini-meltdowns when we discuss the logistics of this adventure, we worked out last night the equation that:

more money = more sanity however our serious lack of funds means that this adventure will be more of a challenge, just like The Amazing Race, except without all the whiney American divorcees who think racing around the world, when they have never left their State let alone the country, will somehow bring them back together.

Nope this is a challenge and my wife and I are good at challenges and the more I can break challenges down into science and mathematical equations the easier it will be so this post will be in three acts.

Act I
The purchasing of the car
(Sight Unseen)

I've owned a lot of cars and they have all ended their life the same way, at the scrapyard.

My first car was a Datsun 180b with two working cylinders my final car was a Hyundai Excel, dubbed The Little Green Teabag of Doom for the way it not so much turned corners as it slid and dipped around them thanks to seized ball joints.

Buying a car sight unseen then would appear to be a dangerous exercise however I think the problem of transport in St Anthony has been solved.

Enter the 1994 Chevy Cavalier.

Our biggest concern on arriving in Corner Brook was that we need a car to get the 10-hours to St Anthony (see map on first post for scale). That being said on our current budget of $0.00 it is going to be hard.

That was until we came across this gem for $800 (or best offer). The ball joints are shot but for $150 they can be repaired so we shot off an email to that effect. Before hand though I scoured the mighty interwebz to find out all I could about the 1994 Cavalier and here is what I discovered.

One reviewer stated:

Likes: no-nonsense low-cost car
Dislikes: lack of refinement, sluggish performance with auto transmission and four-cylinder engine.

I say: I am not overly concerned if it's sluggish. We are not rally car drivers and with all those suicide moose, we'd be mad to want to drive fast.

Another reviewer said:

Good:
"Good fuel economy" (Me: That's a good sign)
"I loved the car" (Editorialised comment ignored)
"Comfortable" (Meh, if I wanted comfort I'd buy a new car)
"No leaks (in convertible)" (Surely this doesn't mean ours will leak because it's not a convertible?)
"Extremely dependable even after 178,000 miles" (That sounds positive)
"Nice riding car"

Bad:
"It’s a little noisy" (Boo)
"Clutch a bit notchy" (What do you expect with automatic?)
"ABS brakes produce too much judder" (Judder. They said judder. Wicked)
"Brakes could be better"

My mind started racing at the thought of fuel economy so I did the math.

The 1994 Cavalier has a 15 gallon fuel tank, 120hP, 2.2 litre, 3-speed automatic apparently get s 23 miles to the gallon in "city" driving and 33 miles to the gallon in "highway" driving

So on a tank of petrol we can expect to travel 345km (city) or 495km (highway)

Now the prices of refueling at current rates in St Anthony are about 116.2 c/litre and being that there is 3.78 litres to the US Gallon that puts our empty fuel tank at 56.7 litres however that would be more like 55 litres because you are not going to have an empty tank which means that at current prices, to fill the tank will cost us: $63.91 which for almost 500km of driving isn't bad although a quick check of Google Maps shows that it is 468km between Corner Brook and St Anthony so that trip may be a stretch however for an alleged 11 hours of driving that isn't bad.

Act II
The Kitty Conundrum
(A case of cat nip and tuck, meow)

The reason we saved Sir Richard from the SPCA was because my wife and I wanted a big cat, the bigger the better so when we saw our 10kg behemoth it was love at first sight.

Now considering how much it will cost to take him with us I wonder if that was such a smart choice.

The problem is the dimensions for a soft carrier that would allow us to bring him on as hand luggage also won't allow us to fit him inside.

At 27cm high, 40cm wide and 55cm long, you would think you could fit a small puma inside but alas that is not the case, plus his weight and the weight of the carrier break every single Air Canada regulation hence we have to go for a hard shell and put him under the fuselage.

Not the most ideal scenario but he'll be drugged to the eyeballs so he won't miss any of the scenery and the fact he snore louder than me, sleeps 22 hours of the day and only wakes to eat or wake us up so we can watch him eat, well, I think he will be fine.

There is a small part of me however that feels bad for giving him the crappy seat on the trip. It's like that person who has to sit in the middle of the back seat straddling the glovebox and being drooled on by their brother and sister on either side.

Act III
The Boy in the Bubble Wrap
(Package me up Scotty)

The other issue was just how to get our belongings across with us. We consulted a packaging and freight company who were going to charge us about $500 to send two boxes that were 25 inches X 25 inches and 30 inches high of no more than 98kg in weight.

That sounded alright until we worked out that boxes slightly smaller than that weighing 30kg will cost us $65 via Canada Post so that's what we are going to do.

The list -- T-minus 30 days

"You know what we need," I asked my wife, her eyes widened with expectation. She knew exactly what we needed at this point.

"A list," she said gleefully, "a list, we need a list."

And so it was done. Our penchant for making lists would come in handy with our new adventure.

Last night we booked our flights from Vancouver, BC, to Corner Brook, NL, at the princely sum of $760 with another $100 to be paid for the luxury of taking Sir Richard onto the plane with us as carry on. Our only fear is that he may fall outside the 10kg weight limit of cat and carrier considering he himself weighs almost 10kg. The big fella may have to go on a crash diet but back to the list.

Before we married I was a huge fan of 'the list' thanks to my good mate Dave's explanation of not only their organisational functionality but their therapeutic value -- peace of mind courtesy of a few dot points that once completed could be scratched from existence along with the completed task.

"See, job done," he would say when he crossed another task off his list, which he compiled each night before bed ensuring that the day was planned to a tee. The list always started with one simple task.

• Wake up

It's unbelievable how satisfying it is to cross things off a list, especially the first task of the day. Another mate of mine, Gazza, had a diary for each year dating back some decade and contained everything he had achieved. You could give him a date, a couple of beers and about an hour and he would find his diary and tell you exactly what he was doing that day almost to an hourly breakdown. Truly old school.

When I found out my wife loved lists, it was a match made in heaven. Our wedding lists (note the plural) were pencilled into a Merry Christmas notebook while another list was on a classier wood bound notebook with a robot on the cover. For a random present I received a 2010 Diary with Leonardo Da Vinci's Le proporzioni del corp umano secondo Vitruvio (particolare) on the cover and carry it every where I go.

Our list of things to do before we move to St Anthony is nearing epic proportions with sub-heads, tree branches for subsequent thoughts and now thankfully there are a few black lines through accomplished tasks.

Things to find out in St Anthony (achieved tasks are italicised)...

• Rent (not yet but we are working on it)
  
• Car (Thought we had this sorted but the car fell through. Back to the drawing board)
  
• Banks (Yes and we are already members -- SORTED)
  
• Pet Shop (Much to the chagrin of Sir Richard there is no pet store hence no more of his delicious California Natural minced New Zealand possum and vegetables unless we can get it shipped there from St John's)
  
• Thrift Store (Yes, bless the Salvos for providing us an outpost of shopping normalcy)
  
• Pub (mmmm, we think there is a place like an RSL there called a Legion and apparently it goes right off on a Wednesday night. Here's hoping there's bingo).
  
• Weather each season (yep, cold and snowy)
  
• Camping (if you can brave the cold and the snow then sure, why not)
  
• Close communities (the tip of Newfoundland is about 90 minute drive and in between there are a bunch of small towns)
  
• Airport to town (there's an airport and there's a bus that takes you from it to the town centre. We won't be using this service however as we are flying into Corner Brook, about 10 hours away)
  
• Craigslist (mmmm, sort of)
  
• Car Insurance (still working on it but at this stage it looks like $60/mth)
  
• Medical coverage (they have a training hospital there so maybe the medical service will be cheaper)

Not the most exciting of lists albeit but a list nonetheless and damn doesn't it feel good to get started on the logistics of it all.

Thankfully the past evening was nightmare free. The tally since we made our decision to move is now: Nightmare free: 1 -- Nightmares: 2 (moose and ice driving)