good god, what a trip down that was.
our troubles started early. the cassette deck, which we had rigged up so that we could play our cd's on the drive down (having neither interesting cassettes, nor radio stations to listen to on the drive through the rockies), started making a funny noise just outside of jasper. being male, and knowing that it had helped before in far more dire straits, i decided a swift hit to the side of the tape deck's housing would clear everything up.
well, it stopped making the sound.
of course, it also stopped working entirely.
this was not good. we still had about 10 hours of driving ahead of us, none of which was going to be in range of a good radio station. k started pulling the deck out, convinced that if she just jiggled some wires, it would all start working again.
it didn't. next step: sticking a pen in to try and free up the rollers. nada. so here we were, shivering in the jasper cold trying desperately to get our tape deck working again.
alas, i'm afraid our beloved tape deck has gone onto a better world. one where memorexes run free under a dolby sky.
we managed to survive though. i was lucky enough to remember a pair of headphones, which i gave to k so she could listen to her music. i didn't really need any music to keep me going...
the rest of the trip went quite well... until we passed Merrit, that is. it seems it had been snowing all day in the coquihala pass, and the plows were out there, but not doing all the much to combat it.
we hit Merrit about 5:30 or so. well after sundown.
it's quite dark on the coquihala - they only place lights at the exits (much like any freeway, of course). combine that with a fierce snowfall on existing (packed and slippery) snow, and you don't have wonderful driving conditions.
I was actually doing pretty well until k started composing her will and testament. i got a little wigged around then.
the descent wasn't all that bad, in retrospect. i was still wiggy from a couple of slips we had before the toll booth, so it felt many times worse than it actually was.
we got home -- right on time -- and wouldn't you know it, we were met with rain. ah, it's good to be back in bc.
apologies to those of you who got used to a daily update. i've been limited before today with the amount of time i could spend online (seeing as it ties up the phone line here). k's parents have hooked up to @home though, so i'm online more (nicer for work too. ;) )