Heading Home From Home

They say getting there is half the fun. Sometimes that just isn't true.

As I mentioned in the previous post, the temperature had plummeted over New Year's, then rose steadily to above zero, with rain. Then dropped again. Sunday it rained, Monday is became cooler (we went into Montreal and were allowed to enjoy the rapidly icing streets and sidewalks). We rented a car and headed back to the lake. The road was a skating rink. Somehow we made it in to the house. WW drove the rental while I took his 4WD, not that 50WD would have helped.

On Tuesday morning, we prepped Ken and Jen's house for a lengthy period of unoccupiedness. We took out recycling and garbage. We tidied and packed. We returned cross-country skis to the garage. We tucked WW's car in an accommodating snowbank and bade it a fond farewell. We left.

We arrived at Trudeau Airport and returned the car. It was freezing cold. We shivered and shuddered our way to the terminal. Outside the doors, the rental car guy finally caught up with me and handed me my cellphone and its charger which I'd left plugged into the car...

We were told our flight to Toronto was cancelled. We had time to get the shuttle to the Via Rail station and catch the train to Toronto. The shuttle was very slow in arriving. WW talked to a Greyhound bus driver who said a bus to Toronto was "just around the corner". It was too cold for me to go tramping "around the corner" on spec. I voted for the train if the shuttle was in time, at which point it arrived. We saw no bus "around the corner". We bought our train tickets five minutes before the train arrived. WW spent the waiting time calling his son to say we wouldn't make it for dinner.

The train trip was uneventful but for two things. One, I discovered there was free and functional wifi. Two, while freely and functionally wifi-ing, my dear friend Rosemary (last seen about 8 years ago) emailed me from Salt Spring Island and we exchanged email like chat during the trip. (We did not use chat because we are both old and stupid and didn't think of it.) This email exchange has had far-reaching effects as I have since, under her tutelage, installed and used Skype to have a long lovely chat with her.

Our Toronto taxi driver is a big Rob Ford fan, watches the Discovery channel while waiting for fares, knows that the boreal forest is the lungs of the world (the Amazon jungle was brushed off as a mere bagatelle in the global respiratory stakes), and entertained us mightily until arrival at our hotel. We were lucky to have the reservation. People had been. stuck in Pearson Airport for three and four days. All the hotels were chockablock. We had a light supper and hit the hay at about 10:30 pm. WW called for a six a.m. wakeup call.

The next thing I knew, WW was stumbling about the room. What are you doing? I asked. It's 7:30, he answered.

Fortunately, the airport shuttle was at the door as we arrived downstairs. We hustled onto it. At the airport, most flights were cancelled. At check-in, we were told only three flights were allowed to leave each hour. We weren't sure whether this was per airline or total. Regardless, by some miracle, ours was one of them. It was a bit delayed, so our missed wake-up call wasn't a problem. Soon enough we were loaded onto the plane ready to taxi onto the runway.

And there we sat. And sat. And sat. The captain finally came on to say a passenger was having a medical issue and they were waiting for EMTs. These finally arrived and the woman was put in a wheelchair and left the plane with her husband/partner. Another couple took their place and we were off.

From there it went like Gilbey's: smooth.