Hell yeah! Back on the Trans Canada Highway for the one hour journey from Baddeck to the Marine Atlantique ferry terminal at North Sydney. And ridiculously picturesque scenes to distract me on the way there, too.
A long slow decline on the wide-open run down Kelly’s Mountain, to her hairpin bend around the bottom.
Unsurprisingly, there have been more than a few accidents here – according to the signs erected on either shoulder.
This is all followed by a cold drive over a Long Bridge, then a meander up some impressive inclines, hugging the landscape, and eventually down into North Sydney.
Only to discover I’m a late arrival, despite pulling into the terminal over two hours ahead of departure.
The cheery check-in agent allows me through the barrier, but puts me in the naughty lane.
Already queued up at 9am, nose-to-tail in the other lanes, scores and scores of vehicles … rental cars of all sizes, every permutation of the all-American truck (XL, XXL, or supersize), out-of-state MPVs, the ubiquitous Subarus; huge winnebagos, tourist coaches, long-distance lorries, nearly-new SUVs, biker gangs, Airstream caravans.
We’re all going to Newfoundland, on a boat … just not the scheduled one.
The long delay provides time for me to stroll into downtown for a Cuban, a hot neck shave and a buzzcut – three things that most definitely weren’t on my schedule when I woke up this morning (or ever, come to think of it).
On my casual lunchtime amble back to the terminal, it turns out the substitute boat is already being boarded, and I’ve lost my spot in the queue … d’oh! Seems you’re on your own around here.
Once parked up on the ferry, I quickly jump out fully expecting the customary sprint up the numerous flights of stairs, but that dash doesn’t happen … these passengers are not for sprinting – they’re all too busy medicating.
I’m easily able to plant my flag and stake my claim to a table at the front of the ship, with a full-on widescreen view, within striking distance of the bar.
When the final truck is loaded, the drawbridge is closed.
We travel in reverse for a few moments, which is to be expected – the seagulls unsure and hesitant to follow, or not. Rich pickings on here, my avian friends! If only you can figure out the automatic doors.
As the captain manoeuvres the love boat out of port, in a smartly executed handbrake turn, everyone is busy trying to figure each other out.
We do this over our picnic lunches, full spreads for some; me with my fat Cuban and my pickled gherkin, shades on. No-one will work out my role in all of this!
The captain’s moves are so smooth we may as well head straight to Love Island right now. That skipper already has a fighting bunch of retired admirers on their hands, all wanting an exclusive tour of his ‘n’ hers, and yet we’ve barely even left port.
There is a lady of a certain age to my right who spends the vast majority of the trip doing an adults-only dot-to-dot.
I know this because, before we’ve even moved anywhere, Grandma Doris exclaims a little too loudly, in a croaky voice and amidst fits of giggles, “I’m going to do the whole Kama Sutra!”, whipping out a felt-tip pen in the process.
And I wonder … how do I get myself into these positions?
This is my life, for the next six hours. Snorers to the left of me, gigglers to the right. And here I am, stuck in the middle with a pretty good view of it all, actually.
When the time comes I get up to head to the bar.
Yet on approach, horror of horrors! The shutters are being pulled down. We’re still a good hour from shore, and the barkeep has seen fit to shut up shop!
In a scene worthy of a film, my stride exponentially lengthens, my pace that of a walking athlete, slowly quickening to the point where I’m practically vaulting over tables to get to that goddamn bar.
When I arrive there, my hand darts under the fast-closing shutter, waving a crisp twenty dollar bill in the process, and emphatically calling out “Iceberg!”.
If I wasn’t mildly panicking with the imminent bar closure, I would of course have added the word “please”.
But I don’t.
The lack of that one simple word means that not only have I got the immediate attention of the barkeep, but seemingly the whole goddamn deck are now fully stirred and all staring directly and intently at me, mute, looking for some clarity on this looming situation.
Even the Grim Reaper over there has been stopped in his tracks.
Almost in one smooth action, the barkeep rolls his eyes, turns on one heel, grabs a blue bottle from the fridge, cracks it open with a very loud ‘tssshhh’ in what is now a semi-stunned silence, and places that Iceberg lager in front of me.
Behind me, I can just about hear muted conversations strike up again, and Grandma Doris is clearly back on her dot-to-dot Kama Sutra (the up-and-down shrieks being elicited giving the game away), yet I can’t turn around yet due to the red flush that’s quickly consumed me, and rooted me to the spot.
I therefore spend a good few minutes stood at those closed shutters, chugging on my ice-cold Iceberg, acting as if this is the exact place I intended to be, playing it cool – playing it ice cool.
But flapping away furiously under outwardly calm waters, contemplating my mum’s instructive words from when I was small: “Always say please!”
I never realised that in doing so, I could avoid a potential diplomatic incident, or a mutiny on a ferry … but hey, every day is a school day.
Approaching the shoreline, being on the wrong boat, we dock at the wrong town – Port-aux-Basques.
A rainbow of houses and businesses are clinging a little desperately to the rocky earth, which itself is just about managing to stay above the waterline.
We have found land, we are in Newfoundland.
Without ceremony, the indifferent stewards nonchalantly wave our vehicles off the ferry, onto dry land, where we snake our way around the bend and straight into the parking lot of St Christopher’s Hotel.
Where we then have to queue for half an hour to check in, all the time trying to remember that we also happen to be half an hour out of kilter from all accepted conventions and every other time zone across the known world.
Once in the comfort of my hotel room, in the corner, a crisp early evening view of the assembled boxes almost falling over themselves into the sea, under the wild blue sky, which appears to be expanding.
I seek out darkness, which as always is to be found skulking in the bar.
Already propping it up, lurking in amongst the gloom, is a bearded man in a biker jacket. This is Randy, owner of a big hearty laugh from Saskatchewan, and his equally balmy partner, Mel.
They’ve just arrived here from Dildo, on a mean-looking Harley-Davidson trike, a proper ride.
And no wonder they’re laughing. It’s electric.
Of course, I drink exactly what they’re drinking – I figure I’d be a fool not to.
These two are in danger of sending me under through fits of laughter.
Smutty talk of all the salacious place names on this here island, all the x-rated towns and hamlets they’ve visited in the last few weeks.
In the midst of all this, the flown-in manual workers, all scattered at separate tables in the dark of the bar, open-mouthed at the three of us practically throwing ourselves on the floor through our early evening come-by-chance merriment and mirth.
As if the pair of them and their Dildo memorabilia aren’t enough, Randy proceeds to tell me of the enormously large souvenir rock that Mel bought last week, on the other side of the island. Which it turned out is heavier than the whole of their luggage, which itself was kept to a minimum to aid the balance of the Harley.
When Randy moves on to tell me about the town called Climax, and the inevitable farewell sign ( … ), I figure this is as far as we’ll go.
I fall off my stool, holding my sides as I go, and bid goodnight to my bawdy friends as I crawl out of the room.
I retire upstairs, surprised that it’s still light outside, my bedroom window now framing the densest of fogs which has suddenly enshrouded the town.
My thoughts of Grandma Doris’s dot-to-dot Kama Sutra on the ferry, Randy and Mel on their Harley from Dildo … nevermind dirty old town, I figure this is one smutty old island.
True sleaze / Love is the drug.
(a double A side)
An Outside World 