Waking up in my cabin over the wheels, being jolted about the rails, riding the Canadian, half on / half off. Where more often than not we’re moving forwards … except when we’re moving backwards – which happens.
It’s freight traffic which shunts us about, messing with our schedule and pushing us into sidings – oblivious to the fact that a good proportion of the Canadian’s passengers are wanted somewhere for a postmortem.
Breakfast is a self-service silent movie, other than the noise generated by the running gear and the usual train sounds.
Up front, I imagine cartoon characters are hastily laying down tracks ahead of us, immediately before our train speeds through.
As we enter Saskatchewan, everyone seems to hit the snooze button as one; the alternately bright green and brighter yellow plains contrasting with a creeping sense of monotony, of life in a moving train passing through a dead flat landscape.
Gargantuan grain elevators occasionally punctuate the scene, appearing at random from out of the otherwise unbroken horizontal landscape, looming large like decades-old places of worship.
In the observation car, we Learn Things from someone who is reciting it all off-by-heart. While trying not to fall asleep.
Yellow, canola; brunch, diner.
Today enjoyed with Harry and Joanna from Toronto, a cheery couple who are not a couple – brother-in-law / sister-in-law; spouses deceased.
When I suggest this could set the scene for more adventures together … slightly awkward laughter.
Nevertheless, our journey through plates of eggs and bacon and fruit and waffles and endless cups of tea is a relaxed affair, running through the usual script … where we’ve been, where we’re going to, all interspersed with highlights of the lives which have led us here, to be sat at this table on this moving train in the dead centre of Canada at this precise moment in time.
The train moves on, west, to a Saskatoon delay, a two hour halt for no given or obvious reason.
If we were allowed to exit through the gift shop, they’d do a roaring trade, but here they don’t let us off the platform, so we all take our daily exercise by walking the length of the train several times over.
In the freight yard beside us, lorries constantly coming and going, some carrying a ghost cargo. This is what we missed last night, now following us around.
Turns out the train also missed Carlos, our Mexican adventurer, when it stopped at Winnipeg.
Ended up being put in a taxi in the dead of night, to catch up with the speeding train – to jump onboard … exactly like what happens in the movies.
Or, it’s possible we may have stopped to pick Carlos up … who knows? The scant English he speaks gives away very little, but just enough for some folk to think he really did take a quantum leap in the middle of the night.
When the train gets going from Saskatoon, no more lakes and no more trees, just endless plains, sometimes green, sometimes yellow.
Small blackbirds with white wings glide over this, occasionally play-fighting directly outside the moving window, showing off.
The grain elevators get bigger.
When the rain arrives, it’s joined by the main highway bringing long-distance truckers into view, competing with the train for top speed across the central plains.
At 4pm prompt, I take a trip down to the prestige party car, for pre-dinner drinks with a good mix of fellow passengers … my last night on the train, and the first where anyone has actually been in the bar at the same time as me.
Murray and Candy from NZ, Ian and Sue from Perth / Chicago, and shortly afterwards Chris and Terry from Essex.
I’m sat next to Murray, the straight-talking Kiwi lumberjack, pushed down that route by a father who considered his first career option of running a nursery to be a little too fey for his tastes.
Murray ended up in timber, following an ill-fated apprenticeship in the 1970s with British Leyland … which we both agree was a fortuitous escape.
And all I’m thinking is – there’s money in trees!
It might not grow on them, but maybe that’s because everything is hidden on the inside.
In a late afternoon social, I’m mingling with grown-up serious people, sipping beer and nodding and smiling in the right places … which is kinda funny, kinda strange, but I go with it – I can’t really go anywhere else.
After a good few beers, Chris, Terry and I trot the swaying mile to the dining car, attempting to keep our present drinks intact if not our dignity.
A salad, a pork chop, mash, broccoli, another slab of chocolate gateau all introduce themselves to us, along with a couple of beers, a pot of tea and after-dinner mints.
All the while with darkness descending outside – this is the late show, the late sitting.
When we realise we can’t be chucked out for a next sitting, because there isn’t a next sitting, we get another round in.
Chris and Terry entertain me with stories of unusual life events, to the point where we’re frequently sinking into fits of laughter, occasionally dragging passing staff down with us, as Terry insists on telling some of the anecdotes to them too.
When we are finally kicked out, I suddenly realise I’ve left my book half a mile behind me – it’s in the bar. I wonder if I’ve done this on purpose.
Well, as I’m here … may as well enjoy a final drink as daylight sinks.
At midnight, we hit Edmonton, for another hour-long delay.
In the cold dead of night, with the city silhouette in the distance behind us, we have a silent riot right there on the platform.
A mob of mosquitoes join our impromptu platform party.
When no-one’s looking, they hop on the train for a free ride to the Rockies.
An Outside World 