Hey hey, the gang's all here!

Thank you to everyone for their well-wishes. My family surprised my brother and I when the door opened at 2:30am -- I had slept in the living room again as I didn't want to be all by myself in the basement in a pretty empty house...at least this way the main floor was somewhat fuller people-wise.

Goodness we were all so happy to be reunited. I've been truly heartsick the past few days without them. I just wanted them home. We were stressed they'd be stranded there for days to come, stressed that they would get ripped off over there, stressed that they were all the way over there and we were over here unable to help them with whatever came. When they arrived we could finally breathe easy. Didn't have to perpetually monitor the phone in case they called. Didn't have to worry that they would encounter more problems on the road.

As I said earlier, it all started around 3:30pm in BC. We were about an hour and a half to two hours into our drive back home from Vancouver. Daddy chose the Coquihalla tollway to shave off a couple hours from our driving time. We filled up in Hope before going on to the tollway...little did we know that we'd be back there in an hour or so.

As we drove along the tollway the van had started to make some sounds as if it were struggling. I suppose that sort of makes sense since the entire road is pretty much an upwards journey. A moment later and we saw a trail of white smoke spewing behind us. Then as we pulled over and my dad popped the hood the smoke wrapped around us to the front of the van, combining with black smoke from the front. Moving quickly my dad came around, grabbed the fire extinguisher and blasted it all over the engine and such. Apparently there were little flames licking all around.

We all hopped out of the van in a strangely calm, secretly panicked, daze. So we should call AAA, right? My brother's cell phone was dead and with us being in the midst of the Rockies my phone was getting no reception. Another driver pulled over and offered to call, but his phone was also out of range. He then offered to take one of us and drive somewhere higher up in the hopes of gaining some reception. I'm sure he meant well but we were all afraid to split up, let alone with a stranger, at this point so we just stood by our van in the spitting rain being absolutely useless.

It turns out a trucker had seen our situation and radioed for help. Not even 10 minutes after we had gotten out of our van then a tow truck was already there with us. Listening to their story, they claimed that they have been contracted by the RCMP to monitor the area and offer assistance when needed. I say "their story" with some skepticism. This entire story reeks of the phrase "highway robbery" but it's all just our gut feeling, no real proof. Let me know what you think.

Being CAA members it would have made sense to call for their towing service, but with our cell phones being useless and having a tow truck right there in front of us we made the decision, perhaps a hasty one, of taking the tow truck that was already there. Looking back, I don't know if we could have made any better decision as my grandma would not have been comfortable waiting out there for too long, and as we were headed back to Hope the tow truck stopped by another car having problems. This couple had called CAA already and had been waiting an hour so far.

Towing got pretty expensive since there were 6 of us that had to be transported back with the van, meaning the driver had to radio in his tow trucking friend to carry the rest of us back. They billed us 271. (Later when my mom told the insurance company the tow bill amount they were shocked, so I know we weren't being unrealistic balking at that amount.) They took us back to Hope claiming, and again I say that with some skepticism even though it was a Sunday, that Brad's Auto Shop (remember that name, 'cuz I never want to hear of any of my friends going to that shop EVER) was the only one left open at that time. Even though he was open it was clear that our family would not be getting back home that night and that was when our family got split. Weird Kid had work the next day so they sent him and I back home on Greyhound. (I hate last minute fare prices...based on his past Greyhound travels to Vancouver he estimated it would be about 90 a person. What he failed to factor in was that we were buying our tickets the same day as our departure so there was no advance purchase...and it was a one way ticket rather than a round trip. We ended up paying 104 a piece, and that's with him getting me a student fare along with his.) I didn't want to leave them there, but Weird Kid had to go, and it would be best if he was not alone on his travels, either. The tow truck guy even billed my parents for dropping my brother and I off at the bus terminal, it wasn't even a two minute drive from the auto shop! I don't think small town hospitality actually existed there in Hope.

You know you're in a small town when they're local Greyhound station is also their laundromat.

We took our bags and as much else as we could physically carry with us back home via the Greyhound. All we could manage was a bag of 4 flats of Krispy Kremes each. (More on the Krispy Kreme experience some other time) Umm, yeah, carrying that many donuts (and high end quality donuts, at that) around for a 12 hour journey gets you plenty of attention, let me tell you!

Oops, Krispy Kreme spells them as "doughnuts." My bad.

Yes, 12 hour bus trip stopping here, there, and everywhere. Luckily, there was an overflow bus from Vancouver going to Hope and onto Kamloops so up until Kamloops - which was at least a nice few hours drive - my brother and I were on a bus with only 2 other passengers. However, past Kamloops the bus was pretty much full. And for some reason I thought it would be better if I did not sleep on the voyage at all. I know that makes no sense since, now that I think about it, your belongings are just as secure on a bus as they are on a plane. But, yeah, I felt that I should be awake for the whole ride so every stop we had I loaded up on another cup of coffee. My body did not appreciate that at all and it fought to go to sleep. It wanted to go to sleep so bad, despite my caffeine-loaded actions, that it hurrrrrrt. Late night, early morning, normal people would be asleep those hours...and for some reason I fought it.

10:30am the next day, Monday, and we were finally home. Spydermonkey picked us up from the terminal. Even though Weird Kid slept on the bus he was definitely in no condition to work that day -- in 4 hours, no less -- so he called in absent. So really we rushed back home for nothing, but at least we could hold down the fort while the rest of the family was away.