an upsetting phrase for me is "when you get back". upsetting because it hints that the outing isn't a stay but a trip - which it was in this situation, i admit.

it also hints at the lack of self-sufficiency when on a wander. outside of saying that chores can be put on hold until the return, it states a need for a base to do what is needed. i think this the reason that a minor cbc presenter and me would compete to "upgrade" sullivan's loop with internet access, wi-fi, inkjet printers etc. it was a way of fooling us into thinking that it was an extreme version of cottage country. that the return trip wasn't necessary that this would turn a trip into a stay.

i realised this in gros morne during the residency. it wasn't the time away but how the time could be used away. how what i wanted to do wasn't dependent on heading back to do it. a rhythm was established nothing was put on hold. the trip became a stay.

as i have stated before this is the strange characteristic of photography. traditionally while photography could be done anywhere and quickly, it would have be taken on faith with others that the photographer was competent - i think this is one reason why photographers make so much of their equipment - for to see the work there were specific needs - a dark room, water supply etc. hence the "return" was needed. the trip was on hold until the results were seen.

what made gros morne a stay was the horrendous amount of equipment that was taken with me so that work could be made and not held until the residency was over. i was also eyeing a unused room in the basement of sullivan's for the same use.

as i have also stated this is not the case anymore. lugging about a digital camera an a printer things change. work can be not only made but finished while "away". of course this could be done without the printer as now more and more a hard copy is an option with work showing up on blogs, websites, social media and now actually using tablets as a option for works. the had copy, the print, the artefact is also much easier. 

this is where - for me - the struggle starts. with digital there is the instant verification and gratification, there is the horror of archiving work, how many copies do i make to feel safe, but it does mean prints can be made and shared. 

with this though the idea of memory  and anticipation disappears, the refuge of a specified room where only one thing can be done is gone. there can be more multitasking. there is also the romantic hold of film that now brings on a hush of respect and stories all over the web http://cnn.com/video/?/video/us/2011/08/20/film-not-dead-yet.cnn 

in the days of transition when digital and film were pretty much equal in use, there was this option of using colour film, one hour photofinishing having a cd made so that prints would come and blogs have images. it was sort of fun, dropping off the film at the dominion on the way to pouch cove in the evening picking the negs and cd the next day heading into st. john's.

on the wander north of 60 i found once again i was lugging too many cameras, the digital for the blog, another sofobomo book now postcards of the weird. film for the real work. want to stop this as i am anticipating the ambitious long distance ding dong ditch come yanksgiving and don't want to be bogged down with equipment. this was an experiment on working method, on the idea of the stay a point of departure for tweaking before a real stay.

my thinking of an option right now is returning to film one hour photofinishing a scanner and a printer still smaller than the deardorff platinotype outfit of woody point and conche. failing that a leica m9p where i gaffer tape over the rear screen.

fifth level

-since there are no people behind me, do you live near here?

-yes.

-i was wondering if this was a posting that rotated six months here six months say in sarnia

-no they ask for volunteers for the southern border - mexico needs more official

-"volunteer?"

-no we can still volunteer, but if no one goes that may change.

-thanks.

re-entry was complete.

there was tim's across the highway from the sunset motel - please help our septic system by not flushing sanitary napkins or condoms. use garbage receptacle. thank you - but thought it too early. there would be others before being south of 49.

passed another on the east side of portage la prairie but wanted the freshest possible box of timbits to hold me over when i got back. i'd wait until i was east of winnipeg. that meant passing the one just before the bypass.

i couldn't understand the lessening of the speed on the most improved road i had been on in sometime. passing the last oil well, i remembered that i wanted to make a snap of one but had kept looking for a better one or that the next one would be just as good as any. now it was too late or too complicated to stop and do the u turn.

a brush fire near the trans-canada outside winnipeg. 

prolonging the stay a bit longer and realising from the past two days that i could find new roads to use, i went a bit further east along the bypass but not far enough for a last double double or any decent coffee as i was on route 59 heading south. more stops along the way - a covered signs, ukrainian churches, a hockey rink made of old tyres, small hotels.

reckoned that i should make a snap of the winding down of canada along a straight section and no sooner than i put the camera down there it was. the border complete with a wooden post showing the border.

beyond this minor bend everything was almost the same. it still route 59, still flat,  the speed limit went from the 100km/h to 55mph i felt like i was standing still but now there were patrols of troupers.

a giant advert with a u.s. flag and "united we stand". thought that i was in some alternative u.s. as from what i read and heard this could be read as ironic.

passed a memorial to 11 september made from plastic flamingos. the towns became larger. 

still stayed a north as possible taking the road to duluth heading through the chippewa national forest, past the birth places of judy garland and bob dylan, didn't slow down for bemidji and the paul bunyon experience. saw the creek that up here was the beginnings of the mississippi then crossed it a number of times. stopped for a restaurant in a fish and a proper coffee in a nice coffee house complete with vegetarian and vegan food in grand rapids which again made me aware of my stereotype that small places miss a lot when it seems that small places away from larger towns tend to be more self sustaining.

another twinned highway heading into duluth crossing highway 61. strained my neck to see lake superior. a series of diversions and i was back in wisconsin.thought about staying north through ashland and bayfield to stay along the lake - always hear of the lake superior snow belt on wisconsin public radio. too dark to make snaps along 53 missing the chance to document more road housed, resorts, motels ending up in eau claire trying to find a motel before all the restaurants closed.

fourth level

i like ferries. i like them for the same reason that i like postcards and the world before mobile phones. i like them because they take away control. in this wander to the true north strong and free, i have skipped over many a river. played tag with the rancheria in bc and the yukon, the north saskatchewan in the prairies and rarely thought about it.  there was a bridge. i didn't have to allow time worry about a queue i didn't even have to slow down -well  where bc plays tag with the yukon i did as they like to have those open grid bridges.

ferries slow you down. when i got over seeing the ferry leave rio for niterói after midnight and knew that i had an hour's wait. after the initial frustration the wait was fine. i still won't take the faster bridge. 

even though i am sure that all the goods vans wanting to get to the island wished that danny williams had started that tunnel but the wait for the crossing, the anticipation, the chats with others was a nice part of the journey.

this is why when i made it too late to paynton to photograph the ferry crossing. i headed on to the battlefords spent the night and retraced my steps - a good 40km of them to photograph the ferry.

three clicks off the yellowhead highway - down a dirt road, a free cable ferry that seem to take one from nowhere to nowhere. when i arrive the ferry was on the other bank. there was a chart up saying when the pilot had breaks. it runs from 7am to midnight. as i approached the river a machine was being loaded on the other side.

it is a four minute crossing that doesn't run in high winds or lightening - metal deck on water.

chatted with the pilot as there was no one going back. she showed me the cable housing and told me what i thought was the cable was really just a guide line

-doesn't it get boring?

-no i am in nature. i've been here for 15 years. i have regulars. they know more or less the schedule and will ring to see when my break is. if i have been just sitting around. i'll tell them to come down.

-cannot imagine a lot of traffic

-there are three first nations in the area, there is oil and gas. 

mentioned that i like ferries as it wrestles control from humans.

she mentions how impatient people not from around here get.

-i was loading an oil tanker on the ferry, have to be careful as it will barely fit, it is not so much the length but the width, when this person tries to get on the ferry also. i stare at him and tell him to wait

-oh he says

-oh. i tell him that i could make him get off that he has to listen to me. and what does he do when we get to the other side? the same thing.

two tankers pull up on the other side, i thank her for the visit and she is off.

with this as the start of the day, my mood changed. it take quite as long to break out of the stupor as it usually does. stopped four more times before getting back to where i was last night. a hotel that i saw heading to the klondike, which i thought was empty and thus thought buddy there who drove up and tried the door a twillock until i saw someone in the upstairs window. 

i waved.

she waved back.

then again at an abandoned play lot after beginning to photograph campers for sale along the highway. going back to the big country began to see the caravan crowd as latter day pioneers so their abandonment was indicative of something.

stopped in borden as again i remembered the hotel from the road and again i thought it was abandoned but it is functioning. i find this perfect as it moves the snaps away from the decaying barn aesthetic. it also slowed me down even more. walked around town did the nod to people who passed. liked the fact that the bowling alley was in the senior centre by the library all in the same building.

next time - yeah right - i would spend more time in the museums that all these towns have as it seems that most have collected all their old buildings moved them behind a fence in the hopes that people will come and look at them.

i realise that these entries seem snarky but it is due to what i see is the misunderstanding of these places, it has nothing to do with the past it is that they still are around that is important. it is more important that buddy who was in his seventies got on his bike after leaving the senior centre than the preserved church in the replica of main street.

did a ding dong in saskatoon but no one was home.

the first decision had to be made.  retrace steps on the yellowhead or head south to regina. headed south. another decision would have to be made in regina - head into barrack bachmann land or hold out a bit longer.

prolonged that decision by taking another back road. why take a diagonal that passed nothing when i could go straight and with a nice right angle end up where i was. good choice for while it was the rolling hills of the province. there were quite a few potential photographs made. 

the towns along route 2 sounded more interesting i got to go through, imperial liberty, stalwart and holdfast. tried to deal with more grain elevators and tried to photograph buddy in the co-op window in liberty but he wouldn't have it. we did chat though as he tried to get someone else to stand in the window.

responsible me was to have me heading for the border at portal north dakota as it is more direct but can't do it. it has been nice not having to deal with two levels of  the dysfunctional, using a currency that has a value - although converting from one that is worthless is killing me. instead of south headed east along the transcanada.

it does seem that not wanting to descend below the 49th has made my work better and has kept me more focused and less manic.
i make another decision in winnipeg.

third level

my friends, love is better than anger. hope is better than fear. optimism is better than despair. so let us  be loving, hopeful and optimistic. and we’ll change the world.

jack layton

i was bracing myself for the truly mindless part of the descent. crossing the alberta border there would be nothing but divided highways back below the 49th and beyond. bypassing all but the most commercial of areas. slowing down to pass through grande prairie, edmonton, lloydminster and saskatoon but outside of that "relief" all the towns would be tastefully off to the side and out of sight.

i remembered an option on the way up that i didn't take as i didn't know how long it would take to get to the klondike, as i was in no hurry to get back, i looked up the route again and  seeing that it stayed northish a bit longer and went through towns. it was the northern woods and water route. decided to take it. 

divided highways are marginally  faster as passing can be done at any time but speed wise there is only a 10 km/h difference between the super highways and the back roads - less when you realise that they are not patrolled.

it could be the wish to delay re-entry is making the return as profitable as the wander up. again it is the roads but am stopping more because there is more to see. when i need food or fuel i have to determine which street to choose aiding in exploration. found not only the town of joussard and lesser slave lake what looked like a resort community that served as a break from the rolling hills of alberta.

still not keen on alberta. there are too many clean white pick-ups. they didn't look like they were being used as pick-ups but bought instead of a range rover as that would look pretentious. cannot understand why they were so clean as most range roads were gravel with gravel the size of rocks. 

while there were farms and ranches and grass fed beef, again this being oil country the cattle were making their way around an oil well or beside a pipeline.

was eaten alive by mosquitos in wanham along the spirit river highway. a mosquito version of the birds as i was photographing a fair ground. it was to the point where some were waiting around patiently on my shirt for the others to finish.

my working method as i did find myself sometimes in a driving stupor was.

-that looks interesting.

wonder if it is worthy of a stop

yeah it has promise

i would then turn around.

the longest delay in my mind clicking in was 20 clicks.

but hey, the other option.

other days i would have been driven mad. a train passing with at least 200 wagons.

but the inevitable came in edmonton, i rejoined the yellowhead highway turned on the cruise control and radio one.

another misplaced newfoundlander spotted heading in the opposite direction toward dawson creek. there has been at least one a day since i started the wander.

the second level

• this is a great hotel but i had a hard time finding it. i said as i was checking out. i had to ask that the gasbar coming into town. it is hard to read a sign when you are going at 90 clicks.

• i know she said. it took me a year even to get that sign up as it had to pass the council. now i am being fined for the thank you for staying at the good hotel. the council doesn't allow writing on both sides i have to paint over the sign as you leave town.

-if i had could have found it when i was heading north i wouldn't have had to jump through a puddle to get to my room it seems that most places around here don't have to worry due to the rooms being taken up by all the crews.

i said that she we where talking i would have to make a snap of her and went to the machine to pick up ziquinho. she followed out - which was great as i really didn't want her behind the counter.

 in the damp and cold. the rain had stopped but there was a drizzle, i asked the questions that i always want to ask - why here. i may have said it with t bit of shock in my voice.

she had travelled the world trying to find a place where she felt at home. born in panama moved to other places that i cannot remember but when she arrived in the north she felt she fit in. understood the feeling finding a place where she was accepted rather than trying to fit in by giving up on certain traits. 

she loved the north - but again i said why here in the north - watson lake is a place one barely slows down to get through. i feel that it is there as it is the last major place for gasoline and food until whitehorse. she liked the people. she pointed to her employees mentioning that they were all from away like her and quite interesting. she didn't want to be in the states but never thought that she would have married a canadian. 

mentioned how rough it must be running your own business in a town where nothing really seems to matter. a room at her hotel was a good $40 more than anyplace else - $50 if you stayed at the renovated barracks with toilets down the hall. there seemed to be a shortage in town for rooms again due to the crews everywhere.

she was putting up a new building as the one i stayed in was shocking behind and attached to the petrocanada gasbar/convenience - or dep for habs fans. it belied the room, which in truth was a studio flat complete with a two burner range surround sound hdtv and speakers for an i-pod. i made use of none of that.

asked why she simply wasn't as cynical as the other places along the row there. hot plate, microwave, refrigerator. didn't need to she saw the hotel as an extension of her. didn't she worry about being her own boss she could really never take a holiday. yes it was called winter.

she hate the dawsons - creek and city. thought whitehorse too big. she was there for the people who would still stop by with cakes and coffee and walk in at any time - and the nature. she liked seeing grizzlies in her back garden she still picks up the camera when one happens by. she liked the people but said the place to be now is alaska - gold

i shuddered.

-they're different not like the rest.

talked for longer than i should as i had to leave the north which was at the east end of town and try to make it to dawson creek.

this was the good and bad part of travel. here was someone interesting with whom i would like to chat and will never see again 

a strange descent out of the yukon and into british columbia - twice as the road plays tag with the border. there was a convoy of us all passing the slower caravans every chance we had. but since i would stop and make a few snaps the caravans would pass me and i would have to start the whole process again. played tag with a long haul driver who ironically was held up by the caravan driving tourists as he was zipping along at 120 even up the steepest hills.

thought that i would photograph the scenery but ended up photographing the establishments that were along the way rest stops before there were official rest stops. i also made snaps of the ones that were no longer, my guessing is with travel becoming faster less rv parks, lodges and conveniences are needed and some simply folded.

with the drop the scenery had changed. more mountains, the road followed for the most part rivers through the area. it was also more "picturesque" mountains winding roads, rivers and large lakes. 

but it wasn't the north. there is this line that separates zones. heading north in the upper midwest of the states, in baja wisconsin everything changes there are pine forests, trees are more abundant and they are a bit smaller.

north of 60 everything seemed to be eeking out an existence, smaller trees, a lot os scrub. a lot seemed to be on the land not in it.

i did turn north again on the road to yellowknife as i saw that the northwest territories border was nearby that would leave only nunavut 

• this may be the stupidest question to-day but is there a tim's in town. i asked at the information centre in fort nelson.
• i wish... are you heading to dawson creek there is one there.

found it strange that buddy here would be suggesting that i drive six hours for a double double and not blink an eye.

-that's ok i'm a vegetarian and i'll guess i'll go to subway.

-there is an organic health food shop in town.

i get the directions and stop in but see nothing i would like as buddy behind the counter is making cupcakes and the cases all have food stuffs.

i mention what i am looking for to the owner and buddy behind the counter says there is one last serving of lentil soup. i take it with a spelt "biscuit"

this is curious. here in the middle of oil and gas land is a building that won a bc award as being the most green building in the province. serving vegetarian and at time vegan meals.

-how many people live in fort nelson?

-5000. 

-what do they do

-oil and gas mainly.

i don't know what else to say the shop was clean out of place as it overlooked a canadian dolllar store and an off license.

but their coffee was roasted locally in whitehorse - locally takes on a whole new meaning - i am guessing that if it is in a day's travel it is local. they make fruit smoothies everything they make is organic as well as the produce they sell. when they can get it up to them. it seems there is only one refrigeration unit lorry that comes north and he comes complaining.

• that simply makes things more expensive.
• what isn't expensive up here?

an organic health food shop in a town of 5000 while peasants pissoir cannot even manage any sort of food shop.

sat out on the patio overlooking the carpark with the alaska highway in the background wondering why i didn't meet these people on the way up.

made their snap in front of their counter. forgot to buy coffee from them and it was too late to turn back.

my opinions of the area between fort nelson and dawson were correct. too far south too tame and while i was wrong - the rockies do tastefully loom over the foreground i really didn't care. stopped a couple of times. but making time had set in. north of fort nelson i saw another heard of bison, more elk and mountain goats, south there was a pathetic moose. houses were isolated here it seemed more because of anti soclal behaviour rather than wanting to get away.

there was more land abuse, more pipelines, more precision scars - a  straight line of felled trees that went for miles then there were the farms.

dawson creek is packed again no place at the northwind lodge so am in a generic multinational hotel just beyond the wal-mart. i did see a sign for skagway again.  

the descent

 into the first level of hell.

 here i was on the levy of the klondike, on the far side through the mauze was the top of the world highway. one machine was awaiting the free ferry across. it would be easy to cross, keep going alaska being only 60 miles or kilometres - i forgot. i could do a circle come back via the kluane. i was so - relatively close to everything. up the dempster to inuvik, a diversion to skagway.i didn't count on the ferry being there. i chose dawson as i thought it would be the end. i would have to turn back but i really didn't a depressing thought.

walked around town making snaps of this place, thinking that if a place like dawson was in a third world country, we would be sending aid so that they could improve their living standards. this was the north american version of the favela tours of rio only here they have even rid the place of the inhabitants. 

needing stamps for postcards - post marks are important for placement - something this method of communication sorely lacks - stepped into the information centre only to be approached by someone in 1890's garb. this was becoming a bit too odd although i reckon dressed like that she would know of stamps and the post office.

looked for a place to have coffee - that looked like it served decent coffee - found a couple with promise but they were inundated with the tour bus crowd guessed that the best thing would be to get off the waterfront as every eatery was overflowing.

the clerk when i checked out asked about the room.

-fine except when the bars closed and the party started next door.

-yes dawson in the summer.

-doesn't it wear thin? i mean dirt streets wooden planks building falling down and everything turned into a hotel?

-let's say that we are glad when september comes. damn a fortnight early.

don't know why i had the need to photograph the city for other and this entry as there is google streetview but continued. also continued to photograph formally. the disparate objects that clashed between the centuries, a plastic kayak hanging from a hang painted sign. after a while i stopped this as it was becoming too easy.

needed breakfast and headed to nautical nellies.

felt differently about dawson. this was off the waterfront and while i could see baffled anoraked canon carrying crowds of pensioners, i had one of the best breakfasts in some time. firstly i didn't have to search for the vegetarian option. i had a version of huevos rancheros with black beans potatoes and junk salsa. the coffee was pretty bad. again it seemed that if one tried, it was possible to find a real town trying to break through the kitsch. 

the other nice weird disconnect is the help, i really doubt that when the gold rush was in full swing one would have a multicultural world of help up from vancouver at the front desks of hotels or as servers.

talked to one of the servers who also mentioned the odd forced feeling of dawson made worse this week by a film crew in town for a shoot. he was from victoria. i also realised that i was lucky as i passed the chinese restaurant in the midnight sun hotel that served up what would be called in the rest of the country chinese canadian food.

i left town, i started the descent. i had to if i continued on i would have continued on. i pretended that the klondike was the berlin wall and while i could look over to freedom, i would have to go back to the gulag on columbus drive.  no chicken, no tok, no old crow, no mayo. 

after paying $1,59/litre i made a wrong turn heading out of town and found a completely different dawson. outside of the  parks canada rehab i was interested, even more so when i saw the labrador flag outside one house wanted to ask why.

leaving it was raining. so much for making snaps on the way back so i entered the making time mode, racing to descend to the lower levels of hell.

then the rain stopped and i had to change driving habits. did stop. mainly for scenery but more and more as i got used to seeing smaller events along the highway. still the mind doesn't react as quickly as the machine. many u-turns or slamming into reverse.

tough decisions at the dempster highway, again when the klondike met the alaska highway - only 800km to fairbanks... but no kept on the return trip like a good ankle braceleted lad that i am. 

whitehorse was manageable few people but baked was packed one last decent meal until dawson creek i thought.

decided not to wade through puddles of water this time in watson lake. 

try t find this hotel a nice hotel but cannot find it ask and hear that it is behind the petro canada gasbar.

fill out the card for the room

buddy looks at it i think that he cannot read my writing

• oh i can read it all right i wonder if i believe it. pleasant prairie
• yeah and it is neither. i think developers play name roulette with village like deer lake where there are neither

he laughs

• i got one better. come by chance,
• yep been there

he's puzzled.

but i can top that dildo across the bay from spread eagle.

turns out buddy is from marystown on the burin peninsula

the room is quite nice.