Friday Follies - Slip Sliding Away - Winter Driving in Canada

Typical blizzard view

Driving in Canada in winter is now a distant memory for me.  Gone are the days of having to warm you car up for ten minutes before you actually go anywhere, scraping snow and ice off your car, and using an abundance of courage to navigate slick roads.  I now live in a land where air conditioning in your car is essential, and burning your bare skin on a white hot seat belt buckle is a right of passage.

I think if you grow up driving in snow, ice and sleet, you truly know the adventure of driving.  Sure, in Australia you can drive on the beaches and challenge yourself with 4 wheel-driving roads and parks, but you need to go out of your way to do these things, it's not a daily necessity.

When I grew up in Alberta, you got your learner's licence at 14 years old and your driver's licence at 16 years old (a fact that appals all Australians that I have met, but WAY cool when you are 14!).  You quickly learn that it is not only the winter roads that you need to beware of, but also the spring roads.  Spring roads are full of gravel that is put on the icy roads in the winter, and what melts during the day, freezes at night, so there is still often very slippery roads to contend with.  Not to mention the pothole dodging you have to do before your vehicle rattles to pieces.  The thawing/freezing routine makes minute cracks bigger and bigger, until eventually you can lose a small family, include all household pets and whitegoods, into a pothole the size of a moon crater.

In winter, there is no such thing as a quick trip to the store to get some milk (or wine).  You must first ensure that they are protected from the elements before running outside to start the car, turn the defrost on high, unplug the car, get out and lock the car while it is still running, and quickstep it back inside before flesh freezes. 

Once the car has been warming up for a while, it's back outside to scrape the ice off the car windows so that you can see, and brush off any accumulated snow.  If you try and cheat and leave the snow in situ, as you drive it slides off your roof to cover the rear window, and the windscreen becomes a flurry of snowflakes as the wind whips the snow off the front of the car. 

Digging out Mum's car on the acreage

Now that everything is brushed and scraped and cleared off, and you are ready to go.  It still feels like the inside of a freezer in your car, but the defrost is going full tilt and it has managed to battle the elements and defrost a small half-moon shape at the bottom of your windscreen.  Hunched over the steering wheel, you peer out of this tiny clearing, shoulder check through the parallel lines of defrosting occurring on your back window, and off you go!  The crunch of snow echoes in your ears as you reverse over a huge solid lump of snow and gravel and salty ice that has dropped off from behind your mud flap.

Winter fun

Navigating the roads is a challenge worthy of the Olympics.  You have to keep your eyes open for ice (unless it's black ice, which you can't see - that's always a fun surprise!), other drivers, the graders clearing the snow, trucks flinging gravel onto the roads to give the cars some traction, plus the other usual driving distractions.  As you approach the intersection, a gentle tap of the brakes to test the waters and see how icy it really is, and then a gradual application of the brakes will see you come to a gentle stop.  Unless you look up to your rear view mirror and see that the driver behind you has hit that patch of ice that you just avoided.  Bracing yourself, you see it all happen in slow motion as the driver gently nudges the back of your car and you comes to a rest four feet from where you were originally.  I can't tell you how many times this happened to me or did it to someone else.  No matter how careful you are, it's going to happen at least once.

If you are lucky enough to live on an acreage, as I was, you

A familiar position

also had to deal with roads that were not graded  or sanded regularly.  You had two tire tracks to follow in the snow (which is fun at night with your headlights reflecting off the crystal-like surface, creating glare) and if you got off those tracks and there was ice underneath that snow, you helplessly tried to steer out of the eternal skid as you slid gracefully into the ditch, dislodging snow banks and all the little mice that live in cosy tunnels underneath.  Once the engine was turned off, a peaceful silence cocooned you as you watched the snow dancing in the air, slowly settling on your car, like glitter floating in a snow globe. 

I never had a practical winter vehicle, but they were great in the summer.  Boy oh boy, could that Fiero spin like top on the ice.

Not my car but pretty much identical. 

 


Some biker chick