Page 36 of The Trip of a Lifetime

‘Not Harrison, though,’ Martha said to Erin under her breath. ‘I can take comfort from that at least.’

‘We’re trying to get on the train to Churchill. Would you be able to give us some help in which would be the best way to go, please,’ Erin said.

The man tapped away on his keyboard and turned the screen around so they could see.

‘Your easy options are bus to Edmonton and then on the Saskatoon. The Saskatoon bus leaves tomorrow at eleven fifteen and takes about eight hours. Then you can get to Canora, which is a short hop to pick up the train.’

‘What are you calling a short hop?’ Martha asked him dubiously.

‘Only about 320 kilometres. Should only take you a few hours.’

‘You can get from the south-western tip of our country to the northern tip in fifteen hours,’ Martha said.

‘And is that a good thing?’ he asked.

‘I don’t even know any more,’ Martha said and they shared a smile.

‘And is that the route you would take?’ Erin asked, aware of a small queue gathering behind her.

‘Yes, I would,’ he said. ‘You could continue on the southern route through the Badlands, and that’s a striking landscape. It’s more direct but it’s a route less travelled and if you don’t have your own transport…’

He trailed off and Erin had already decided it wouldn’t be the route they’d be taking.

‘Thank you so much for the information,’ she said. ‘We’ll come back when we’ve decided what to do.’

Outside, they spread the map out again and really looked at the options. It was looking like they wouldn’t be going further than Edmonton today.

‘The next bus to Saskatoon isn’t until tomorrow anyway so we’re looking at a night in Edmonton.’

‘We could get a taxi to Edmonton,’ Martha said.

‘You want to get a taxi so you don’t have to get on the bus with the others? That would cost a fortune. We’ve been very lucky with lifts up until now, but this is a huge area we need to cover. We’ll be better off on the coaches. Maybe we can hitch between Saskatoon and the train station at Canora. Can we just go and get a coffee for now?’

They found out a taxi was going to set them back about $500 and dismissed the idea immediately. The bus tickets were a no brainer at $80 for them both and at two thirty they were on board. Martha was looking for the others but the doors closed without anyone from the race getting on.

‘I don’t know if that makes me feel better or worse,’ Martha said. ‘Because I don’t think they’ve missed the bus. I worry they’ve made a better choice than us, found a faster and cheaper route.’

‘Too late now,’ Erin said. ‘Our choice has been made and personally, I think it’s a good one.’

They found a hostel in Edmonton and it wasn’t anything like the luxury of the hotel they’d just vacated but it was clean, and once they had settled into the dormitory room and made a little small talk with the other women, they tried to get as much sleep as possible to gear themselves up for the eight-hour bus journey the next day.

The bus station turned out to be where everyone met up again. Erin had lulled herself into the false security that they had chosen the best route and would get ahead of the others. But, as they all discussed the different paths they had taken, it was clear that with only so many options available to them it was difficult to get a clear advantage, particularly in this part of the country. So even Harrison and Sam had managed to catch up with the pack. No matter what they had chosen it seemed they were still all going to be on the same coach out of Edmonton.

The coach was loaded up with camera crew and there was a line of producer cars behind.

‘Is this a joke?’ Liz said. ‘We could do this race all holding hands in a line.’

Martha laughed and Erin glanced over at Sam. He was smiling at her as if he had it carefully arranged and had been waiting for her to look his way. She turned from him and decided to keep her head down and read her book as the bus bounced them out of Alberta and into the province of Saskatchewan.

17

MARTHA

When we filed off the bus at Saskatoon there was a collective groan as our limbs moved for the first time in eight hours. No one hung around, though. We scattered just as we had done on that first day of the race. We still didn’t seem to know where we were going. How I wished to be able to pick up my phone and google hotels and hostels in the area. Instead, we just followed our noses. In this instance it was the smell of food that had me looking.

The wonderful aroma, it turned out, was coming from a restaurant just along the street from the bus stop.

‘We could just go and share a small, hot meal,’ I said to Erin. I was so hungry on this journey half the time. It was all the exercise that prodded my appetite.