Day 11 Road Trip - I'm just an actor, I can't answer any of your questions

Still not used to the changing timezones, a heavy night out and utilizing the benefits of a windowless basement, this was a new sleep-in record for the team – waking at 2pm. Saying goodbye to Saskatoon, we headed for the ‘gina but ending landing in Moose Jaw (Juice Jaw). Al Capone’s old Canadian stomping ground (known as Little Chicago), we arrived just in time to take a tour of the city’s underground tunnels. Intrigued by the history, we instead endured ear piercing squeals from crazy actors that took $14 from each of us, an hour of our lives and couldn't answer any of our actual questions about the history of the place. With light failing, we decided to bunker down in Moose Jaw close to Tim Hortons and Prairie Dogs. An entire 20hrs later Amin found the answer to his question from the night before… and it was Sacha.

Day 10 Road Trip - Saskatoon: The land of brown

With not many plans for Saskatoon, we had a very lazy day and a quick afternoon drive through the city confirmed we weren’t missing much. We headed home lamenting on the number of retirees that lived here, with the hope that we would find a younger crowd at The Cat Empire gig later that night. (thanks Ross – you’re a champ). We partied pretty hard (Amin obtaining an eye injury to prove this), and once again ended up at The Yard and Flagon Pub in search of the prized $5 Poutine. With no Poutine in sight we had to do a pit stop at McDonald’s, meeting Mr Donald himself.

Back at Adrienne’s at 3am in the morning we reminisced about the evening, picked the meat out of our ‘vegetarian’ Big Macs and Amin questioned - "seriously guys - who ate all my fries?"

Day 9 Road Trip - Big Dinosaurs with Cereal

Day 9 was the day of the dinosaur. Drumheller – the land of the giant paper-mache dinosaur, and not much else except an eerie semblance to the movie Wolf Creek for the Aussies on board. We were, however, able to pick up two entirely homemade vegetarian soups for the Team Awesome herbivores – which is a rare feat anywhere in Alberta.

Onward to Cereal, a small town in Prairie nowhere, where we stopped at the local museum to Sacha’s delight. Originally designed as a pee stop, we ended up being coaxed into a tour of the local artifacts for at least half an hour. Despite the delay, we arrived at a decent hour in Saskatoon to be greeted by our awesome host, Adrienne. We met the rest of the family and prepared ourselves to go out in DT Saskatoon with Amin’s friend Kelvin, who was also stopping off in this fair city on his own road trip (follow his trip on ratheroddjourney.com).

Our biggest discovery in Saskatoon was the $5 poutine at The Yard and Flagon Pub. Seriously.

Day 8 Road Trip - The calm throughout the storm

After a midday wake up call, a 22 person crew was rounded up for a 4hr float down the Bow River. Departing at 3.30pm and as thunderstorms set in, Sacha and Bree were a little hesitant after seeing lightening in the distance, but we grew a pair and got in the raft with beers in stock.

A quarter of the cans down, the sun finally showed it’s face and we docked for desperately needed pee breaks and cliff jumping. With a little convincing from the boys, Allie and her hair fearlessly jumped off the cliff too! The rest of us… chickened out! Getting back into the rafts, we all made it down the river in one piece, minus a few bumps and bridges along the way.

The rest of the night was taken up with laundry and sleeping.

Day 7 Road Trip - Last weekend of the Stampede

Bree and Amin got up early-ish, to make pancakes and coffee with Baileys for the crew. Allie was allured by the smell of coffee but it seemed nothing could wake the sleeping Sacha - not even the heat of the 1pm sun.

Finally with the cars packed we headed to Calgary, arriving just after 3pm to stay with friends of Allie. The team split up, with Bree and Amin going in search of an unsuccessful vegetarian meal along 17th Ave SW (but Bree happened upon a Vintage store much to her delight!!!). Allie canned-on with our wonderful hosts Matt and Wil, and Sacha went for a run. We stocked up on beer and vodka and prepared ourselves for the big show. Wheelchair comps, face punching, dog bites, and a crazy landlord appearance that moved the party to the 4th floor; the night was epic.

Day 6 Road Trip - Let's Can-More!!!

With the rise of a new sun, Sacha found that she was still alive, and was born again (into what we're still not sure). Heading for downtown Jasper, with the promise of coffee and Internet, Amin found a delicious Jalapeno and Cheese Pretzel that seemed to satisfy him for days. We headed back down to Banff to pick up the Tomcat. After a failed car park and siphoned Internet Skype attempt by Bree, we continued on to camp in Canmore (get it can-more!). Setting up our own private tent-villa was all thanks to a huge tarp and Amin's nifty work with a microphone stand. Bree got the first battle wound of the trip cutting her foot with an axe, and with the sky lit up by a trillion stars, we continued to can-more beer well into the morning hours.

Day 5 Road Trip - Camping in Jasper " A Bear-y Good Experience"

Waking up just shy of 10am, Amin attempted free breakfast, but after spending too much time trying to rouse the Beauties, he missed out himself. The crew decided to head to the hot springs for a relaxing day. Surprisingly, it was hot. There were a lot of old people there for medicinal purposes. We were just hung over.

After packing up the Tomcat (Camaro) and leaving it for a nights rest at the Chalet in Banff, we piled into Pontiac Pete (aka The Sunfire) and traveled north through the Rockies to Jasper. One of the most breathtaking and picturesque drives of our entire trip. We stopped at Athabasca Glacier, and then continued on in search of goats. By the end of the journey, we'd seen an Elk, a bear, a family of Mountain goats and two eagles. With reports of a bear having to be chased from the campground earlier that day, camping in Jasper that night was to be Sacha's last - brought on by her fear of the imminent bear attack that was bound to take her life. Successful 1st camping night with pasta, smores, wine and lots of hot sauce.