Saskatchewan

Once we crossed the border into Saskatchewan, we drove straight towards our next destination - Saskatoon. Initially, I had only expected to be mildly impressed by the place. A small town in the middle of the prairies didn’t seem all that exciting, but funnily enough, Saskatoon soon became one of my favourite places along the road trip.

We messaged our next Couchsurfing host, Thomas, and told him that we might be a bit late as we were going to be getting dinner with some people that had messaged Iryna online. When we reached the bar, the three of them waved us over to their table, and introduced themselves - Riley, Jane, and Chris. As we ate, we got to know them fairly well, so much so that Jane invited us out to brunch the next morning.

After dinner, we met up with Thomas at his house. He told us that he wouldn’t be there in the morning when we left, as he had to be at work for 4am (he’s the guy that chases down hot-air balloons). After a long day of driving, we immediately crashed.

The next morning, we met up with Jane and had what I think might be the most delicious brunch I’ve ever had and will ever had. If you’re ever in Saskatoon, you need to visit Poached - it’s absolutely incredible.

After we said goodbye to Jane, Riley messaged us saying that he got off work early, and wanted to show us around. We picked him up at the house he shares with Jane and Chris, and he took us to two incredible places. The first was the Saskatoon River Beach. For a hot summer day, it was the perfect way to unwind. The current was strong enough that we were able to just sit and drift down the river a little bit. The second place he took us to was the Saskatoon Berry Farm, which has the most delicious perogies and cheesecake (it’s a farm run by Ukranians).

We had initially planned on leaving Saskatoon by 2pm to each Edmonton in the early evening, but we were having so much fun that by the time we said our goodbyes and hit the road, it was already 6pm.

Alberta

The drive to Edmonton was one of the more memorable ones. Iryna was wiped out, and was napping in the back, and Dave had already done quite a bit. So it was me driving, and Dave being my DJ to keep me awake and alert at the wheel. Sometime after we crossed the border, the sky turned pitch black. In the mountainous horizon, we saw bolts of lightning arcing across the sky. I still don’t understand how Iryna didn’t wake up, what with Dave and I literally yelling, “did you see that one?! Oh man dude that’s so freaking cool!” every few seconds.

I had hoped that because we were driving into the storm, our extremely dusty car would get a decent cleaning. The funny part is that the front of our car did, but the back half was even dustier. How it remained that way is beyond me, but by the time we reached our destination, we were too tired to care.

We didn’t reach Edmonton until 11:30pm, and by the time we got to our next Couchsurfing host, it was already well past midnight. They were gracious enough and welcomed us into their home. It turned out that our host, Courtney, was actually in Alaska, and her roommates were the ones that we would be staying with for the night. They were all young, in their early 20s, and since housing has become something that is increasingly unaffordable, they eight or nine of them had gone in on a mortgage for that house together. They had a unique system, in which everything was for everyone to use and eat unless otherwise specified. It had a warm, communal feel to it.

Waking up the next morning was a little tough. After a long night of driving, I was beat. Iryna woke up the next morning to a small, fluffy yet extremely grumpy looking white cat walking all over her face. It’s name was Roy, but she referred to him as the furry little asshole that woke her up. There were people studying in university, working on small farm projects, and a girl from Australia who during her travels across the country, found this group and decided to stick with them.

We didn’t stay in Edmonton long. I wish we had gotten more of a chance to see the city, but the three of us were eager to get to the next part of our trip - camping in Jasper and Banff.

On the way to Jasper, we got pulled over, and Iryna got her first ever ticket for speeding. After we calmed her down, I took over driving, to give her and Dave a break. We didn’t actually reach the campsite until much later, because on the drive in, we kept having to stop to get out of the car and just take in the sights.