Roll-Over Beethoven

My dear Silver Spirit was humming and burping a little too much, so I made her an appointment to get the exhausd pipe welded back onto her muffler. On my way to the garage in the morning I was humming to my new I-pod and sipping my fresh tea when...... a turn on the gravel road came up too fast and too sharp for the speed I was driving. I tried to control the situation, but started sliding to the left and lost control over the wheels. Steering right, my faithful beast slidded to the right.... into the ditch with bushes that luckily stopped her in the forward motion. But because the ditch was steep and sloping to the left, and in combination with the movement I had, the Silver Spirit started rolling to the left.

While sliding, all my shells and stones on my dashboard were send flying throughout the interiour: "Shit," I thought "that will be a mess to clean up." Well, when she started rolling, everything else went flying too. my whole box with food came crashing down in my lap: "Fuck the shells! This is way worse."

After a 360 degree roll she landed back on her four wheels, I was sitting in my chair, tea cup still in my hand but empty now, I-pod still palying and motor still running. Totally surprised at what had just happened. "Well, I guess I better start working on fixing this."

So I put my cup away, turned off the motor and started running up the hill to the first house one Km away.
At those friendly people I called the police who would not drive up (if I wanted a report I had to come to the office) but connected me with a tow company.
The man were able to pull my busted darling out of the bush, so the tow truck was not really neccesary, but she still got hooked up and draged into town.

All the guys at the shop looked at her and helped thinking how we could wash this piggy with the least amount of money. I started to unload my house, finding stuff on opposide sides of the car, pestopaste all over and shells in every hook and cranny. It came rolling out when I opened the doors.

The next day, All, my super mechanic, started fixing her slim, silver body and cleaned her up in two days. Her frame was bent back so the doors would close properly and a new front window could be put in, this window came from an old Toyota on the junk-yard. It had more bursts than my previous window before the roll, but it was free and available. My sun roof was chattered, both pieces of glass, but because there is a plastic seal between them it was not leaking. So we set it back and sealed it. I can not slide it anymore, but at least it's still there. The last window on the side (thank god not a 'rolling' window) was totally gone and now is replaced by a piece of hard clear plastic. All even welded my exhaust, so that was fixed too. Her mirrors were broken, so I replaced them myself with the red ones from the other Toyota, now she has red Devil Horns, Soooo cool. Her body is full with dents and little bruises, but she is zooming like never before and booming with pride on being back on the road with such a fast recovery after such a dangerous tumble, I love her. She made me $1000 poorer, but it was well worth for the experience it gave me.

The time I had to spend extra in Whitehorse gave me a new friend, Kendal, 23. Being here only for three month to work, she invited me to come to Kelowna in South BC to go snowshoeing and lean how to ice-skate (she was a profesional ice-dancer). I hope I get a hold of her, cause that would be so cool. She entered a wet t-shirt competition with her friend at the bar she is working at, just for fun with two beachballs as fake blow-up (hence the photo) and got a free ticket for the 'Frantic Follies Show' at her other work place for me. The morning before I left we played Carcassonne and said goodbyes full with future plans.

The road to Dawson City brought some awesome hiking near the mining town of Keno (this is where the very first gold was found leading up to the Klondike Rush) where a signpost told me I was 4400 miles, 7085 km, removed from Paris.
And another absolutely nice hike was to a lake in Tombstone National Park where I packed some sandwiches and my sleepingbag to find a spot with view and roll myself in a piece of plastic. Super cold that night, there was frost on my bag in the morning.




And look what Dawson brought me after that ..............