Jodie Ponto Photography

What most people don’t know is that touring musician is really a synonym for trucker. The vast majority of time on tour with a band is spent in a vehicle. Life becomes a series of whizzing dashboard scenes and you become more intimate than you ever thought was humanly possible with gas stations, CBC radio, side of the road pee stops, and creative methods for amusing yourself and staying awake on long-haul drives.

That said, here is what 7,500kms of BC and Alberta roads looks like through my iPhone and the Vangina windshield.

Banff National Park, AB

Jasper National Park, AB

Crowsnest Highway, AB

Crowsnest Highway, AB

Medicine Hat, AB

Kootenay Pass, BC

Highway 95, BC

Kootenay National Park, BC

Kootenay National Park, BC

It was 3 hours into a 4 hour 80′s playlist and we were en route from Calgary, AB to Freedom Fest in Moose Jaw, SK.  I was behind the wheel belting out If I Could Turn Back Time when the van’s back tire popped harder than those sailors who watched Cher prance around on the USS Missouri in nothing more than a fishnet body stocking.

This is the 2nd consecutive year we’ve broken down on the Friday before the Canada Day long weekend (check out photos of last year’s adventure in road travel hell here). Coincidence or not, we’ve decided Canada Day long weekend’s eve shall forevermore be a day spent drinking, not driving.

Busted flat.

The Badlands.

Waiting on the side of the Trans-Canada Highway while Miss Quincy fishes the spare tire out of the Vangina.

You know it’s a blustery day when Shari’s ass-length dreads blow in the wind.

Shari “The Chip Burglar” Rae holds up Miss Q & Holly while waiting for a new tire in Medicine Hat.

You can’t fully comprehend the absolute enormity of Canada until you traverse it by automobile. For some perspective, once upon 2 years ago Miss Quincy & I stupidly drove from Calgary to Montreal in one fell swoop …. It took us 54 hours.  54 fucking hours!  That’s with a constant rotation of drivers and only stopping for gas, grub, and one four hour sleep in a roadside ditch.  What’s even more unbelievable about that number is that it excludes 5 whole provinces.

Here are a few rogue photos from the past week when Miss Quincy & The Showdown and I put over 3,000kms on the Vangina in a massive westward trek from Quebec to Saskatchewan.

Quebec City By Night

Everything you’ve ever heard is true, Quebec City is a time-travelling European city stranded in North America.

Backstage Pass

When travelling as an independent band you don’t often find a backstage full of star-studded dressing rooms, bottles of vintage Dom Perignon, 18 year old Greek virgins, and jars of M&M’s with all the brown ones removed.  In fact, there’s most often not a backstage.  Here’s what it really looks like:

Shari & Miss Q putting on their stage faces at Chez Rachelle & Erika in Montreal.

Pre-show beerverages on the leather-couched back patio of Not My Dog in Toronto.

Backstage in Bruno, SK at the Bruno Arts Bank.

Pre-show rehearsal at The Rusty Bike in Moose Jaw, SK.

Roadside Attractions

Miss Q making dinner for four on the hood of the Vangina in Wawa, ON.

Shari shadow-kicking the shit out of Miss Quincy.

Sleepover Time

As mentioned many times before, to survive on the road you have to become one hell of an adaptable sleeper. You must develop the ability to sleep when you can and where you can, or you will die a haggard sleep deprived death.  Here are a few of the more respectable places we’ve bedded down in over the past week:

Miss Q & Holly take turns chugging cough syrup (for illness not inebriation purposes) at the Motel Express in Quebec.

Our European mansion of an apartment in Quebec City.

The Thunder Bay International Hostel – although we arrived too late to take their infamous dump tour we still managed to sleep peacefully beneath the watchful eyes of the hostel owners’ wedding portrait.

Ontario: Putting The Cunt in Driving Across The Country Since 1867

As anyone who has ever driven across the country knows, the vast majority of your highway time is spent in Ontario. I’m not exaggerating when I say it takes days & days to circumnavigate the edge of the Great Lakes.  As Miss Quincy put it, “Ontario puts the cunt in driving across the country”.

One of the innumerable craggy lakes along the Trans-Canada’s seemingly endless Northern Ontario stretch.

A Northern Ontario sunset looking especially beeyootiful after 9 sweaty hours in the Vangina.

Prairie Respite

The Vangina finally emerges into the Prairies after 4 days of driving through Ontario.

3 days ago I was sure I wasn’t going to be alive long enough to lose my East Coast of Canada virginity.  Last year’s ol’ plane crash in the Yukon really ruined my relationship with flying and I can’t help but feel absolutely certain every plane I board is doomed to go down in a blaze greater than the Tenerife airport disaster of 1977.

Against my irrational fears, my flight on May 22 from Vancouver landed safely in Montreal where Miss Quincy & The Showdown‘s trusty Vangina was waiting with an empty shotgun seat.  From the airport we hit the highway East for an 11 hour drive to Moncton and our new New Brunswick home, Plan B.  Plan B is a bar straight out of the best sitcom you’ve never seen and the folks who run & frequent it are so wonderful we’re stopping by again next week on our way back West.

The Vangina taking a rest at the Motel Express somewhere on outskirts of Rivière-du-Loup, Quebec.

Singing Bob Wayne‘s Love Songs Suck at the Couche-Tard on the Quebec/New Brunswick border.

Outside Plan B, our Moncton home sweet home.

Inside Plan B, our Moncton home sweet home.

Cody, Plan B’s official Lifeguard on duty, updates the chalkboard in between helping patrons drown in beer.

Pre-show Miss Quincy gets down with a little office work before undergoing her miraculous nightly transformation to stage hot.

Miss Quincy & The Showdown kicking raunchy rock n’ roll ass.

Miss Quincy & The Showdown let their inner superheros show.

The ever-rare real bed – Moncton boudoir at Chez Lifeguard Cody.

You know what they say, a band that stretches together stays together.

Shari “Packmaster”  Rae loads the Vangina for the drive to Fredericton.

As this year’s Summer Tourcation comes to a close, I’m left with a stockpile of photos that will forever be lost in the bowels of my hard-drive if I don’t do something with them now. So without further ado, here are a few tales from the Vangina.

The Vangina

The Vangina came into our lives early in the tour after the tragic demise of the trusty ol’ Mama Dragon and our home sweet trailer Ruby. This is what she looks like when she’s packed to the roof with 5 stringed instruments (including an upright bass), a drum kit, 2 amps, a full PA, a merch set-up worthy of a farmers’ market,  luggage and sleeping implements for 6 weeks, 10 hats, and 4 ladies:

Once in awhile we do have guests in the Vangina. Meet Hairold.

A pictorial representation of Breathy Betty (the GPS, that is).

The Cream of Happiness

Nothing makes a morning happier than Carolans in your coffee. We consume so much of this creamy delight it’s a wonder they don’t sponsor us.

The Health Test

It’s important to keep active on the road. With that in mind we have developed a daily health test that would make Hal Johnson and Joanne McLeod proud.

Paul Lake is Our Bathroom

Using Paul Lake as our own personal bathroom to get ready for a gig.

The Shit Sprawl

After living out of a suitcase for awhile, home becomes wherever you happen to sprawl your shit.

Home-ifying some motel room with a classic shit sprawl. JP washes her filthy clothes in the sink while I take mine off and get to work in my bed turned office.

Sleepovers

As I’ve touched on before, to survive on the road you have to become one hell of an adaptable sleeper. You must develop the ability to sleep when you can and where you can, or you will die a haggard sleep deprived death. As per usual, over the past 6 weeks I’ve gotten my dream on in more places than you can possibly imagine. These are perhaps my favorite:

Tarynn & Merlin’s Magic Tree Castle in Ucluelet. Visit them at the Ukee Treehouse B&B next time you’re on the Island. And yes, that is a king sized bed.

The barn loft in Twin Butte, AB.

The Drummer Who Wasn’t Allowed To Drive

The one and only time our colonial cousin and English drummer Nurse Layhe was allowed to drive.

The Rogue Smell

One of the major enemies you have to battle when living out of a minivan with numerous people for long periods of time is The Rogue Smell. Sometimes the smell is so assaulting and elusive that you are forced to call in a rogue smell expert (yes, I’m talking about you, Nathan Rogers). In this case, a simple tear apart and sniff down of the minivan yielded the nasal assailant – a bag of vegetables that had managed to slip away under the seat and turn itself into sludge.

Workplace Injuries

Bass Fingers.

Guitar Fingers.

The Jam Factory

Edmonton.

Victoria.

Vancouver.

Duncan.