Jailbreak to Canada

Every year Cambridge Rag organises a fundraising event called Jailbreak. Participants have 36 hours to get as far away from Cambridge as possible without using any of their own money. Teams of two have to get sponsors beforehand who pledge to give a certain amount per kilometer travelled, borders crossed, strangers kissed, whaetever comes to a donor's mind...

My friend Julia and me took part in this year's Jailbreak, ending up in Calgary, Canada. We travelled 6960 km overall, topping off the adventure with a week of hiking, skiing, feeble attempts at hitchhiking the amazing experience that friends-of-friends are the best friends. This is our story:

Friday morning, just before 9 a.m. in Cambridge. 150 teams had come together for the Jailbreak. Costumes varied widely, a couple of bananas, other teams wearing sombreros and our favourite: butterfly and butterfly-catcher. We decided to go "somewhere warm" - Mexico or Hawaii were our ideal destinations (hence the costumes) but we agreed to settle for anything far away. Our consisted of a change of underwear, a towel and swimming things. How wrong that choice of clothes would turn out ... When the siren went off we ran into Cambridge town and collected about £70 within an hour. Satisfied with our initial experience we took the train to London. We didn't really have a plan but thought that the area around Liverpool Street was a good bet.

Around 2 p.m. we had collected about £200 and took a break. Spitafield's Market and the pubs around Liverpool St. were good, the large offices a disappointment. When we went through the revolving doors at RBS five security guards literally jumped towards the door, making gestures for us to not even bother entering the building. Our costumes probably didn't help but the polite-aggressiveness surprised us. Meanwhile, we called a couple of businesses in hope for corporate sponsorship. Unfortunately, this didn't really get us anywhere but the day was still young.

By about 5 p.m. we had collected around £350. Our buckets were getting heavy with 50p and £1 coins and we decided to cash-in before the banks closed. As we were counting we got a call from a friend: he had found two one-way tickets to Calgary within our budget. We were overwhelmed, Canada hadn't been on our map at all and decided to have a bite before making any decision.

After realising the phenomenal money-for-distance ratio we eventualy booked the flights and immediately fell into a strange mixture of excitement, tiredness and disbelief. We were exhausted and cold, so we made our way to a friend's place to spend the night there.

Saturday morning at Gatwick airport. After getting some warm clothes from our friends we felt better prepared but still slightly worried. Wikipedia mentioned an average temperature of -9 degrees during January for Calgary. Optimists that we are we nevertheless took our swimming gear with us.

We still couldn't believe what was happening. Every couple of minutes one of us broke into what we later called the "Canada giggles". Our fellow passengers politely ignored us.

One of the best experiences of the whole trip happenned that Friday night. After booking our tickets we began to ask around if anyone had relations in or around Calgary. Within a couple of hours we got five contacts via Facebook, all friends-of-friends whom we had never met before. Eventually it turned out that my friend Ross's schoolmate Ali lives about an hour away from Calgary, has a spare couch and is willing to accommmodate us for a couple of days. His email spoke of incredible hospitality and spontaneity and read something like this: "This my address ... I won't be back before Sunday night but my flatmate will be around ... If no one is at home just let yourselves in, in Canada we don't lock our doors".

Half an hour before the deadline we landed in Calgary. This picture was taken shortly afterwards just outside the airport as a proof that we've made it. First impressions of Canadians were good. Ladies wearing cowboy hats walked around the airport telling everyone they were welcome to Canada. Immigration singled us out because of our virtually nonexistent luggage and inappropriate clothes. The officer didn't seem too impressed by the jailbreak idea and asked us if we took drugs. Evetually we were let into the country. We hadn't slept much in the past 36 hours but excitement and Canada giggles kept us awake. We took a bus into town and started investigating how to get to Ali's place.

Downtown Calgary. I haven't mentioned Max so far. After we booked our flights in an internet cafe around Liverpool St. Julia and I sent around text messages about the latest development. Max, an old friend from uni in London, checked the prices, realised he had not too much to do next week and booked a one-way ticket to Calgary for himself. Someone had indeed managed to exceed our coolness!

Calgary is a strange place. It is the "Houston of Canada" as a well-travelled friend called it, advising us to leave it ASAP. An oil-boom in the 1970s led to mushrooming concrete and glass towers without any heart or soul. The city is organised along a grid, most streets have no names but numbers. Everything seems designed for cars and not very inviting to people like us. It may have been because of the temperatures or the day of the week but when we were there the city looked pretty dead. We were glad to move on soon.

After an unsucessfull attempt at hitching a ride from Calgary to Canmore we took an overpriced Greyhound bus. Public transport really doesn't seem to be a strength of Canada. Shattered we managed to find Ali's house where we were greated by his flatmate Neuf. Neuf's real name has been forgotten by most people, replaced by a nickname depicting his origin in Canada: Neufundland.

From left to right: Neuf, me, Max and Ali. Neuf and Ali were fantastic hosts. They took us out for humongous beers ("schooners") and introduced us to their colleagues/gang. Did I mention their work entails patrolling the slopes of a ski-resort, using explosives to set-off avalanches, abseiling people from broken-down cablecars and general bad-assness?

Our days were pretty much dominated by the outdoors. We went on a couple of hikes (in Canada you don't go for a walk, you hike!) frolicking in snow and ice. Just behind Neuf and Ali's house was a huge frozen river. After we established that the ice was at least half a meter thick we left the track and started general shenaniganry on the ice.

Julia looking pretty.

Peter looking pretty.

We spent about two hours dancing on the frozen river ...

Max letting his inner bear out.

More frozen river. The landscape was simply stunning!

Another hike we did, this time a bit further out of Canmore. We followed "Cougar Creek" for a while, walking on the ice until it got too thin. When you stood without moving you could hear the water running underneath the ice, a beautiful sound!

We eventually left the riverbed and followed a trail up the mountain. I'll never ever make fun again of "Rocky Mountains" being unimaginative!

Our more than inadequate equipment meant that we couldn't reach the summit, after a while we just couldnt move upwards anymore and started slipping and falling instead. We took a rest at this beautiful viewpoint overlooking Canmore and made our way back down. Sitting down and using your body as a sledge turned out the best and safest option...

WOW!

Green and white were clearly the dominant colours of the area.

Living with two mountaineers-extraordinaire had the distinct advantage of getting a discount for skiing. We spent two days at Sunshine Village, the resort Neuff and Ali work at.

Sometimes we would run into people we knew, here Ali en route to some dangerous spot that mortal people should rather not enter. As one of his colleagues told us: "Don't ski where he skies!"

Given our mission this picture simply had to be posted.

After a brilliant five days in Canmore we had to return back to Calgary and eventually the UK. Uni was calling. We arrived in the morning in Calgary and had a couple of hours to kill, so we decided to take a walk around and give the place another chance.

While not much more lively than during our first visist the bright and warm day let us appreciate the city's own asthetics a bit more. We still weren't convinced until ...

... WE FOUND THE PUBLIC ICERINK IN THE MIDDLE OF TOWN!

Topping this off: Streetfood Canada style: Hotdogs and burgers cheaper, better and faster than any international chain would have been. Calgary had clearly won our affection!