… possible place to stop for the night when you have a travelling companion like mine.

So here I am in the Dreamland Motel in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, in Canada. And I hope that His Nibs appreciates the … gulp … 424 miles (most of which was on normal roads) it took to reach here.

Last night was an excellent night’s sleep right the way up to the alarm. I was really comfortable there. My clothes had dried with the air-conditioning so it didn’t take long after the medication and breakfast before I hit the streets.

Just across the road in fact to the IGA supermarket where I bought probably the most expensive lettuce in the whole world, amongst other things.

Then I hit the road on what should have been a quite uneventful drive.

And it would have been too except for a couple of things – namely who in the whole wide, wide world would expect a gap of 160 miles (260 kms) between petrol stations in the USA, particularly when you drive part of the way through a perishing oilfield?

By the time I got to Phoe … errr … Malta I was running on fumes. The notoriously unreliable “mileage remaining” indicator was showing 48 kms left.

I’d stopped a few times on the way too. Firstly to photograph the mighty Missouri, and secondly to chat to a most interesting guy who was unloading from a trailer a pile of scrap metal that turned out to be a 1926 Ford T that he had just found.

He showed me around his yard and there were piles of interesting stuff too. And I now know the difference between a 1925 Ford T and a 1926 Ford T. Easy when you see them next to each other and compare fuel tanks.

He was telling me about his issues with the local authority and I sympathised. We’ve all been there before.

Crossing the border was fun. I had more difficulty crossing into Canada than I did crossing into the USA two weeks ago, although the guy at the border post was very polite about it. And they have a machine that kills your engine for you so that you can’t make good your escape.

The drive onwards was interesting, but not exciting. I found an abandoned railway and an abandoned homestead. And I stopped along the road to work out what it would take to go to Leask – something that brings back memories from my childhood. But that’s far too far.

In Moose jaw I couldn’t find a motel of my style at first. But a free wi-fi connection ( thanks A & W) enabled me to see an internet booking site and I creamed a couple of addresses off there.

It came up trumps too – the first one that I tried. Reasonable price and reasonable accommodation even if you I did need a degree in electrical engineering to plug in the microwave and make it work.

An early night now and I’m having a lie-in tomorrow. I deserve it.

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