Here is a short story that you may not have heard...

A Visit That Lasted A Year

We were at the beginning of our second year after graduating from Beamsville High School. Blair and I had met up in Edmonton and we decided to hitch hike out west from there to Vancouver. This was about 1981. Andy de St. Croix was going to Simon Fraser University (first year), was renting a small basement apartment, and had said to come out and see him. So Blair and I hit the road.

It wasn’t easy for two big guys (with 2 large backpacks) to get a ride together, but a couple days later we ended up on the outskirts of Banff. By the railroad station, in the trees, we pitched our small tent one night as we heard coyotes all around us. We didn’t sleep very much that night.

The next morning, out on the Trans Canada Highway, we tried hitch hiking for hours without getting a ride. We finally decided that it was best to split up in order to get a ride more easily.

Blair got a ride first and then I followed; separate rides, hoping we’d see each other somehow that night in Vancouver...

All we had was Andy’s address and neither of us knew anything about the big city of Vancouver, how expansive it was, the roadways, or how we would get around once we were dropped off from our rides.

After a few hours of being picked up, I asked my driver if he wanted to get breakfast, so we stopped at a Howard Johnson’s. To my surprise, there was Blair and his driver already having a big breakfast. We talked for a while and after eating we each continued separately with our own rides.

Much later that day, I arrived somewhere along the road that Andy lived on. In the dark. In the pouring rain. I walked for hours. I finally arrived exhausted late at night and Blair followed shortly afterwards, both of us soaking wet and hungry.

Within 24 hours we had decided to stay in Vancouver, look for jobs and get a place together. Within a couple days, we were moving into a house that we rented in Port Coquitlam. We stayed the year.

Phil Burak