A Nightmare on Highway #2

 Travelling on a major highway on daily basis cannot be fun but there are people who chose that as their career because the pay is good. A majority of truck drivers here in Canada are Punjabi Sikh Indians but people of different ethnicities could be found doing this job. I have been driving on a major highway for nearly 2 months now and the only thing I am lucky about is the fact that it's not a road going trough the mountains or it would have been much worse. 

This winter has it been remarkably warm and it's all blamed on global warming. If it had not been this issue, I don't know what would have happened to me now! Highway #2 or Queen Elizabeth II Highway was really bad this past Thu. when I was heading south. There were big snowflakes, flying horizontally to my windshield! Luckily and with a little careful driving I reached home safely. It was worse the next morning, when I was heading north, Large patches of fog would not let me to see past 3 feet (Here I'm trying to accommodate Canadians and of course Americans despite learning all my course base on metric system!). I started early so I was not late at work. My manager was surprised! 

Heading back south was a different story! The road was dry but all the trucks I had seen earlier in the morning at the other side, southbound, now where ahead of me and had caused a major slow down! The speed was reduces to, first 5.5Km/h and then stop and go and this continued for nearly half and hour and I think in that half an hour I travelled only a kilometer or so! I called 511 three times, as my telephone is old and doesn't have a strong sound and I realized that the highway had major back ups at three spots leading to nearly 2 hours of extra time for any trip to south!

I, at this time, found the first exist and went to Olds because I was low on fuel. I then went to a local McDonald's to see if I can get map on my phone going and perhaps continue south on Highway #22. The stupid phone didn't work and then I used my old GPS. The stupid GPS directed me to some dirt road which was covered in ice with no light! Then I turned back and took Highway #22A and that was it.

I reached home around 20:10, some 2 hours late! I'm thinking of moving somewhere close to 

(Photo: A jack-knifed semi. This looks like to be very common and these idiot drivers never learn. I can't tell how many I've seen since the start of the cold season and it hasn't been a cold season with lots of storm, snow or such!)