Day 1

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Hello, is this thing on? What can we tell you today?

Day One, start to mile 537. We are in Quesnel [pronounced Que-nel], BC.  It took me about 25 tries to get a good dial-in connection from here and the connection is very slow.

(talking to rallymaster, Jerry Hines, ready to pull-out and start mile 0)

The start went well. A number of our fans were on hand to see us off and take lots of pictures. It was quite a media event with the pro teams camera crews all over the place. After the hype we settled in to a leisurely drive.

On Hwy 9 there were numerous signs and banners rooting for TeamD that had been placed along the route by our supporters.  Eric's sister met us at a gas stop and boosted our food stores with a "cookie bear" that served as more than one meal later on.  Our early support caused some jealousy among our competitors.

Our first TSD (timed section) started outside Darrington, WA and ended near Sedro Woolley. It was a good warm up and we think we scored low. After the TSD we had a 350 mile transit section to Williams Lake, BC. (A transit is simply a "cover the distance" driving leg.) We crossed the border into Canada without incident. Our favorite question was "What kinds of guns do you have in the car?"

Several other competitors and at least one worker vehicle enjoyed a stop and chat with the RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) between the border and Hope, BC. The visit included a paper memento to take home. So when Team Isuzu wins ask them about the speeding ticket. In all fairness the radar detector maybe saved Eric although he wasn't going too far over the limit.

Outside Williams Lake we had our first TSD in snow and it was at night. It was pretty fun and the normally reserved Mr. Willey commented "This is really fun!" We got stuck behind a local resident and our first checkpoint found us about 12 seconds behind. The local was not interested in letting anybody around and those behind us fared worse.

After that it was a quick 60 miles into town for a buffet priced at $6.00 US. You get what you pay for and so tomorrow night we'll be looking around a bit before choosing a restaurant.

Lessons learned: pull out early if non-rally traffic is likely to hold you up and choose restaurants wisely.

Scores will be posted tomorrow morning so no news on that. Our first event tomorrow is an ice race at Gold Pan Speedway. It is the first of four such side-attractions. Gold Pan is a 3/8 mile oval I'm told. Neither of us have done that kind of racing, much less on ice. However, it should be fun.

More from the North tomorrow night.

--Eric