Should Auld Acquaintance be Forgot.............

May 3, 2006
They day dawned a little brighter - blue sky smudged by clouds, the winds high but no rain. We set out to explore the city by car but it was still much too cold to walk. Around noon, we left Calgary hoping to outrun the inclement weather – and we did as we headed for Drumheller. As we descended the hill down into the town, we were hit by another rock – another chip on the driver’s side windshield. Apparently, these huge windshields are $1,000 each side to replace. I’m not positive what our glass deductible is but I think it’s $500 so we’ll just wait and see if the windshield cracks.

Fernie had been trying to locate an old work friend of his. He lost contact with PK in 1993. I showed him how to ‘Google’ someone and he was happily surprised to find a couple of Drumheller newspaper articles about his friend. We were unable to find a phone number or address for him except for the mention of his town, Beynon. With a bit of research, we found that Beynon is located between Rosebud and Wayne on the CN main line. Sounded easy to find when I located Rosebud on my ‘Streets and Trips’ map and found an approximate location of Wayne, online.

Rosebud, southwest of Drumheller is a quaint pioneer town, now a centre for the arts. The Opera House stages professional theatre and couples it with dinner after at the Mercantile. Caesar and I wandered around town reading the historic plaques, while Fernie visited the General Store trying to get info on his friend or directions to Beynon. The information was sketchy – the clerk qualified her answer with “I’m not too good with maps” but at least he found out that the road to Beynon was not far from Horseshoe Canyon and the clerk gave him a local map, though not to scale and didn’t mark the side roads. We drove into Drumheller past Horseshoe Canyon, parked at the Walmart and unhitched the Honda.

In the meantime, I noticed on the local map that Wayne was not too far from us – about 12km, six of which were a curvy, gravel rural road along a picturesque gulch. Historic Wayne, population 42, has a general store, hotel and “The Last Chance Saloon”, all interconnected. Once more, Caesar and I took a stroll while Fernie did his private eye routine. Through the store and the hotel, he ended up in the saloon. He asked the proprietor if he knew PK or where Beynon was, when a voice from across the room exclaimed, “I know him”. Fernie wandered over to chat to the old-timer who said, “Buy me a drink and I’ll give you the lowdown”. Three dollars bought a bottle of beer and the old chap proceeded to tell Fernie exactly how to find his friend’s house. “Down past Horseshoe Canyon a few miles, you’ll run across a yellow house right beside the road – it used to be a B&B. Go past it a ways and where the main road turns, you turn left onto a gravel road and follow it for about six miles. You’ll cross a white bridge and you’ll see a footbridge on your right. Park your car and walk across – that’s where he lives” He contentedly settled down to enjoy his beer and Fernie thanked him for his help.

We followed his instructions precisely but obviously got on the wrong gravel road. We stopped at a farmhouse, Fernie knocked but no answer. He could hear a piano playing so he knocked louder, then stuck his head in and called “Anyone home?” Such audacity. Finally, a woman came to the door and said, “Go back to the highway and drive six miles south”. We did….but still no Beynon – wrong road again. Why don’t these roads have names? It is much easier in the city. We stopped at another farmhouse, a Ma & Pa Kettle sort of place, dogs and cats running wildly, rusty machinery, dilapidated house. A young man said he’d never heard of the place or of PK. We were about to give up but decided to try just one more farm. After five minutes of knocking, a man answered and said “Yes, I know PK” and he explained how to get onto the ‘right’ gravel road to Beynon.

This time – success! Six miles along a winding gravel road, down into a gully, we came across the white bridge and just past it a gated suspension footbridge over to a fenced house, fronted by two large flags – one a Canadian flag, not sure about the other. Signs proclaimed that was an ecological area. Beynon appeared to be comprised of about four houses – no wonder it wasn’t on the map.

Fernie fiddled with the gate until it opened and crossed the bridge to the house. I saw him knock and wait and eventually went around the back and PK came to the door. They visited for a while, swapped information and Fernie told him we were just passing through and apologized for coming to his house unannounced but explained how he had tried to find him. Fernie came back out so happy that he’d found his friend and that they can communicate again.