"Are you OK with a truck?" she asked

Last week I had an assignment in Prince George, just for a day...a long day as it turned out because either the 5:30 return flight had been cancelled, or there'd only been the late 9:20 pm flight to begin with; I'm still not sure.

By the time the flight landed and we trekked into the terminal I think it was around 9:15 a.m. As always I headed straight for the car rental desk, but there was already a line-up. Since I had a reservation I wasn't worried. As the clerk typed in all my details I overheard the client next to me being offered the choice of a truck or a mini-van. The car fleet had already been lent out. According to current advertising trends I should have been  aghast at the thought that I may end up driving a "soccer mom" mini-van rather than a perceived "real man" truck consisting of an $80K fully-optioned gas guzzler on my assignment within city limits.

Funny story about that actually. A number of years ago I briefly worked with a guy who had exactly that truck; a Ford F350 turbo-diesel, extended cab, 4x4 pickup with lift kit, custom wheels and huge offroad tires. He even bragged to me about having replaced the mufflers with straight pipes to gain more power (and to intentionally make more noise of course). He claimed the turbo assembly provided enough noise dampening. He was sadly mistaken in that claim. At the time I estimated he'd sunk about 100 grand into that truck. I naively asked him what it was like to take it off-road and his immediate response was that he'd never do such a thing. He'd spent too much money on it to chance scratching the paint on an unpaved back road.

So based on pure practicality, given the choice I should have selected the mini-van. But lo and behold the anticipated choice was not offered. Instead the clerk asked me, "Are you OK with a truck?" Um...sure. I actually assumed it would probably be an SUV; some people refer to them as trucks. Some even have truck frames, or at least they used to. Equipped with my keyfob with license plate data written on it I made my way to the parking lot. After review of several suspected candidates I finally matched the plate with the largest vehicle in the lot; a Silverado crew cab, 4x4, Duramax diesel. Thankfully with functional mufflers! And no, I didn't take it off-road. Too much snow, and the waiver probably forbade me to do so anyway.

I'm just glad I didn't have to park this one on Vancouver's city streets. Prince
George is definitely the place ya want to drive something this big.

The coastal mountains were spectacular again, as usual. It really is a great
flight going north from Vancouver on a sunny Winter day.

This is at least the second time (if not third) that I've been awed that such a
clear divide is visible between the mountains and the plains. I'm not even sure
where exactly this occurs; I'll have to look it up on a map one of these days.

I caught a cool perspective of the plane just prior to touchdown in PG.