Winter has arrived in Western Canada over the last 4 days. It all started Monday night, with rain, and as the temperatures dropped, the rain froze and we awoke Tuesday morning with 6 inches of snow, over top a huge layer of ice.
And as anyone can imagine, the drive into work that morning was, well, Hell. And of course I was super nervous about driving as my Mustang is rear wheel drive, and it is the first time I have driven this type, ever, let alone in winter. I woke up early that morning as I knew the commute was going to be long, and boy was I right. An hour and a half it took me to get into work that morning, going at a snails pace the whole way, and not even by choice, but because I had too. The roads were skating rinks and there was SO much traffic, that is just how long it took. It was backed up only a block from my condo.
It snowed for about 3 days straight, so the plowers and sanders have barely been able to keep up. Wednesday morning I had to drive up towards Mouth Royal College, and Deerfoot wasn't too bad, but Glenmore and Crowchild were horrible, lots of ice under a layer of thick snow. I had tons of people passing me but I refuse to let them get to me, and if I don't feel comfortable driving faster, I refuse too. Now, I am not going 10km/hr, I will go up to 50 or 60, but I still have people giving me looks. The way I look at it, if I do go faster, I am more likely to loose control and cause an accident, which I am not willing to risk!
Yesterday it stopped snowing so the commute today was only an hour, and the roads are slightly better, at least the main ones, however I still get extremely nervous especially when the lanes speed up. I feel OK driving in the communities and side roads, as no one is going very fast, and because of the rear wheel I am able to push through the snow and able to correct if I fish-tail while pushing through ice, especially when starting at a set of lights. In fact, coming into McKenzie town is horrible because there is so much ice everywhere, it is very slow going. It can take me up to 20 minutes just to get into or out of McKenzie town, this would normally take less then 2 minutes and I get very frustrated! However, when I can speed up on the main roads, because we have so much black ice, and even random patches of thick ice that you can see, I can feel my car pulling to one side and struggling. If I was front wheel drive, I would be okay, but not as confident (yet) with my rear wheel drive. I can easily see that if I get going too fast and hit an icy patch, my car losing control, fish-tailing and me getting into an accident. This is where I can feel adrenalin rushing through me, my heart rate rising and even my mouth getting very dry! Thankfully once the weather gets better, and the roads are able to clear and dry up, I will feel more confident, but for now, it is what it is!
Below are pictures to what I woke up to Tuesday morning:
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