By Peter Wilson pmwilson@wimsey.com
If a month on the road from Vancouver to Inuvik in a caravan of Volkswagen buses sounds like heaven, then do we have the virtual vacation for you.
Okay, it's not the real thing. You're a tad late for that. The caravan left on Monday for points north.
But if you want to ride along in a virtual way while some 20 vehicles--from a 1966 microbus to a 1996 Eurovan Camper--make the 4,200 kilometre trek north this summer just point your browser towards the Inuvik website at http://www.chaco.com/inuvik/
There you'll discover that not all internet users sit through the best weather of the summer staring enviously at the surfing avocado on the California Avocado Board home page. No, they're out there on the road fending for themselves and having a great time of it.
Or so the trek organizers--Tobin Copley of Vancouver and Ron Lussier of Cupertino, Calif.--hope.
The trip, says Lussier on the web page, will take the buses and the 27 people signed up for it not only along highways but also along "dirt, gravel, and shale roads." Eleven vehicles headed out from Vancouver and will be joined by others, coming from such places as Oshawa, Ont., and Anchorage, Alaska, on the way.
Adds Lussier: "The folks making the trip will all share a love of Volkswagen buses and not much else. One driver is a flautist who was the voice of Woodstock from the old Charlie Brown specials and another is a conservative from Orange County, Calif." [TTC: Neither Martha Rubin nor Steve Maher were able to make the trip.]
The group got together for the trip through the Internet's Vanagon mailing list, which is a virtual club for the drivers of Volkswagen buses. Anyone can join the list by sending an e-mail message to listserv@lenti.med.umn.edu and include the message subscribe vanagon your_email_address. For those not familiar with the terminology, this simply means that the words "subscribe vanagon" are followed by your e- mail address.
Details now on the website include a news release on the trip, a map of the journey, and a complete itinerary so that even if you're not on the road with the caravan you can be there in your imagination. There are plans for those on the trip to file details as they travel to Inuvik.
As well, those who have only e-mail access can follow the trip by joining the Inuvik mailing list by sending a message to inuvik-request@chaco.com.
The body of the letter should include just the word "subscribe," but without the quotes around it, of course.
If all has gone according to plan the group should be camping tonight at the Liard River Hotsprings provincial park after having left the Husky RV Park at Fort Nelson this morning.