I like Being Kidnapped

Woken by Julien throwing up/dry wretching in the loo. Showered, put laundry on and headed to a chocolate shop for a coffee date I had arranged for 10:45am with a girl I met in a bar. She never showed up. The day hadn't got off to the best of starts but it turned in to another reet good 'un.

It was the day of the Banff triathlon so I stood by the side of the road in the sunshine and cheered strangers on, earning myself a bag of goodies for my enthusiasm. All the goodies were power-bar related and tasted horrible. Back at the hostel I went to cook myself some lunch but in the kitchen there was a crazy hunch-backed woman mumbling to herself so I ran away to hide in my room for twenty minutes. When I returned she was still there, still talking to herself but now there was another normal person who I could share sympathetic scared eye gestures with so I made my super noodles while crazy lady shuffled in and out of the kitchen cursing at fridges and cupboards and kettles.

Rented a kayak for the afternoon which is the perfect way to spend time in Canada. On the river two girls in an inflatable dingy said hello to me and we hooked our boats together for a bit of a float, chat and... what's this? A beer from your cool box? Don't mind if I do.

Michelle and Jenny are most excellent people. Seeing that I had a pen they said we should draw pictures for each other. Not a suggestion I've had before, but a good one. I drew a goofy cross eyed man waving, wearing women's underwear. Michelle drew a river and mountains and Jenny just hung on to the handles trying to decide if she was enjoying herself. Jenny can't swim and has a fear of water.

We pulled over to a wee beach so that Michelle could get in the water for a wee and as the clear water looked so inviting I stripped down to my flowery underwear and dived in (upstream of Michelle). An initial feeling of 'this is perfectly relaxing' was replaced after three seconds with 'f--- me it's cold'. The girls invited me back with them by Michelle asking Jenny 'Can we kidnap him?'. Spontaneous days out are exactly what travelling is all about so I popped back to the hostel to get showered and changed and then they took me to Michelle's house in Canmore, a beautiful house with large wooden deck and mountain views. We sat round a fire, toasting hot dogs and doing conversations very well, mostly about serial killers!

I only returned to the hostel two days later having had a great weekend, playing frisbee golf and making some great new friends. So yep, I like being kidnapped.