unkl brws
Dagobah Resident
I saw this report on FB today from a reporter from the Ontario Farmer newspaper about what happened last night at a truck stop on the way to Ottawa -
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"Ontario Farmer reporter Ian Cumming was live on the scene in Vankleek Hill, Ontario, last night as over 1,000 trucks and vehicles made their way into Herbs Truck Stop for a rest. Here in a column written hours before the convoy reaches its final destination of Ottawa, Cumming speaks to the group of people gathered that included truckers, farmers, nuns, volunteers and citizens. (www.ontariofarmer.com)"
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Convoy, the night before...
By Ian Cumming
Herbs Truck Stop, half way between Montreal and Ottawa, just across the fields from the cattle sale barn, wasn’t used to having well over 1,000 vehicles jammed into its two parking lots.
Half a dozen OPP officers directed the traffic in off Highway 34 as dusk started to settle in on Friday, with minus 25 temperatures.
In the morn, they will be growling out of here for the hour-long trek into Ottawa.
The countless transports in one parking lot, idling in the snapping cold, were parked next to Herbs, which was jammed full with sit down diners and folks standing. Coffee was free; you paid for your meal.
No masks, no one asking for vaccination status.
“We came from PEI,” said brothers Mark and Michael, eating supper, who didn’t want their surnames in print.
Mark used to drive a truck in the oil patch out in Alberta and Michael, an employee of the federal government, is about to lose his job for not being vaccinated. They had joined the convoy from the Maritimes, believing they said, "in freedom.”
The other parking lot was continually filling with an endless line of vehicles, adorned with flags, patriotic messages and printed insults against politicians.
Volunteers packed people into parked line-ups, trying to squeeze even vehicles in.
They also had arrived here from over in Gatineau with over 300 free hamburgers cooked on a BBQ in that parking lot- leaving Herbs for the transport drivers. And when the food was gobbled up in less than an hour, someone showed up with 200 more.
“Do you have a place to sleep tonight, because we’ve opened the Ottawa churches,” the two kindly nuns asked cattle dealer Frank McMahon, who was munching on a hamburger, with all the fixings.
He did have a place to sleep, but thank you, he replied, his eyes watering after they walked away and it wasn’t from the cold.
There were impromptu bonfires, people laughing and hugging, horns honking, engines rumbling as they idled or crept into a parking spot, and when dark settled, they started with the fireworks.
There was one journalist among the several thousand people, even though this story has, and is, being pontificated on in the past days.
The reporter was from Ontario Farmer, and only when presenting his credentials as a farm reporter, showing the paper itself, were interviews granted.
Mike Roy and his band were here with five transports from Stanstead, Quebec. He’s the third generation to own this family business.
“Grand-père drove truck when he was 13,” and crossing the border into the U.S. is done six-days a week.
“Steel, logs, pressed wood, small trailers and granite are transported to and from Florida, New Hampshire, Boston and Drummondville.”
Roy and his family are vaccinated, but he is here, “because masks and vaccination should be a choice in this country,” he said.
Josie Gingras, sitting in the cab of her monster gravel truck, wearing sunglasses in the dark of night, has a hard time communicating in English.
Why are you doing this, she is asked in halting French. “Liberté,” she replied. “Pour mes enfants.”
-------------------------------
"Ontario Farmer reporter Ian Cumming was live on the scene in Vankleek Hill, Ontario, last night as over 1,000 trucks and vehicles made their way into Herbs Truck Stop for a rest. Here in a column written hours before the convoy reaches its final destination of Ottawa, Cumming speaks to the group of people gathered that included truckers, farmers, nuns, volunteers and citizens. (www.ontariofarmer.com)"
--
Convoy, the night before...
By Ian Cumming
Herbs Truck Stop, half way between Montreal and Ottawa, just across the fields from the cattle sale barn, wasn’t used to having well over 1,000 vehicles jammed into its two parking lots.
Half a dozen OPP officers directed the traffic in off Highway 34 as dusk started to settle in on Friday, with minus 25 temperatures.
In the morn, they will be growling out of here for the hour-long trek into Ottawa.
The countless transports in one parking lot, idling in the snapping cold, were parked next to Herbs, which was jammed full with sit down diners and folks standing. Coffee was free; you paid for your meal.
No masks, no one asking for vaccination status.
“We came from PEI,” said brothers Mark and Michael, eating supper, who didn’t want their surnames in print.
Mark used to drive a truck in the oil patch out in Alberta and Michael, an employee of the federal government, is about to lose his job for not being vaccinated. They had joined the convoy from the Maritimes, believing they said, "in freedom.”
The other parking lot was continually filling with an endless line of vehicles, adorned with flags, patriotic messages and printed insults against politicians.
Volunteers packed people into parked line-ups, trying to squeeze even vehicles in.
They also had arrived here from over in Gatineau with over 300 free hamburgers cooked on a BBQ in that parking lot- leaving Herbs for the transport drivers. And when the food was gobbled up in less than an hour, someone showed up with 200 more.
“Do you have a place to sleep tonight, because we’ve opened the Ottawa churches,” the two kindly nuns asked cattle dealer Frank McMahon, who was munching on a hamburger, with all the fixings.
He did have a place to sleep, but thank you, he replied, his eyes watering after they walked away and it wasn’t from the cold.
There were impromptu bonfires, people laughing and hugging, horns honking, engines rumbling as they idled or crept into a parking spot, and when dark settled, they started with the fireworks.
There was one journalist among the several thousand people, even though this story has, and is, being pontificated on in the past days.
The reporter was from Ontario Farmer, and only when presenting his credentials as a farm reporter, showing the paper itself, were interviews granted.
Mike Roy and his band were here with five transports from Stanstead, Quebec. He’s the third generation to own this family business.
“Grand-père drove truck when he was 13,” and crossing the border into the U.S. is done six-days a week.
“Steel, logs, pressed wood, small trailers and granite are transported to and from Florida, New Hampshire, Boston and Drummondville.”
Roy and his family are vaccinated, but he is here, “because masks and vaccination should be a choice in this country,” he said.
Josie Gingras, sitting in the cab of her monster gravel truck, wearing sunglasses in the dark of night, has a hard time communicating in English.
Why are you doing this, she is asked in halting French. “Liberté,” she replied. “Pour mes enfants.”
The RCMP blocked our local Convoy, but as there are so many roads in and out of Winnipeg. They finally got through. Hundreds of trucks downtown in an hour or so.
