What if I told you a home game for my son's hockey team was a tidy 2 hour and 6 min drive away?! Anything for hockey, right?!
Noah plays for a Junior team called the Rocky Rams based in Rocky Mountain House, Alberta. The team happens to be in the midst of an extended homestand, meaning not just a couple days a week up the highway for practice, but games as well. This week and next, there is a combined 9 ice times in Rocky. It's not until two weeks from now we have a "road game" in Airdrie, 12 mins from the house.
He didn't want to live there with a billet family, so that means we take turns packing dinner, and making the drive up north. The average practice we leave at 4:30 for a 7:45 ice time, getting us home close to midnight. I promised to commit to his schedule if he was all in. He is, and so am I. He has his own car, but I find it way safer getting him there in my truck equipped with 4 x 4 & snow tires.
At times it does feel like we live up in the town of Rocky as we just got back from a weekend of games and hosting New Years. The following two weeks are also back-to-back home games, so the 3 of us, plus the dogs, will once again be taking up residence in the Best Western in town. It's easier this way instead of braving the winter conditions on back to back days. The one catch is he must always wash his gear before each game (superstition, maybe?), thankfully the hotel has a public laundry area so we're good.
Last year we drove 52,000 kms in 6 months for hockey and I can't imagine this year will be much different.
He loves it, we love it and we wouldn't have it any other way,
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