Phantom Truck

I drove to Hay River on Monday afternoon - lovely drive, sunny the first part of the way, and then kind of snowy the rest of the way. Not much traffic, and got in Hay River by 6:30pm...had some supper with my co-worker and took her for a tour of the town. The workshop was wonderful and then we got on the road to head back to Yellowknife at 4pm or so yesterday. The first few hours were snowy, but at least in daylight. Then it got dark...and it wasn't so easy to see anymore in the snowy weather. Not much traffic on the highway, but of what there was, about 80% was tractor trailers flying by me in the opposite direction. And with the snowy conditions...they left me in a huge cloud of snow - total whiteout and scary as hell. They often travel in packs of 3 or more, so just as the snow is clearing from the first whiteout, you're sent spiraling into another, and then another. The roads weren't particularly slippery as it was cold and dry so the snow was also pretty dry, but then we spotted the phantom transport truck...

Because of the snowy conditions, the rear lights on this truck were covered in snow and we didn't know there was a truck in front of us, other than the cloud of snow we were driving through. Being a dark highway with no streetlights, until a vehicle, usually a truck came in the opposite direction, we had no real idea he was in front of us. Once in a while we would get a flash of light as something reflected the sides of his truck on a turn, but other than that, it was just a dark shadow on the highway, and very dangerous. He could slow down right in front of me and I wouldn't see him until I was RIGHT ON TOP OF HIM (or under the truck, lol). We had him in front for about an hour, right into Yellowknife, and one crawling up my ass from behind...it would have been messy should one of us wipe out on the snowy highway...I was planning on heading into the ditch before I would let the truck from behind plow into me...at least the ditch/side of the road was shallow and full of soft snow...

GLAD to be home, but sore today from the tension of a white-knuckle drive...