The Parkway Shuffle
In the middle of the night, Freedom Convoy trucks quietly relocate downtown.
read Part 1 of this series here: Fireworks & Applause previous installment: 10 PM in the Nation's Capital
Prevented from advancing into the downtown core, Saskatoon residents Jake and Lynnette make the best of things their first evening in Ottawa and throughout the following day. When they crawl into the bunk of their truck Sunday night, they have no idea they’ll be departing the Sir John A. Macdonald Parkway in a matter of hours.
Lots of people left the city late Sunday. The weekend was over. Expected back at work and school, many stowed their protest signs and headed home. Some of the truckers who’d arrived as part of the western Canada Freedom Convoy may also have left the nation’s capital then, but no one knows how many did so.
Around two in the morning, Lynnette hears a noise and gradually surfaces. “All of a sudden,” she says, “it’s a good solid knock. And so I crawl over [Jake] and open the door and all I see is a cowboy hat.”
Another trucker from Saskatchewan calmly tells them to get out of bed, get in their seats, and prepare to relocate. “No Jake brakes, no nothing,” they’re advised, a reference to the truck’s engine brakes. “Just keep her quiet.” Recalling these events, Jake jokingly says they were part of a mischievous “black ops.”
Lynnette laughs, “I tell you, that was the most fun night that we had.” It takes close to an hour to rouse everyone, and to get the participating vehicles turned around. This is difficult enough in their bobtail, but some of these trucks are pulling trailers. Then, following a lead truck, they exit that part of the city. This mini convoy - which also includes private vans, cars, and pickups - drives around a bit, and then heads for downtown.
Before Jake and Lynnette go back to bed at six that morning, three additional city blocks of Kent Street have been packed tight with protest vehicles three lanes wide. (Kent is a four-lane, one-way street that connects to Wellington Street at the top.)
Jake and Lynnette will spend the next three weeks parked near the Gloucester Street intersection, five blocks south of Wellington, in what is considered a “highly desirable government office neighbourhood.” On one corner there’s St. Patrick’s - a spectacular Roman Catholic basilica that dates to the 1870s. On another there’s a 15-storey Government of Canada building that houses the federal Tax Court. Kent Towers - a high-rise, condominium building 23 storeys tall - is on a third corner.
In the first video Lynnette records on Kent Street, she suggests not everyone in the neighbourhood is thrilled to wake up to a sea of trucks. “Early morning, there was a bunch of very not happy people,” she says. A few Ottawa residents walking past on the sidewalk at that moment, she tells us, are wearing double face masks. “They’re wearing N-95 and a blue [surgical] one over top.”
Lynnette’s looking forward to a shower. Someone has offered to bring them back to his hotel room so they can “get all cleaned up.” They’re awaiting his arrival. On their dashboard there’s a pizza box and a large Tim Hortons coffee cup, gifts from well wishers.
Soon we hear a male voice at Jake’s window asking “Want a cookie?” A female voice simultaneously offers them oranges and bananas.
When this post was first published, Jake & Lynnette were assigned the pseudynoms ‘Ted & Sally.’