I road-tripped across Canada with my 79-year-old mom. Here's why it was a decision I'm so glad I made.

John Denver’s Take Me Home, Country Roads fills the car as I drive on a winding tree-lined road. Chief Mountain looms in the distance. My mom grew up hiking to the top of Chief with her friends, eating a brown bag lunch and enjoying the views. Standing proudly over the Great Plains, the mountain is a kind of security blanket for those who grew up nearby—comforting, and strong. As we near Chief Mountain, our eyes grow misty and our hearts swell. After 11 days in the United States, the Canadian border is only a couple of miles away. Soon we’ll be home, in Alberta, the province where I was born, and close to the town where Mom grew up. Our mountains are here, their jagged rocky peaks as familiar as the palms of our hands.

Before we set out on this road trip, my brother was convinced Mom and I would drive each other crazy within a couple of days. Honestly, so was I. When I planned our 27-day route through the United States and Canada, I was thinking like a travel writer: researching routes, and planning stories and social media posts, my 79-year-old mom acting as my sidekick. It would be an epic road trip that would rival the ones plastered across Instagram and TikTok. I was ready.

When I opened my laptop on the first night, I felt as though I was closing a door on my mom. Though she insisted it was fine, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being dismissive. At that moment, I decided to focus on the trip and on Mom. This trip was a once-in-a-lifetime chance to bond. Work could wait. I closed my laptop. It was one of the best decisions of my life.

The American leg of our road trip was filled with scenic drives through places Mom has never been and likely won’t see again. We drove to the beginning of Route 66 in Chicago and navigated the original roads using road signs instead of our phones. I noticed small details about her that I had never noticed before: the way she pours water into travel mugs like a chaotic toddler, and how she moves her entire body when taking a photo.

In Oklahoma, Mom’s bed was way too high for her five-foot frame and arthritic knee. The resourceful traveller that she is, she found an armchair to use to climb up into the bed. The downside? I became nervous and had to spot her. Her height lovingly became an inside joke as we passed by various Canadian and American landmarks. I jokingly call her shortstack and after watching her grab both sides of the car door, lean back, and then catapult herself onto her seat, I started telling her she was “a go for a launch” anytime we got into the rental SUV.

We drove across the top of Texas, then through New Mexico to Gallup, Arizona before heading north. Mom was gobsmacked by the beauty of Monument Valley, and when we reached Great Falls, Montana we paid homage to my dad at one of his favourite restaurants: Fudruckers. It was 11 days of new places and constant laughter. I started to see Mom as a whole person—not just as my mom.

Somewhere on the road, I realized that since my dad’s passing in 2015, this was the first time the two of us had truly relaxed and lived in the moment. It was intoxicating.

Exploring Canada though was the part of the trip that resonated most with both of us. We spent our first night back in our home country in Waterton Lakes National Park, where I worked for a season at the Bayshore Inn & Suites in my late-twenties. We drove slowly up to Cameron Lake, and Red Rock Canyon, staring at mountains covered with tall charred sticks that were once heavy with green needles. The Kenow Wildfire burned 19,303 hectares of land in 2017, destroying much of the area. We eye the lush green regrowth carpeting the forest floor and it doesn’t take long before Waterton once again wraps us in its warm embrace.

Memories wash over Mom who reminisces about adventures had here in her teenage years. Long weekends dancing in Waterton in the early 1960s. Dancing until 3 a.m. in the morning. Hiking to Bear’s Hump in dresses and high heels. We drive around town, buying breakfast sandwiches and treats at the chocolate shop. I think about my aging mom here as a teenager decades ago and also about my grandmother who attended the same dances in the 1930s. In a way, Waterton is a part of our family, much like Chief Mountain.

Before leaving, we drive to the iconic Prince of Wales Hotel, which sits atop a cliff overlooking the park and townsite. Seated in the dining room of the hotel, with its floor-to-ceiling windows, we soak up the view one last time.

Alberta will always be special thanks to visits with friends and family, trips down memory lane to places we both lived and worked, the bear I spotted, and some much-needed pampering we did at Jasper Park Lodge. The highlight though, was Connie—Mom’s cousin bestie. Upon learning that Connie was losing her eyesight, we jumped at the opportunity to bring her along for a foodie adventure. It became one of our favourite days on the road. Of all the moments I captured, the one that stands out the most is of the two of them sitting side by side, their heads leaning into each other, and their pure love for one another radiating through the image.

There’s so much to be seen, learned and celebrated in Canada. On our road trip, we took advantage of the chance to do that. We were humbled by the exhibits on Northern Plains Indigenous peoples at Wanuskewin, an experience that hit harder after visiting the RCMP museum in Regina. We felt similarly humbled visiting the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, especially the red dress alcove which represents the thousands of Indigenous women who are murdered, missing, and violated each year. It was a heavy day, but an essential one.

In Winnipeg, I took Mom to the neighbourhood where we lived when I was in kindergarten, driving past the school and our old house. We had a prime rib dinner at the iconic Rae and Jerry’s Steakhouse. With its red shag carpeting, dark woods, and a lounge with mirrored walls, we thought of Dad coming here in the 80s for business dinners. The lounge chairs were exactly the same as his office chair at home.

I’ve struggled to write about our road trip together. After my dad died, I unconsciously put my mom in a glass box on a pedestal, to keep her safe for as long as possible. I regret that now.

Letting go of control and expectations is difficult, and doesn’t always work out, but when it does, life becomes more magical. We laughed daily, and towards the end of the trip we had a couple of disagreements which led to deeper conversations. Mom started “momming” somewhere in Saskatchewan (apparently that never stops). For once though, it didn’t bother me.

Mom and I talk about the road trip often, her eyes sparkling as she thinks back to all of her adventures. In the quiet of my apartment in Quebec City I wish I could have done a trip like this with my dad, and how incredibly grateful I am to have taken it with my mom. Life is full of surprises—good and bad. This time it was overflowing with good.