Driving South?

I've been having all sort of adventures of late....I've been at my parents' house in Whitehorse, Yukon for Christmas. I've been thinking of leaving for days and days, but the weather down south has been cold, so hadn't tried. Finally, on Saturday, I started driving back south. I made it 400 km, and then something funky happened to my car! It kinda lost power (intermittently though), then a puff of smoke went out the back, and the 'check engine' light came on. I stopped and had a look, but could see nothing, except a bit of smoke coming out of the tailpipe? I drove a bit more, then pulled over to talk to a big rig tow truck driver who was working on the side of the road. You see, up north there is super-patchy cell phone coverage and it was #$*%ing cold, so I had to drive my car somewhere, or else just choose to freeze.

Along the road, I had passed a little old Jetta a couple times, and he passed me again while I was stopped looking at my car. So while I was chatting with the tow truck driver, he came back. How lovely! Turned out he felt guilty after going a couple km's so thought he better come back and check on me. He checked under the hood, then followed me to the nearest community. There, he pulled out his multi-meter, and determined I had no obvious problem, except that my check engine light was still on. He was actually a mechanic, heading south for apprentice training! Siiigghhhh, my Knight in Dirty Carhartts....

I called my Subaru guy and he decided that I probably had just gotten some bad gas, and my car should be fine.

But as it was over 500 km to the next community heading south, but only 450 km back to mom's house (and the nearest Subie dealer), and it was -45 C, I decided to turn around. I mean, to head through 500 km of wilderness in frigid temps with anything other than optimum car conditions, you really deserve anything bad that might happen.... What is the Road god called? The road version of Ullr? He would be totally annoyed and smote you with any sort of misfortune.

I stopped at the Subie dealer her in Whitehorse this morning, and they confirmed that it seems to have been a one-time episode, likely bad gas, or seperated water from fuel, or possibly -45 C gremlins? Anyway, the computer said all was well, and my car runs like a top.

My plan is to try again tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

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btw, usually when I'm driving, I stop for a quick piddle in the ditch then get rolling asap, but there was too much traffic on Saturday! Ugggh, so I was forced to use a biffy. It was incredible, so I had to take a pic to show!