It's almost 50 years later and she still doesn't have the answer.
So she wrote a book about it, using her water-logged diary that chronicled her incredible adventure.
Lou Alwood's book, Why? The Journey 1965, describes her cross-Canada horseback trek nearly 50 years ago with Joyce Myhon. Neither woman had ever ridden a horse before they began the once-in-a-lifetime trip.
Alwood has a signing of her Friesen Press book at Books & Co., 1685 Third Ave., on Saturday at 1 p.m.
Alwood, originally from Port Alberni and now a resident of Prince George, had asked some girlfriends to take the journey with her and one by one they bailed on her. One night she got a phone call out of the blue and a young woman from Prince George stutteringly told her she'd go on the trip with her.
Two virtual strangers went on the journey that lasted six months to the day from when they started. The trip went from April 21 to October 21, 1965 from Clinton, B.C. to Halifax, Nova Scotia. It was 4,582 miles.
"It was freezing when we started and it was freezing when we finished," said Alwood, who at nine years old would tell her mother a story about how she would cross the country on horseback when she grew up. "We were the first two women in history to cross Canada on horseback and we didn't know it until we got into northern Ontario."
They were told that in 1939 a woman named Mary Bosanquet rode across Canada on horseback, but history documented she only made it to Sault Ste. Marie and then the next year rode to New York City.
"So we ended up being the only two women in history to do this and we only slept indoors 11 nights out of those six months," said Alwood with a shake of her head. "We never gave up."
Over the years, people kept asking her if she was ever afraid during the trip.
"No, not of the wild animals," she'd answer.
When the trip ended Alwood and Myhon went their separate ways, living their lives and running into each other upon occasion.
Alwood, who does wildlife photography, hunts, fishes and camps, went to find Myhon last year while exploring bits of her old stomping grounds. Sadly, Alwood discovered her riding buddy had passed away five years earlier. She's dedicated the book to Myhon.
"She was a great lady," said Alwood.
When she went to see what she could see, she was amazed at all the drastic changes that have taken place over the years.
"Now there's freeways everywhere, there's bypasses - but I found one little stretch of road with a yellow line going down it on the way to Kamloops, down by the river along the Thompson," said Alwood, who was in the air force for five years as a fighter plane tech, then worked five years at a plywood mill before she went on her trip. After she returned, Alwood worked on the Dog Creek Reservation as a scaler and a bucker for five years after her trip, ran a sawmill for some hippies one summer, and then came to Prince George to work at a plywood plant, went to Bear Lake to be a park ranger there, worked as a paramedic, then went into property investment.
Later this year, Alwood will retrace her steps along the trek to find two camp spots.
