One day I happened to come across an ad for a vintage bass sax on the Sax On The Web site. I thought owning a bass sax would be an interesting possibility, and that it might be a fun horn to play in the sax ensemble I was in at the time.

After giving it a great deal of thought, I decided I would buy the horn. I contacted the seller, Paul Coats, and let him know that I would like to get the bass. A number of other people had also been in touch with him about it, but luckily I was the first person to commit to buying it. 

The next stage was to figure out the logistics. How would I get a fragile 80 year-old horn back to Eastern Canada safely from Louisiana?

I thought about driving to New Orleans, but dismissed the idea when it became obvious that it would take too much time and money. I needed a safe way to get the horn home. I finally decided to drive to Bangor, Maine and fly from there via Cincinnati to New Orleans.

I purchased two return tickets so I could bring the bass back without having to put it into the cargo hold of a plane.