Patio Lantern Tour

I have always found it difficult to write the final blog.   This one is no different.   As we pulled into our yard last evening, reality hit…this adventure had come to an end.   But we have so many memories. Being on the road for 3 ½ months, we traveled 22,742 km through 23 States and 1 Province.   We know that we will be asked, “What was your favourite place that you visited?”   That is impossible to answer.   We saw and experienced so many things.   The variety of landscapes in the United States is simply ‘mind boggling’!   It has so many beautiful National Parks and we had the pleasure of visiting quite a few of them. It is time to wrap this up.   We would like to thank all the people who have taken the time to follow our travels.   It has been fun to share our experiences with you once again. We would also like to thank all of our friends and family who shared in and made our adventure possible.   Without your help and support Sue and I would not have been able to lea

After a couple of days spent in Sault Ste Marie and a couple more spent in the Blind River area, we returned home last evening.   It felt a little strange driving into our laneway and realizing our adventure had come to an end…maybe not quite…there is an awful lot of stuff to clean and put away. Distance Traveled = 637 km. Wildlife Sightings = Great Blue Heron, Bald Eagle, Mallard, Sandhill Crane, Crow, Raven, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Goldfinch, Turkey Vulture, Osprey, Chipmunk. P.S.   Stay tuned.   A wrap up blog is coming…hopefully today! Coming back to Canada Sault Ste. Marie Waterfront Mississaugi River

It was strange to pack up the tent trailer for the last time in a campground.  Mixed emotions actually.  We have returned across the border.  It was an uneventful day as we crossed the rest of the Northern Peninsula of Michigan. The blog will go quiet for a few days until we get home.  Check back in a few days for a wrap up of our adventure. Distance Traveled = 198 km.  Wildlife Sightings = Chipping Sparrow, Robin, Osprey, Turkey Vulture, Bald Eagle, Sandhill Crane, Crow, Raven, Chipmunk, Deer. Sue put these up again...first night and last!

We took a 30 mile boat excursion today out into Lake Superior.   It could not have been better weather.   The sun shone, the wind was light, and the swales were only small ones, which we suspect is rare when venturing out into Lake Superior. This area, Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, is made up of sandstone cliffs that can only be viewed from the water.   The name, ‘Pictured Rocks’, comes from the streaks of mineral stain that decorate the faces of the cliffs.   These streaks are caused by groundwater leaking out of the cracks.   The dripping water contains iron, manganese, limonite, and copper as well as many other minerals.   They are something else.   I hope that our pictures can tell the tale. It is time to move on from here.   Tomorrow we will return to Canada.   We have been on the road since May 12.   We have experienced so many things on this adventure that in many ways it will be a sad day to pack up the ‘little tent trailer’ one final time.   Do not worry, we wil

At our campground in Hayward Wisconsin, a sign in the office stated: “Be courteous, please do not walk through occupied sites”.   At the time I thought well that is obvious.   As it turns out I guess more campgrounds should hand that advice out.   You would think that common courtesy would be something that would be taught in the home…apparently the campers of Michigan missed this lesson.   Last evening, I felt like asking what their campsite # was so that I could go and walk through the middle of their site while they were eating dinner! Sue found us 3 ‘Superior’ waterfalls today.   They were a bit of a drive but heck that is what we have been doing for over 3 months now.   Today we had our first ‘Pasty’.   A Pasty is a full meal wrapped in pastry. It is Finnish.   It has meat, potatoes, turnip, and lots of other vegetables in it.   It is served with gravy and is incredibly filling.   It is a legacy left by the Finish woodcutters who lived here back in the 1860’s through the

Last evening, we were again wondering where the diary area is in Wisconsin.   It is on the west side.   Our route through the state missed it.   So again, Wisconsin showed us more forest as we exited the state. Michigan introduced a new wrinkle to the trees theme.   It added rocks and lakes, lakes and rocks and eventually the biggest lake of all Lake Superior.   If we had not known better, we could have been driving through Northern Ontario. We are in Munising/Pictured Rocks KOA on the south shore of Lake Superior.   We will be here for 3 nights so we can explore the area. Distance Traveled = 456 km.   Wildlife Sightings = Sandhill Crane, Bald Eagle, Blue jay, Chipping Sparrow, Black-capped Chickadee, Crow, Raven, Canada Geese, Red-tailed Hawk, Turkey, eastern Kingbird, Deer, Grey Squirrel, Chipmunk. More of Wisconsin's scenery! First glimpse of Lake Superior Neat statue honoring Iron Ore Miners and Loggers

Once again it rained all night and most of the morning.   We are glad we did not have to take down the tent trailer.   Again, things are wet.   Today we truly did nothing.   The most exciting thing was having breakfast in a Norwegian Restaurant in the town of Hayward.   We will be back on the trail east tomorrow. Distance Traveled = 29 km.   Wildlife Sightings = Red-breasted Nuthatch, Sandhill Crane, Robin, Black-capped Chickadee, Chipping Sparrow. Rather interesting campsite...surprisingly private! Only in Wisconsin...can you tell it was a slow day?

For the last 6 weeks at least our tent trailer has truly felt like home.   If we are away for the day, we often will find ourselves saying, “let’s go home”.   It is a good feeling to have relaxed to the point that we are ‘always at home…wherever we roam’. Maybe the exception would be Wisconsin.   From an interest point of view, there is not much here.   We stopped at a few ‘Historical Markers’ today most of which were less than inspiring.   But we did learn that this area was a fur trading area with a battle between the Northwest Company (French) and the Hudson Bay Company (British).   I am pretty sure every Canadian of our vintage learned about Radisson and Grosseilliers in their Social Studies classes.   They were in this area in the mid 1650’s on behalf of the French Governor of New France.   After a dispute they were instrumental in the founding of the Hudson Bay Company. Today Wisconsin showed us very little.   We are still looking for their ‘dairy industry’.   It sure a

It started raining last evening and did not stop until we were finishing our first coffee this morning.   Things are a little wet around here, far wetter than normal for this time of year we are told. Today was a slow day.   Not much goes on in this part of Wisconsin…that might be true about the entire state we suspect.   We took a quick tour of the area and found our first dairy operation called Cowz-R-Us.   It is a rather large operation with at least 4 barns that we could see.   We saw 6 transport size milk trucks parked outside.   It would be interesting to know just how many cows this operation milked…I am sure it is a lot. We also found a ‘cranberry farm’ down a paved dead-end road.   There were lots of cranberry fields/paddies (whatever they are called).   It looked like a large operation.   Not sure we were supposed to be there, but no-one was around so what the heck…and the bird watching was pretty good too! Distance Traveled= 63 km.   Wildlife Sightings = Robin,

King of the 2-lane highway…if we had traveled Interstate 90 and 94 today, we would have been to our destination in about 3 hours.   Instead it took us most of the day.   Minnesota showed us some diversity today…but not in its agriculture.   Once again, we traveled through cornfields and soybean fields until we got close to the Mississippi River.   Who knew the Mississippi was anywhere close to Minnesota…not us…again we are astounded at our ignorance of US geography! Upon approaching the Mississippi things got hilly, trees appeared, and so did many small lakes, just like we had Minnesota pictured.   But before we knew it, we were in Wisconsin, another new state for us.   Wisconsin is the # 1 producer of milk in the US…not where we have been so far…we never saw a cow.   (Not quite true, we saw 3 really old Holsteins…maybe they had been taken in by some animal activist who thought that it was cruel to kill animals…who knows?)   We did see lots of hilly land growing corn though and f

We took down in the rain this morning, never a great experience.  To be honest though, considering how many times we have set up and taken down the trailer on this adventure, we cannot complain. In an attempt to avoid Interstate 90 today, we went slightly south before heading east.  It took us into a new State for us, Iowa.  My preconceived idea was that we would see a lot of corn…it did not disappoint.  We spent most of the day within about 10 miles of the Minnesota border.  This region of Iowa grows 2 crops, corn and soybeans.  We are not sure how they get away with a 2 crop rotation but they do.  The black soil grows fantastic looking crops, probably better than anywhere else we have been.  Of course, thousands of acres of corn and soybeans come with the customary elevator systems, some extremely large.  We also saw lots of pig barns today, again more than anywhere else we have traveled.  One of the unique things we saw today was 2 different ethanol plants.  We are not sure what t

Sioux Falls is the largest city in South Dakota at about 170,000…not very big.   Yes, it does have a falls that we visited.   It is a nice falls.   There is an awful lot of water going over right now due to all the rain that this area has experienced recently.   Even we can attest to that. We also went to 2 different Microbreweries today.   Like in Ontario, this industry is booming.   The first one was in an old railway warehouse, quite a neat old building.   We enjoyed a tasting and some lunch.   While there we realized that there was one right across from our campground…kind of handy…maybe a little too handy actually.   We had a great conversation with the young guy looking after the place.   All in all, a good slow day, probably needed after our experiences of 2 days ago. Distance Traveled = 27 km.   Wildlife Sightings = Canada Geese, Mallard, Goldfinch, Thirteen-lined Ground Squirrel. Sioux Falls A Thinking Farmer Thirteen-lined Ground Squirrel

When we arrived back from Pierre yesterday, the sky was a little cloudy but nothing to be concerned about.   We did our usual.   Sue loaded our pictures onto the tablet, and I wrote the blog.   We enjoyed a ‘cold one’.   Still nothing seemed awry.   There was a light wind out of the southeast.   Then it started to sprinkle.   We moved under the awning.   No big deal.   The wind picked up a bit.   We were not concerned…the awning was secured with 10-inch pegs.   It started to rain harder and the wind began to increase, enough that we folded up the chairs and tucked them under the front of the trailer and we moved inside…still not overly concerned.   We poured another ‘cold one’.   Then all ‘hell’ broke lose.   The wind was now in the Northwest.   It began to rain sideways.   The wind (as we found out later) was a sustained 60 mph with gusts recorded up to 80.   It was hitting the sides of the poor ‘little trailer’ dead on.   It was rocking.   Now most smart people would have bailed in