High plains?

**Note -- I'll be uploading photos when I can, as the last couple places we've stayed at practice internet throttling. Those who know me know how impatient I can be -- I have no time to wait 10 minutes for one photo to upload. I hope you, my readers, are more patient that I am! When I get them uploaded, I'll add links to this post, and a couple photos.

Over the past few days, we've traveled from Grand Island, Nebraska to Ogden, Utah. The trip from Grand Island to Rawlins was long -- almost nine hours on the road. The combination of nasty winds from the southwest, and a long uphill climb made for a very long day, and very poor gas mileage!

The weather has changed considerably too. The humidity we encountered in Omaha and points east is gone. While that makes heat easier to bear, it does nothing for my sinuses. I know I'm strange, but I find it easier to breathe in humid climes than in our naturally dry climate of the West.

It felt weird to be going across the Continental Divide without huge mountains all around. The divide in Wyoming actually happens in two places because the Great Divide Basin is in the middle. It's actually at about 7000 ft above sea level, but if you were just dropped into Rawlins and told to drive west on I-80, you wouldn't really notice that you were more or less in the middle of the Rocky Mountains...sorta. When I cross the Divide at home, it's usually at Sunshine Village Ski Resort where the Divide chair actually crosses into British Columbia and back into Alberta before reaching the top.

The landscape really is stunning, even if it does seem to go on forever...well, until it hits what you can see of the mountains in the distance. There has been, or still is, a significant amount of oil/gas activity in the area. I took pictures of pumpjacks, oil batteries, and compressor stations along the way. But at the same time, there were a couple huge wind farms! The many windmills looked like an army, all standing at attention facing into the southwest wind, ready to snare the invisible energy. In one case, I was able to snap a picture of a windfarm with an pumpjack in front. A tale of two energies....

Right around where we crossed into Utah, the landscape changed again. Gone was the high plains, and here was the winding roads through the passes in the mountains, and the long up- and downhill grades to get through those passes. The rock is not the same as the granite we're used to seeing in the Canadian Rockies. Here it's red, and worn in interesting ways, almost looking like desert hoodoos, except it just goes on and on as a wall of rock with hidden valleys that snake away from the roadways.

Travel through one more pass, and there we are, in Ogden. We were early enough in the day to thoroughly enjoy sitting under the awning on a warm afternoon, with a gentle breeze keeping the worst of the 30ish temperatures at bay. A nice swim in the pool in the evening, followed by a spell in the hottub (I want one!), and then to sleep, ready for the next phase of the trip to Caldwell, Idaho.

Corn and soybeans...cornering the market?

Not possible because EVERYONE is growing one or the other. In Illinois. In Iowa. In Nebraska. Corn. Soybeans. Corn. Soybeans.

The first picture was taken at the site location for the movie "Field of Dreams," near Dyresville, Iowa. "People will come, Ray." We did. It was pretty darn neat to see. The family who owns the land lives there, and have kept the site simple, and free for people to visit. We saw kids and dads pitching and hitting the ball. We walked out to the cornfield. It was blistering hot out, but that didn't matter. There was a certain peacefulness there...a little piece of heaven. I'm glad we stopped there.

Too bad we didn't have a ball and a couple of gloves ... Ger would have loved to have thrown a ball around that diamond!


From the Field of Dreams, we continued south and west and spent the next couple days at the Amana Colonies. Yes, there is a Whirlpool Amana plant there. The history of the villages, which you can read about on the linked website, is really interesting. It's really too bad it was soooo hot out and there was nothing special going on. We just missed the Christmas in July event the weekend before, and I'm sure that would have been quite the event! Besides doing some more shopping at the outlets at Williamsburg, we spent a good part of an afternoon walking around the village of Amana. We had lunch at the Ox Yoke Inn out on I-80 where I ate sauerkraut for the first time ever! With the brats and knackwurst, it was pretty darn good! So was the black cherry soda!

We checked out some of the shops, had ice cream, and got a package of brats for a dollar, courtesy of the token we received at the Amana Colonies RV Park. Seeing the coal-fired train just outside one of the villages was a little extra treat!

One of our granddaughters is a huge train fan; she would have loved this one!

We left Amana on Wednesday, and drove through the rest of Iowa (and more corn and soybeans -- we're beginning to wonder if farmers in the US grow anything else!) to our destination in Gretna, just outside Omaha.

The scale of flooding on the Missouri River that's still apparent is rather staggering when one thinks that it's been weeks since the flooding first began! Mother Nature really can be a pain!

We stopped at Omaha to see a couple friends from my interest in figure skating. We met them at a cafe called Jones Bros Cupcakes ostensibly for dinner. But the real draw was the cupcakes. Really.

From Omaha, we drove only a couple hours west to Grand Island, where we had a nice dinner with Jim Knight, who will be presenting to teacher-leaders and administrators in our school division in September. The conversation -- and the dinner -- was good, and I'm really looking forward to Jim's session in September!

Next stop is Rawlins, Wyoming -- only because Cheyenne is full to the rafters because of Frontier Days. Timing *is* everything!

As usual, all the photos can be found on Flickr.

Traffic? What traffic?

The past two days have certainly been about traffic -- and driving in said traffic. For a couple of people whose greatest traffic challenge is usually Calgary's Deerfoot Trail on a Friday evening rush hour, yesterday and today were interesting.

Just about anyone who lives in Canada has heard horror stories of driving on Ontario's Hwy 401, most notably through the metro Toronto area. A bazillion lanes of traffic in each direction, express lanes, collector lanes, construction...any one of these would be enough to freeze the knuckles of Alberta drivers, but put them altogether in one trip, and look out! The navigator (that would be yours truly) decided it would be best to stay in the center lane on the express side because that way, it was more likely the 'fat dots' (yes, that's what my brother called the wider line markings on the roadway that indicated the lane was going to end) would be on our right side, and that we wouldn't run out of roadway. Maneuvering 38 feet of motorhome that's also towing a little car on a dolly can be trying at the best of times, but in heavy traffic, it's definitely a challenge. There was certainly no down time as we trundled our way from east to west, certainly not enough for me to even jump over to the couch to snap some pics of downtown TO off in the distance! Still not sure what this is all about...don't push him out of the ditch?

After we got through the Toronto area, the rest of the drive was pretty uneventful. The picture out my window from the bridge at Sarnia looking towards Lake Huron was absolutely breathtaking though!

The colours in the water were so blue...I was just in awe. We had about a 20-minute wait at the border, which wasn't too bad, and I only lost a tomato from Mexico. The border guy didn't ask about alcohol, meat, or anything else, but boy, better not have any Mexican veggies! What's really stupid is that I bought it in Walmart in Great Falls, MT. Yeah, I know....

We stayed that night at the Holiday Shores RV Resort in Durand, MI. This place is beautiful! There are over 500 sites in this resort, and a 9-hole golf course. Most of the sites were long term guests; whether owners or renters, I don't know. Many of these retired people were cruising the resort on their golf carts like we used to cruise downtown on a Saturday night! Everyone was really friendly, and it was just a really pleasant place to stay.

We got on the road early Friday morning, heading for Chicago. On paper, the trip shouldn't have taken more than 5 hours. On paper wasn't accounting for construction season in the Chicago area, nor was it accounting for two nitwits who made silly choices in how to get around tolls and the like. We found way more construction that we likely would have come across had we just paid the toll and stayed on I-80. But then again, there was one point after our little detour where it took us over half an hour to go seven miles! Of course that little delay allowed me to take this neat photo of the Des Plaines River in Joliet...

The metro Chicago region is HUGE! We drove and drove, and we drove some more! But we finally made it to our destination. We're in the Sycamore RV Resort in Sycamore, IL. It's a nice little RV park with small lakes, walking trails, a very small beach, and nice calm, quiet environment. We have enough room for the motorhome, the car, and a cement pad for the patio chairs. We spent last evening sitting on our 'deck,' enjoying nice wine, uploading photos, and working on the blog. Watching the fireflies was kinda cool too!

On our travels yesterday, we did find a couple Costco stores where we plan to pick up some tri-tip roasts -- absolutely to-die-for cuts of beef! And of course, I've already scoped out the location of the Premium Outlet Mall. Tonight, we're having dinner with a long-time (I was going to say 'old' but he's bigger than me, and there's no snow around here for a face-down snow angel!), dear friend. Tomorrow we'll be meeting up with a number of Ger's buddies who are getting together. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like we'll have time to get into Chicago proper and see what there is to see there. Someday, we'll be back, and some tall friend of mine will have to give us the grand tour!

As usual, pictures are on Flickr.

Family

That's what this trip has been all about. Meeting family. And what a wonderful meeting it has been! My only regret is that this meeting didn't take place many years ago. There's a certain sense of completion now...now that I've met all my siblings, I don't feel like there's anything missing anymore. I spent too many years wondering, and now I know. Thank you, all of you, but especially Ken and Sharon for helping to put it all together.

Okay, you guys -- all of you!...your turn! Next time, the party's out West!

TO and Niagara

Walking along Yonge Street is a wonderful exercise in people watching. Signs bigger than big on Eaton Centre, funky little shops next door to higher end boutiques -- Yonge Street is a mecca for those who relish exploring life in the big city. Walking past Maple Leaf Gardens, one of the icons of the NHL...at least it was when I was growing up, and if you were truly Canadian, you rooted for either the Maple Leafs or the Canadiens...I wish I could have seen it in its glory days. However, its nice that someone thinks the history of the building is worth preserving, even if it's in the form of retail shops.

The best part of the trip downtown though, was surprising one of my brothers. The last time we saw him was when he came to our wedding with our grandmother almost 29 years ago. He knew we were planning a trip out here, but didn't know we were coming in that day. The look on his face when he looked into the back seat of the truck was just priceless! We all had a wonderful visit over lunch at Jack Astor's before walking back to his apartment. The visit was far too short, but at least we managed to share email addresses and cell numbers. The next time he comes West, he has no excuse for not calling! (Love ya, Dave!)

We spent the rest of the afternoon/evening having dinner with another brother and his family. Meeting all these members of my family for the, first time is just making my whole trip! After a great dinner (and this to-die-for cake from Costco called "Tuxedo Cake"), we came back, prepared to get a good night's sleep for the long day to come. And boy, was it long!

Actually, we didn't start out horribly early, but given how much we putzed around, maybe we should have! On paper, going from Lindsay to Niagara Falls shouldn't take a great deal of time. But then there's Highway 401 going through Toronto. Express lanes, collector lanes, construction...for a prairie kid like me who thinks Deerfoot Trail in Calgary at rush hour is a challenge, the 401 is a whole different animal.

Neither Gerry or I have been to Niagara Falls before, so this was a real treat. The whole Niagara Peninsula is beautiful. The town of Niagara-on-the-Lake has such a quaint, charming main street with all kinds of neat little shops -- shops that my husband and my brother worked very hard to keep my sister-in-law and me OUT of! (yes, I ended that sentence with a preposition! :-p)

What we didn't do on this trip was check out any of the many wineries we passed. There was a little bit of self preservation involved in that decision. While I do like trying out new wines, going from place to place, and sampling some in each of those places would have led to a bad headache. Can't enjoy the Falls, and the anticipated dinner with a monster migraine. So sampling may have to wait for another day -- or I can just use my Canadian Wine Access guide to help me figure out which of the many wines from this region I should try.

Finally, we arrived at The Falls. The power of that much water falling over the Niagara Escarpment is incredible to behold. The American and Horseshoe Falls are quite different from each other, but each stunning in its own right. Of course, being on the Canadian side of the Niagara River, we couldn't get up close and personal with the American Falls, but I'm sure the close up view was every bit as stunning as our view of the Horseshoe Falls on the Canadian side.

After walking back to the truck, we went for a late dinner at Mamma Mia's, a wonderful Italian restaurant that has been in operation for decades. The portions are huge, and oh so good! My leftovers made a wonderful lunch the next day! Although dessert would have been awesome, we were all so stuffed there was just no room!

After we left the restaurant, we stopped in a little shop that all kinds of cotton skirts, blouses, dresses, table cloths, and....coin hip scarves! I think this may just show up in one of my Zumba classes in the fall! *wink, wink* I did pick up a normal skirt, and a cotton dress. There's way more heat and humidity happening here on the eastern half of the continent, and skirts are definitely a way of effectively dealing with that! Besides...they were pretty!

Then we began our little sojourn back to Little Britain. It was well after 10 p.m. when we headed east, and the GPS predicted an arrival time of 1:20 a.m. We were doing really well with that until some unexpected construction on the highway just west of Toronto. Remember, I did say earlier that Canada has two seasons -- winter and construction. Well, now a lot of that construction happens at night. Suddenly, what was 3 lanes was being whittled down to 1 lane. Sally, or whatever her name is on the GPS had to start adjusting arrival times (She's rather an insistent one if you don't follow her directions!), but it only got worse as somehow we ended up on whatever road took us right into downtown Toronto. The CN Tower was getting closer and closer, so I had to take pictures, right? Right.

Of course, we won't mention riding on the streetcar rails aka 4x4ing urban style, will we? Or coming face-to-face with the Air Canada Centre and having to make a u-turn to get back out. Will we?

We did eventually get out of Toronto, and after a pit stop for gas, we finally made it back to Little Britain in the wee early hours of Tuesday morning. It was a wonderful day of fantastic sights and great company. We do need to do it again!

Lakes, Locks and Licks

Day 7 of our trip was spent touring the area near Lindsay, Ontario. We saw locks at Kirkfield (lift lock pictured above), Fenelon Falls, and Bobcaygeon. The whole canal/lake/lock system that runs from Lake Ontario to Georgian Bay is really quite ingenious, and allows people to enjoy leisurely trips through a number of towns along the way. Of course, one must be able to afford the fuel to run the boats, but there didn't seem to be a lack of traffic on the waterways! As usual, pics can be found on my Flickr page.

I want to come back someday and spend time on a boat, cruising up and down those waterways, stopping for lunch at a chip truck (!!!!) and moseying along on a sunny afternoon. Looks like a little piece of heaven to me!

Of course, an afternoon in that area wouldn't be complete without Kawartha Lakes Dairy ice cream. We stopped at the walk-up storefront in Bobcaygeon, and each of us had something different. Waffle cones were mandatory, and I had creme brulee. Way more than I should have had, but it was soooo good!

To all my ice cream-loving friends, yes, if you visit Toronto, try to find time to head northeast to the Kawartha Lakes region. You'll get some lovely, interesting scenery to go along with your treat!

The Great Lakes

I've never seen this part of the world before, so everything was new, especially the Lakes. SOOOO big! And so many trees! Yes, there are a lot of trees in the foothills and the mountains of Alberta, but those are mostly spruce. These ones are deciduous trees, and I imagine the colours in the fall are just spectacular! (As usual, photos are all uploaded to Flickr -- today's batch are under Day 5 and Day 6).

While I love my motorhome and wouldn't give it up, sometimes it's a little inconvenient. Like when we were coming through Sault Ste. Marie to come back into Canada. A sign showed that the Soo Locks were off to the right somewhere, but getting this big rig into those kinds of places, especially with the Civic on the back end, is not a fun task. So I end up taking a lot of pictures from afar, like this one of the locks as we went across the International Bridge.

We made it through customs with no problems, but then we didn't do any shopping on our whirlwind ride through the US, so we didn't expect any. The nice woman working the booth said we could follow the truckers -- just follow the signs and that would get us out on the TransCanada the easy way. It worked as she said, and within a short time we were on our way east towards Sudbury.

We stopped at the Serpent River Campground at Spragge, ON. It was right off the TransCanada, but the traffic noise wasn't horrible, and we were able to get a decent night's sleep. We were up and gone the next morning by about 10:00, finally on the last leg of the journey to Little Britain.

Driving across the Shield was what I expected and wasn't. It's rather like driving through the mountains in some ways, except there are no piles of rock that rise thousands of meters (feet) into the air. Trees, trees, and more trees. And after we passed Sudbury? INUKSHUKS!!!!

Enterprising (agile?) people had built inukshuks all along the highway from Sudbury right up until we turned off Highway 69/400 towards Lindsday. I was despairing of ever getting a decent shot of one because by the time we'd get close enough for me to focus with my dinky little camera, we flashed by and all I got was a blur. I finally got this one on a 'stand' of rock in between the north and southbound lanes out the front window. I just thought they were so neat!

We cruised down the side of Georgian Bay, past Parry Sound, and saw signs for Don Cherry's Restaurant, and the Bobby Orr Hall of Fame (I think that's what it was called). We didn't see the bay though, because the highway was a few kilometres inland, and maneuvering that big rig in and out of small towns was just too much of a chore. Besides, the final destination was only a couple hours away!

We pulled into the Riverwood Park campground around 4:30 Friday afternoon. We have a nice site, although getting it level was a bit of a challenge. But it's large, lots of room to sit and sprawl. My brother and his wife came out from Little Britain, about 15 minutes away, and we spent the entire evening enjoying each other's company. Seeing family is a good thing.

There will be more posts about family later as we met up with more of mine yesterday and will see even more later today! Pictures to follow!

Well that's a little corny!

Corny? Just a little! Corn, corn and more corn. That, dairy farms and trees. Lots of trees! That was our trip across Wisconsin today.

We left Lebanon Hills Park Campground by 9:30 this morning. Not a bad start, considering Google said we had about a 7 hour drive today. We stopped just across the Wisconsin border for gas and coffee, and continued on our way. Wisconsin is beautiful country. Green, rolling hills, lots of trees... But it seems like just about all they grow is corn! I'm sure some of it is feed for all those dairy cattle they have, but I bet a good bit of it is also because of the ethanol subsidies. Whatever the reason, there sure is a lot of it!

I also saw the Mississippi River for the first time in my life. At least that's what the big sign said just as we got to the bridge that crossed it. I was a little underwhelmed, but remembering how far north we are, I didn't think too much of it, and took some pictures anyways (today's photos are posted on Flickr). A little while later we came across a HUGE river that looked to me like the Mississippi should look. So I quickly dug out my trusty Good Sam RV Road Atlas, and from there I deduced that the BIG river was actually the St. Croix River which meets up with the Mississippi not too far south of where we crossed it on I-94.

Other than a lot of green, and a lot of road, today's trip was very unremarkable. Until I saw Lake Michigan. Other than Lake Ontario (from a distance), this is the closest I've been to one of the Great Lakes. I'm impressed. Anytime I can't see land on the other side, I'm impressed. I'm a prairie girl...what do you expect?

Anyways, we're spending the night in Park Place of the North campground, about 15 miles south of Escanaba, MI. It's a nice little spot right on M-35, with a walking path that goes out to the lake. Unfortunately, the boardwalk that goes right to the lake is broken, and the ground rather wet, so we didn't get that far. But it was neat to see. We got here early enough that we were able to barbecue steak and potatoes, and enjoy a nice dinner outside. This is what holidays in an RV are all about!

Tomorrow, it's to Sault Ste. Marie and back into Canada...and unless someone is generous enough to share their wifi (as happened tonight), we'll catch you all when we get to Lindsay on Friday!

The Mall of America

Had to happen sooner or later -- one of us got sick. That would be me. I have no idea if it was something I ate, or a bug, but I felt like death warmed over for several hours last night. Mother Nature didn't feel much better. Around 10 o'clock, the owner of the campground was going around to all the sites saying that the sheriff had just stopped in to let him know that trucks were being blown off the interstate near Fargo because of a nasty thunderstorm. If we wanted, we could go take refuge in the (cinderblock) washroom building until the storm passed. I really didn't feel like leaving the bed, so we stayed behind. There was some wind, and a good bit of rain, but the worst of it apparently passed us by. The storm was still going on in my innards, and that kept me up until after 1 a.m! By morning however, all was well again, both with me and the weather!

I woke up about 8 or so -- sleeping in for me these days! -- and made a pot of coffee. Since we only had about a 3 hour journey today, I decided to let Ger sleep for a bit. When he finally rolled out, we took our time packing up and left the campground around 11:30 a.m. Late start for us! I hadn't eaten anything and my belly was reminding me of that fact, so we stopped for fuel about halfway through the trip, and I got some salt and grease into my system, courtesy of McDonalds. Gotta love salty fries on a tender tummy!

We pulled into the Lebanon Hills Park Campground around 3:00 p.m., got set up and then headed out for the Mall of America. The guy working in the campground office told me it's smaller than West Ed -- and he's been to both. He's right, it's smaller, but it's still impressive in its own right! The amusement park in the middle of the mall is quite amazing. My son would love the roller coaster that pivots in all directions as it goes around the track. My tum was getting queasy again just watching! Then there was the Lego store, with the huge Lego sculptures on the roof.

Just outside the store, there was a play area with several tables of blocks for kids of all ages to (re)discover their inner child. We could just imagine our son-in-law there, playing with his daughter! I apologize for the quality of the photos -- someone (who shall remain nameless) forgot to check the battery in the camera and couldn't even take one photo with it! All the pics we have are off my Blackberry. Oops.

I did have to chuckle when we realized the Microsoft store is right across from the Apple store. People walking from one store to the other; both stores seemed to be quite busy. We checked out some prices, and the actual numbers are the same here as what they are at home. Which means it's *gasp* cheaper at home, because the tax here is 6.25%, where at home, we just have the 5% GST. I did have to check out Nordstroms, Nordstrom Rack, and Coldwater Creek, just because those stores haven't yet made it to Canada. Soon, though, from what I hear!

We stopped for dinner at the mall in a restaurant called Cadillac Ranch. The food was good; typical burger/steak/salad type stuff -- rather hard to screw up. We did amuse ourselves watching a couple women try to ride the mechanical bull. Ger tried to talk me into trying. I think the boy has been driving to much -- his brain has gone mushy!

Now we're back at our motorhome, and Ger has a buddy visiting him. Looks like we might be in for some more thunderbumpers tonight. It will be an early night though because tomorrow looks to be about 7 hours of driving as we head east and north to Escanaba, MI, on the shores of Lake Michigan. Three more sleeps until we're at Lindsay!

North Dakota

LOOOONG day!

We left Glendive by 9:30 this morning, heading east on I-94. Stopped for fuel at the Flying J at Beach, ND, just over the border. Diesel was $3.99/gallon...ugh. Especially since yesterday's arduous journey saw us get less than 8 MPG. That's not good at all! Hopefully by the time we fill up next, today's leg of the journey will have been kinder to us!

The picture above shows the landscape we encountered travelling through Theodore Roosevelt National Park. It's called the Painted Canyon, and it seems to go on forever! It's too bad we've got such a tight schedule heading east, because it looks like it would be awesome to see!

We also blew past one of the entrances to the Enchanted Highway, which claims to host the largest metal sculptures in the world. This one of the geese certainly fit the bill of being large!

The next thing we saw was what has to be the world's largest Holstein. I had to take a picture of it just for Sandy and Jess (and their parents, of course!). Her name is apparently Salem Sue. I zoomed in as close as I could -- if you want to see a larger picture, check out my Flickr feed from the trip.

After going through Bismarck and seeing the Missouri River in all its (flooded) glory (can't imagine what those poor folks in Minot are going through!), we continued down I-94. Near Streeter, we passed many fields under water, some so much so that the highway was down to one lane in each direction. There are pics of that in the Flickr feed as well.

By the time we hit Fargo, we were really glad that there was only just over an hour left of the trip. We passed into Minnesota, and the first thing we saw was a rest stop that was all closed up. Ger wondered why, and then I remembered that the Minnesota government had shut down the other day because they couldn't pass a budget. Oh, my... We saw another rest stop later on that was also closed. However, the local constabulary (State Troopers) were still out there, looking to nab people who went over the 70 mph speed limit. I told Ger they were probably trying to raise some money so they could get paid!

We finally pulled into the Prairie Cove Campground and RV Park around 7 p.m. Central time. Because I'd booked ahead, the folks here were ready for us, and we pulled in, ready for a break. A nice glass of wine, and some pasta and chicken for supper, a good night's sleep, and we'll be ready for the Mall of America tomorrow!

Goodnight!

Big Sky Country

Okay, so now I know why they call Montana "Big Sky Country."

We spent today travelling across Montana from Great Falls to Glendive, near the North Dakota border. We took State Hwy 200 because it looked like it would be a considerably shorter trip than travelling down to I-90 at Billings and then going across. What I failed to learn in my research is that although Hwy 200 is designated a 'truck route' it is just barely that in many sections. No shoulders along significant stretches of road, and work being done on many areas meant it was a tiring drive for Gerry. It didn't help that the wind was blowing like crazy out of the southeast. What's with that? What happened to that west wind that was supposed to help our mileage in this hotel room on wheels?

However, before I go on about today's drive, I do have to tell you about our afternoon/evening in Great Falls. We got into the city at about 2:30ish; not bad, coming from south of Calgary. We already knew we couldn't get a spot in the RV parks in town, so we planned on spending the night at the Walmart 'campground.' The Walmart in Great Falls does allow RVs to overnight in their parking lot, so we knew we weren't going to get towed away. We had to get groceries because I didn't want to risk losing 'forbidden fruits' (and meat and eggs) coming across the border, so all I had were staples. We also picked up a cheap phone that will let us call home (and home call us *hint, hint* Kenny) without exorbitant Telus roaming charges. Seems odd to be using a dinky little phone like that instead of my Blackberry, but to save $3/MB, I'll forgo the updates to Facebook and checking my mail for a bit. And yes, even texting the kids.

After we put all the groceries away and got the phone set up, we set out to find Eddie's Supper Club because a friend had recommended it highly. The placemats on the tables said the place had been run by the same family since 1944, and the decor looked like it! But the service was wonderful, and the food was very good! I had a campfire ribeye steak that was yummy! Ger had prime rib which he said was good, but he's also very biased towards Leto's in Lacombe, Smugglers in Calgary, and the Keg. So yeah, I agree with Pat, if you're in Great Falls, you have to check out Eddie's.

After dinner, we found a Starbucks so we could get our 'net fix, and then headed back to the motorhome. By the time we got there, several other units had pulled in, and we talked with one guy who was on his way to Lacombe! Such a small world! After a nice little visit, we headed into the motorhome. But we forgot one thing...it's July 4th weekend down here.

There are vendors selling fireworks all over the place! And obviously people are buying them because they were going off all over the place around us. I looked out the front window of the MH and could see them a block away, and on the horizon...seemed like everyone was setting them off! The kicker was the one that went off at 7:00 this morning. I'm sure that was just the fireworks vendor in the Walmart lot telling all us squatters to get the hell out so someone other folks could come stay and buy fireworks. Maybe not, but it's a good story!

So we got up, got dressed, fired up the MH and headed to the Flying J to fuel up. Of course, breakfast at Denny's was a must, and then we were on our way. As I said, it was a very long drive, but there was some amazing scenery. I don't think I've every seen so many badlands as on that trip today! We stopped at a rest area near Mosby to grab some lunch, and I took some pictures of the historical signs there. I also took a lot of pictures on the way, often bouncing from one side of the MH to the other. I'm trying to get them loaded on Flickr, but the wireless here isn't cooperating all that well, so I'll have to post the link to the collection later.

(The wireless *was* good enough that we were able to Skype with Brenna earlier tonight and sign Happy Birthday to her -- that was fun!)

Tomorrow, we're going all the way across North Dakota, via Bismarck, to Ashby, MN. It's all Interstate, so it should be relatively uneventful. There was some flooding around Bismarck a couple weeks ago, but there doesn't appear to be any warnings out now. Keep your fingers crossed, 'kay? We'll have 'net access again, so we'll see how uploads go then!

Uh-oh...there go the fireworks again!

The Start of Summer 2011

On the road again! Yay! My first year at the new school came to a successful conclusion yesterday. So today we embarked on the trip we were supposed to take last summer! We're on our way to Ontario to visit my brother and his wife. But rather than drive across the southern parts of Saskatchewan and Manitoba, which may or may not be still suffering from the ravages of Mother Nature's gift of too much water, we're going to scoot down to Great Falls, MT and head east from there.

As I did on our last trip two years ago, I'm going to upload all my photos to Flickr, and post links and travel commentary here. Feel free to comment on my musings -- after all, blogs were designed to invite commentary! (weren't they?)

Tomorrow, Great Falls!