Days 17 and 18

Welcome back!

My 30ish mosquito bites from Hermit Island are finally beginning to shrink and stop itching!! That's a relief. Just thought I'd let you in on a little of the challenge of the adventure. (And used alot of disgusting mosquito repellent!!! Several applications per day.)

Anyway, on with the journey. After doing a couple loads of laundry, blogging, having brunch, and getting ice we left Plattsburgh, NY and got to the border about 1 hour later. The first time we went through the border they asked us some questions and let us through. This time - we must of have looked suspicious and worse for wear - we got "the pink slip." The first customs agent asked us a bunch of questions about what was in the car, in the car carrier and about us. Then she gave us the slip. We pulled into a parking space and a 2nd officer came over and asked us all the same questions and then a few more. Our big concern was that he was going to ask us to remove everything from the car and the carrier. The car wouldn't have been THAT bad. The carrier WOULD have been that bad. He decided the car and it's contents were congruent with our story so he cleared the car. But WE had to go into the immigration office to get cleared. They called us up to a window and 1 person asked us all the same + other questions while a second officer stood by and watched our reactions. More than likely the first was in training. After the questioning, we were asked to sit down again. After some time, they called us back over and set us free to enter Canada. WHEW!! While we were sitting there waiting we were talking about the worst case scenario and talking about how to redirect our trip. So it wouldn't have been THAT bad if they hadn't let us in.

Whenever we cross the US/Canadian border going either direction we loudly sing our duet of Oh Canada and The Star Spangled Banner. It's a HOOT, eh! The rest of the time we either listen to Waylon, Willie, John Denver or Simon and Garfield or nobody - mostly it's nobody.

Anyway, we decided to high-tail it. So we drove through some absolutely beautiful countryside. Farms, dense green forests, lakes of every size, rivers, streams, a "creek" that was the size of a large river in AZ! It was mostly cloudy so that added to the beauty (in my eyes). We drove as far as Pembroke. What a wonderful place to stay. If you ever happen to be in Pembroke, consider staying at The Travelodge. It was a great hotel with a great resturant. Malcolm was thrilled with his dinner of braised duck with black cherry balsamic compote over garden vegetables with a side of rhubarb compote. I had a few bites and it was indeed might tastey. He declared at the beinning of the trip that "each dinner will be a celebration." This was indeed!! Our waitress was Janice and she was adorable. Gave her our card b/c she really wants to come to AZ. Then she found out that we do counseling and she said it would be great if she and her "sweetie" could come to AZ and see it's beauty AND work through some of their challenges. Cool!!

Yesterday, Father's Day, I did most of the driving so Malcolm could have a day off. Another beautiful drive through the same countryside on a mostly cloudy day. SOOOO beautiful. B/c we were driving I didn't take too many pics, but when I have a chance "down the road" I will look at and load some of the ones we took.

We drove til we got to Blind River and we are staying at a place called LakeView Inn. While we were seeing the signs along the way we were thinking this would be SUCH a beautiful place. BTW, the lake to be viewed at this point is Lake Huron. I realized yesterday that we will have either seen, gone around or been very near all 5 of the Great Lakes on this trip. That's pretty cool, eh?

Today we are off to Twelvemile Beach near Munising, MI. (Thank you Mike for the recommendation.) It's only about a 4.5 hour drive so we will have some time to explore the beauty of the place. We'll be there for a couple of days then head to Minneapolis to see Malcolm's daughter and family on Wed night and my cousin on Thurs morning. And then we are on the road again.

That's about it for this rendition of the blog. Pics to come in the future!!

Love you all. Thanks for following along with us!! It's nice to have you with us.