The journey begins

Our return journey to Canada began after two hectic days of completing our packing, and loading the truck on August 1 and 2. Bless the dolly we bought at the beginning of the year! We (Ricardo, Moopy the cat and myself) were bent on leaving the second, so in spite of the time (8:30 pm) we fired up the caravan, and drove to Sacramento, CA with 130 miles for the odometer.
Day 2 found us rolling into Elko, NV after 417 miles, much better! We crossed the impressive salt flats, where I kept thinking it would be a great way to teach water evaporation.


Day 3 was our longest, 625 miles due to "no available accomodations"...We arrived at Rock Springs, WY where the receptionist at the Holiday Inn told me the whole town was booked. So we continued for another 100 miles to Rawlings, with the same results. By this time it was 10 pm and we were quite tired, but the idea of sleeping in the truck kept us going, singing all the tunes we could possibly remember to keep the driver awake! Even Moopy joined in the singing...Finally, another 100 miles later we arrived in Laramie, where we found the best accomodations: A place that said "Yes, we have a room". You can imagine we got a late start on day 4, yet managed to drive another 470 miles to York, NB.

By now, we had a good routine going: I read to Ricardo from his study books so he wouldn't fall behind, Ricardo drove, and Moopy slept. I think he had the best slice of the pie.

By day 6 we were old pro's, I even managed to do some jogging and laundry! After 410 miles, we stopped at Davenport, IA and had a great steak dinner. Day 7 got us to Toledo, OH after 400 miles. Until now we had been driving constantly on 80 East, here it changed to 90 East. By now we were starting to get excited: we were within one day driving distance! Day 8 was our last stretch, 300 miles crossing IN, NY and arriving in St. Catharines, Ontario at 5 pm. Our border crossing was quite painless, paperwork and stamps, but no opening boxes (we must look really honest!).

Today, Friday 12 was when we finally finished our long "to do" list, and now have a few days to catch our breath before we fly north on Thursday 18th. We, the three mousketeers are getting excited with our imminent adventure. The plan is to fly to Thunder Bay, from there to Sioux Lookout (yes, it actually took it's name from doing just that!- for defense purposes) and arrive in Wunnumin Lake on Friday 19th. Ricardo and I got happy to find a map that actually had the place....