Day 28

Grammie and I decided to get on the road early in order to be able to enjoy our next park a little bit since we would only be there for a few days.  I checked the weather when I woke up and it looked like a huge storm was on the way so the girls and I went ahead and started packing up.  We were ready and waiting at the park entrance making breakfast and snacks when Grammie and Brayden pulled in.

The drive was going to be about 5 hours so we had tons of snacks, a movie for each car, and new activities.  About an hour into our drive I was trying to keep up with Grammie who seemed to think she was still in her Z car and just as I reached her a police officer going the other direction whizzed by me and promptly turned around.  Oh man.  I haven't been pulled over in more than 10 years!

He walked up and asked for my driver's license and noticed we were from Pensacola and asked what we were doing in the area.  I told him we were just camping in Ontario.  He peeked at my speedometer seeing only mph and said he thought I might be having a problem converting mph to km/h and I just nodded my head.  Technically, I didn't lie right?  He didn't give me a ticket but did say something about it not counting anyway.  Do tickets out of the country not count?

After about another hour we stopped for gas then a pit stop at Tim Hortons.  I'm not sure if these are a northern thing or a Canada thing but they are always packed!  We had trouble even getting into the parking lot at 10am!  I thought it was just a fast food place, but when we went to the counter to order a snack, the kids were drooling over the doughnuts. I quickly vetoed and had them choose between yogurt or a muffin and we got back on the road.

When we hit the main big city we would be driving through, it was black all around us.  Like tornado black so I sighed and got ready for a rough drive.  Somehow Grammie got us all the way through it with only some sprinkling.  We successfully skirted all the rain.  That is until we got to the park.  We stepped out of our cars to a hot and muggy 78 degrees thinking we might have made a wrong turn and headed back to Florida!  The clouds didn't look great so we decided to leave my car packed for now.

I'd asked the check-in person if there were any must-dos while we were here and she just shook her head.  Ok, I guess we'll just be enjoying the beach then.  I also asked if there were any grocery stores or restaurants nearby so we headed that way.  The place she recommended was closed on Tuesdays so we kept going to grab some groceries.  This store wasy TINY with only about 4 30ft aisles!  And $5 cream cheese - yikes!

We noticed a restaurant across the street from the store so we parked and hoped for the best.  I'd had my fill for awhile of fish and chips so I was hoping they might have a little something different.  It turns out they weren't to vegetarian friendly so we opted for the pizza.  Our server was actually a little shocked when Brayden asked for a pizza without pepperoni!  Grammie and I looked at each other both imagining the cooks picking off pepperoni from a frozen pizza.

Well, I'm not sure if the pizza was actually frozen or not, but we were very surprised it was quite good.  Lesson learned.  We boxed up the last few pieces for the girls' breakfast the next day and headed on to Grammie's bed & breakfast to get her and Brayden settled.  It turns out they actually were staying in the finished basement of a very nice couple's house.  We talked for awhile about Florida, sports, travel, and Canada then were on our way to find the ice cream store everyone was telling us about.

The shop was in the middle of a tiny town and when we walked in it seemed like we stepped back into the 1950s.  There was a counter with barstools atop a checkboard floor, an old-fashioned menu board and signs, and Coca-Cola paraphenalia everywhere.  The owner was so good with the kids and just seemed generally happy to meet people and be there.  While we were siting inside eating it started raining lightly but steady.

Not one to want to set up or take down a tent in the pouring rain, we decided to go back to the park and set up.  Grammie has learned over the past few days how to jump in and pick up one of the jobs to get us set up in record time.  We went down to the beach to check out Lake Erie and put out toes in.  The water was a little warm but definitely not swimmable for these Florida people!

Since the park didn't have much to offer, we decided to leave pretty early again in the morning.  Grammie and Brayden left us so the girls ran to the small park next door and I got us ready for showers and a rainy night ahead.

We three had been up pretty early with the storm coming so we hopped in the tent and read until all our eyes were heavy.  We made it to 8pm!  This would be our last night without stinky Brayden so we snuggled together and giggled until we all fell asleep.

Quote of the Day: "But your phone says 7:30!" as Ryan peeked at my phone before bed.  I convinced her it was our time at home so she would go to sleep.  Evil Mom.

Day 13

We began the day bright and early with quick goodbyes to our friends who we will join later and breakfast in the car.  We were headed this morning back into Buffalo for a fun family sailboat ride (with a little science mixed in).  We were to join the crew on the Spirit of Buffalo for a couple hours on Lake Erie.

Disclaimer:  If you are a sailor, I would like to apologize right now as I know I'm going to call things by the completely wrong name.  Feel free to skip ahead!

After putting on life jackets and listening to a quick safety talk, we were ready to go!

Ryan was the first to volunteer to help us get moving by pulling in line 1.  This required her to confirm the order to the captain although I'm positive only the crew member right next to her actually heard her.  Then Laney hauled to bumper to be stowed on the bow.

As we started moving, one of the crew helped us get our bearings by giving us a little history lesson on where we actually were.  Seems the boat was actually docked in the old entrance to the Erie Canal.  Within minutes, our volunteers were getting their sea legs and jumping up again to help hoist the sails!  The kids learned how to respond to captains orders quickly.  I totally need to use this at home!  Heave!  Ho!

Once were on the lake, the crew started the first of our science activities by scooping up a sample of Lake Erie for the kids to dig through.

All the kids got in their groups and started finding all kinds of samples of critters.  Our group found mussels, snails, and blood worms.  This led to an interesting discussion on invasive and native species.  They have been exposed to this on land before in the Rockies and Smokies, but never on water so it was interesting to see their brains figuring it all out.

Next up - designing a boat to float.  Seeing as how Brayden's group actually lost this same competition in our homeschool co-op, you'd think the girls would have taken over but they let him lead.  For the record, his design this time around was much better and they got second place!

Next up was a discussion about fish species in the lake.  Did you know Lake Erie has the most diverse population of fish of all the Great Lakes?  They got to use a handy little flow chart to identify a couple of the fish in the bucket.

Last, we learned a little about birds and migration patterns then were set free to wander the boat with binoculars in search of birds.  Being from the Gulf Coast, we'd already seen seagulls, heron, and mallards, but it was still fun to track them down.

Sad that it was over (but happy to be warm!), we said goodbye to our gracious crew and headed north! There's Grammie and Ryan in front of us.  We were a little concerned about the kids being split up and no Dad along, but Grammie went through pretty smooth.  I, on the other hand, was sent to the inspection station to talk to an officer.  Seems I'm too honest sometimes.  When asked if I had any firearms, explosives, pepper spray, knives, etc I had to admit to it so I had to pull over and tell the officer my story.  Meanwhile, Grammie was getting worried waiting for me up ahead.  

The officer questioned me a little and let us go once he realized I wasn't a threat.  I told him I thought I had a thing of pepper spray in my bag but I wasn't positive as I hadn't seen it lately.  He suggested we just pretend I couldn't find it and rolled up my paper for the garbage.  Guess I don't look like a threatening enough mom of three in my rough & tough minivan!


We made it!

We still had about a 2 hour drive so we settled in with music and books for the ride.  The first thing I noticed was the speed limit said 100.  Sah-weet!!  Then I realized it was kilometers per hour.  Aw man.

Then off in the distance I saw a car being towed and thought I recognized the logo on the back.  As we got closer I realized it absolutely was the Ghostbuster car!  I assume it is being taken somewhere for the re-release in the theaters?  Or maybe a museum?

Within an hour we were in stop & go traffic on the highway and there were highrise apartments everywhere. We were still an hour away and there were people everywhere!  This was one crowded city.  We finally reached our next stop - the Eaton Chelsea in downtown Toronto.  The kids were most excited about visiting the pool and it's 4-story corkscrew slide!  They ended up bobbing up and down in the pool watching everyone else do it because "the line was too long and it was too cold outside the pool".  For the record, the line was only 5 people.  There's always tomorrow.

This will by far be our most comfortable sleeping nights of the trip!

After time to talk with Dave on Skype, the kids and I crashed on the cloud-like beds.  We just might sleep until noon!