Manitoba Farmers

There are some farms in Manitoba where the farmers have realized that most of us city folk cannot recognize crops. I loved this--they put signs up by all the different crops, visible from the highway, so we could learn. Crop after crop we would see "flax", "canola", "wheat", "barley", "oats"...

But my favorite sign? The one that read "pasture".

And along the way

after leaving Winnipeg, and the wonderful hospitality extended to us, we were presented with these two gifts...

and this

And now we are home.

Things we DID do

We left Minnesota and headed through Wisconsin and North Dakota, towards Winnipeg. On the way, we stopped at a place that Martin remembered as a kid. He remembered there was a great big otter--and there was. It towered over his 6'2 frame, and it was fun to take the picture for his parents.

What he had forgotten was this:

And really, they look silly when they are in the trees!

We spent a good half hour there, watching and photographing the cranes. We also spent some time trying not to get pecked by the geese and their 'teenaged' gosling. It was amazing!

We arrived at Cynthia and J-L's, and were charmed completely by their wee ones. Their daughter is bright as can be (and prints better than some adults I know). Their son is a major flirt. So we had a great supper and enjoyed their hospitality immensely. We like these people, a lot! They gave us so much freedom to come and go.

And come and go we did. One of the reasons for the road trip was to see where each of us grew up. Martin grew up in Winnipeg, and we spent the day looking at his old stomping grounds. There were several great moments, but the best one for me was when he spotted his neighbour--a handsome gent dressed in paint spattered short-shorts, and an equally paint-spattered shirt. His wife came to greet us as well--she didn't recognize him at first, but when she did, the most lovely expression transformed her face from one of total confusion to one of pure and absolute delight. She has alzheimers and so she kept moving between the present and the past...but that moment was completely perfect.

We also drove to the cabin that really does exist on the corner of Alice Lane and Wonderland Street. And we walked the beach which was a delight.

And also? We spent a lot of time watching these--there are a million of them!

Things heard on the phone

"He's going to be on strict bed rest for several days"

"He has pneumonia and a blood clot. Then he had a heart attack"

"He sounds bored"

"He is so tired"

"He's in ICU"

"He went home today"

(Thanks to everyone who read my last post and offered up a prayer for him).

The things we didn't do

We didn't go look at the prairie dog village, or take a leisurely drive to my cousin's, or stay overnight where my mom grew up, or see my cousin's kids.

We aren't going to go to my home town, even though we are only 20 km away from it right now.

My brother had a heart attack. We are going home.

I'll write more about the things we DID do a little later.

and, DARN!

I lost my sunglasses. They've been with me for a long time. I know this because of the sailboat incident and I had them then. I know THAT because I was so surprised that they floated!

Sigh. I hope whoever finds them enjoys them!

The longest day

Today was a really really long day. We didn't sleep as well as we expected to last night, because we had the dumbest bed in the full hotel. It was sloping towards the head, and not only that, the air conditioning fan was so loud that we awoke almost every ten minutes when it came on. The icing on the cake was that the room next to us was apparently empty (how could THAT be?). Either that or the patron was dead. The alarm clock was going before 7, and continued until after we left.

However--and this is important--the hotel manager did his best to make it well, better. He reduced the rate in half (the rate that had already been reduced by a third was reduced by another half). And he bought breakfast, which was actually pretty good. And it helped us today because we had so far to drive.

We drove from Chicago to Wisconsin. There's a lot of toll roads in Chicago! Then we cut diagonally across Wisconsin and came into Minnesota at St. Paul's. We decided to drive through the twin cities so that we could avoid the rush hour tomorrow. It's another long day! But at least at the end of it we get to see some cute kidlets and their parents.

Smoquing!

One of the things we decided to do on this trip was to hit some of the restaurants featured in Drive ins, Diners and Dives--but not all of them (a deep fried fully dressed hamburger? uh uh!!). We watch it on the weekends, and there are only a few that are on our intended route. One of them is called Smoque.

And it was great! Let me just say that these people know how to barbeque, but not only that, I liked their coleslaw....and I don't like anybody's. I also liked their beans, but my favourite? Those Louis Back Ribs. I actually didn't care for their sauce, but then, I haven't found a bbq sauce that I'm crazy about.

If you're ever in Chicago...check it out!

A Shout-Out to the People of Michigan

We have had quite a lovely day. We started out by leaving our hotel armed with granola bars, apples and water, and we drove to the village of Frankenmuth. This little town celebrates its Bavarian heritage, so my German hubby wanted to go see it's beautiful flower-laden downtown. On the way, we saw the biggest Christmas store (scroll to the bottom to see the panoramic tour). I think my friend Gail and my mom would both have stayed there for hours. We needed to get on the road, but even so, our 'let's take a peek' took at least an hour. It was fruitful, as we finally found a star for the tree that we both like, but it was sooo over the top.

While there, we asked the cashier where she would recommend us going for breakfast. She said Satow's, on main street...and then added that it was the drugstore. We were a bit surprised, but we have learned to trust the locals. So we found this lovely little building that has a series of murals painted on the outside wall. It is a drugstore, yes--but it is also this very cute eating place. I loved watching two oldtimers at the counter, engaged in conversation, and shifting their weight on the swivel stools. We had a great, affordable breakfast too. As a little Bavarian town, of course the sausage was homemade. They even had stollen!

We travelled right down to the south westernmost corner of Michigan, spent an hour in Indiana as we made our way around the bottom of Lake Michigan--a great lake that we never saw! We stopped in Illinois, where we are staying at a lovely resort hotel. Wise and frugal hubby scored a GREAT deal!

We're tired, and have a long day tomorrow. So, good night lone blog reader!

Deals, deals and more deals

This morning we woke up to the beautiful lake, and our beautiful friends, and a gorgeous breakfast. We slept well, we ate well! Afterwards, we drove to St. Jacobs. We started at the farmer's market, where M found landjaeger sausage. He was delighted! And he ate them before I got more than a whiff of them (which truthfully, was probably quite enough). We bought cherries to eat on the way, and our friends filled their cooler with goodies to take home. My find? Stroopwaffels! Who knew that I didn't have to fly to Holland to get them?

After a morning that went by far too quickly, we bid adieu to our friends and continued west. We had a pretty uneventful border crossing, though we are not sure that the red jaguar in the next lane fared as well!

It didn't take us long to realize we were going south when we intended to go west--but after a quick (and much cheaper) tank of gas, we had it all straightened out again. We arrived in Birch Run at a reasonable time, and spent two hours at the outlet mall. It was productive--all the kids birthday and Christmas gifts done, which will be helpful when we take them home this week.

But we are tired, so now we are crashing at the hotel, ready to head out again tomorrow.

Not a bad way to begin!!

Thanks, John and Joelle...we had a beautiful time!

Gearing up for a roadtrip!

Tomorrow we leave for an extended road trip, which will take us around the great lakes, through hubby's home town where we will also check in on Master Jack and Miss Abby; then a quick visit with my cousin, and a look at my home town. We'll go to the cemetery, and then boot it to my parent's place to celebrate their 50th. I started to tell you all about that, but they read this blog, and that would just spoil the surprise. After that, we are going south to see some favorite kids (and their parents), and then we are going to drive around some parks. We expect to see some cowboy country, and some badlands country, maybe a few animals along the way, and stay in some bed and breakfasts. It's been a while since we had a long holiday, and we are both in the mood to head out!

Yesterday we washed the cat. She is all cuddly and mushy today, having quickly forgiven me (whew). I'm just curious if she'll be as forgiving in a month. We haven't told her yet that she has to spend it with a DOG.

An iconic moment

After our huttopia adventures, we spent the weekend at the Montreal Jazz Festival. We saw two concerts.

Eliane Elias was okay. I found her constant flipping-of-the-hair thing, to be a distraction. But in her defense, she is a beautiful Latino woman who clearly loves great clothes and great shoes and has the rhythm to make it all work for her. So if she wants to flip her sexy long blonde locks every other minute, she has the right to do it. My husband and my friend loved it. Maybe I was just jealous--she looked great. And she is a terrific jazz pianist. Her singing didn't move me, but then it didn't have to. It was wonderful to hang out and just listen for awhile.

Dave Brubeck was a whole other story. This was the first time in my life that I watched an artist get a standing ovation just for coming on the stage, and I really appreciated that. I found out afterwards that he had been quite ill, so dragging his 88 year old bones on stage really was an accomplishment. But that wasn't why he was applauded with such fervor. He is really talented, and I have to say that I loved every minute of the concert. If his name doesn't seem familiar, take a listen to this...and you will realize that you knew him all along.

The absolute highlight for me however, was something that sounded a lot like this. It isn't just that I enjoy the song, but I loved how this guy interpreted it, and just what he made his instrument do. It was 'wow' terrific, and as a sometime-flautist myself, I could appreciate his tone, technique and talent.

I'm going to be listening to a lot more Dave Brubeck and Bobby Militello after this!

It rained. And rained. And when it was done raining, it rained.

Last week was our annual camping trip with Dave. This year, we all admitted we were getting older (and yet no one said a word). We decided not to sleep on the ground. Under the auspices of 'trying out a tent trailer', and failing--we then turned to huttopia camping.

I have to say, this was really great. Even though it rained.

It's been my experience this week that few people know what a huttopia is. Think cabin, made of canvas. All the camping stuff that we normally lug around was already there--with the exception of food and sleeping bags. It had a stove, and a fridge, and electricity. I especially enjoyed the sleeping area, divided by black canvas into two bedrooms. The black part is important for it allowed us all to catch a regular 8 hours rather than waking up with the birds at 4 a.m. Okay, I'm lying a little. The birds still sang, rather it rained or not. I love that, and I hate that at the same time. But at least if the room is dark, it's a lot easier to pretend that it isn't 4 in the morning.

That darned rain though was problematic. First, it invited all the bugs to come to the trio buffet. In fact, if I had to assign one phrase to the week, it was this..."it doesn't itch. It really doesn't itch. HONEST, IT DOESN'T ITCH!!!"

Second, the rain was a direct cause of a three hour detour. The day started out innocently enough--I chose a new hiking trail, but we had to drive to get there. It promised a lovely walk, close to nature (translate that to mean bugs), where the birds were (bugs), etc. etc. We had to take a secondary road, that barely existed thanks to the rain, to get there. And since, upon arriving, we realized that it may have been simpler to just come in the other way, we decided to go back to our huttopia haven that direction instead. BAD IDEA. You see, an hour or so into the drive, the road was washed out. Gone, completely impassable. You'd think that it wouldn't be so difficult to put up a sign oh...anywhere before we got to the 'thou shalt return' point. So we had to drive back the hour, take a detour for an hour, and then drive the original hour back to camp. Boy, was I popular. I wasn't going to choose the hike again!

Third, the rain really interfered with such traditions as roasting marshmallows and cooking sausages and singing campfire songs and such. You need to be able to keep the fire going to really make those things fun. And...well, there was our huttopia just waiting nice and dry, so in fact, we had one fire, upon which we dutifully grilled (er, braised) steaks. That was that!

Still, it was a great week. We went to the mineral spas twice. We were treated to the requisite amount of creature sightings (deer, birds, chipmunks and squirrels, and a fox). We played numerous games of kuuduk and cribbage. I got to ride a motorcycle, which was way cool. We went in the paddle boats, and we watched a loon go fishing. Pictures to come later!

We tried something new, and it was a grand success. Except that it was monsoon season.