Last Leg

As I mentioned in the last post, we decided to return home a day early. We were supposed to stay in Ludington, Michigan for two nights, but we looked at the long range forecast (hot days, warm and humid nights, and strong thunderstorms) and decided to leave early and beat the weather. We left Ludington at about 1:15 and made for the Toledo Strip. About 6 hours later, we were in Fremont, Ohio, just east of Toledo.

Fremont is a small city near Lake Erie. Out hotel was off I-80, and there are typical chain restaurants nearby. We decided to go into town and check out a local pub, The Garrison. They had a good menu, and good beers on tap. While we waited for our food, we read up on Fremont. A couple of facts: It's the former residence of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, the 19th President of the United States. It is the home of the first Presidential Library, that of Hayes. It's also the location of the Heinz ketchup factory that produces 80% of the ketchup sold in the US. Fremont was previously called Lower Sandusky, but was  was renamed Fremont, to honor John C. Frémont, who helped acquire California during the Mexican–American War. Frémont was a political ally of Hayes and in 1856 was the first nominee for President of the new Republican party.

After having skipped lunch, Vicky and I were starving, so we had dessert, something we rarely do. We shared bread pudding with maple walnut ice cream on it. They brought out three squares of pudding! We were stuffed!

The next day we were eager to get on the road and get home. The hotel offered one of those free breakfasts that are best avoided. I just wanted to get some coffee for the road. But when I went into the breakfast area, I took note of how horrible it actually was. The room was unair-conditioned. It was hot, humid, and smelled of something you didn't want to eat. The people standing around waiting for a toaster looked like they were on the walk to the gallows. The food that I saw was pretty scary looking. I poured myself a coffee, which had no flavor at all, not even "hot water with coffee flavoring" flavor.

Since we would be traveling on the Ohio Turnpike, we decided to stop at one of the vaunted Service Plazas. The Turnpike is a toll road, and back in the days when they had actual toll collectors, it was probably a good idea to have these plazas so people wouldn't have to get off the turnpike just to get gas and a bite to eat and thereby increase traffic at the toll booths. Plus, the turnpike commission probably got a slice of the action. But now with E-ZPass, you don't need many (or any) toll collectors and flow through the exits is pretty quick. So why stop at a Service Plaza where you know the gas is more expensive and the food not so great?  The reason: at any exit you don't know how far away the nearest gas or diner is unless you take time to Google it on the fly. That, and traffic near the exit might be something you don't want to deal with. 

So we got off at the Service Plaza just west of Cleveland. The Ohio Service Plazas are big, and there is a variety of places to grab a bite, all of them chain establishments. We grabbed a breakfasty sandwich at Panera along with some real coffee and hit the road.  Before too long we were climbing onto the higher rolling terrain of the Allegheny Plateau, and were soon in Pennsylvania. Still a three hour drive home, but soon enough we were on familiar ground. The last fifty miles were a joy to drive.

At a Pennsylvania rest stop a couple of hours from home

When we pulled into the driveway, our final mileage for the trip was 7063.8. That's an average of 229 miles a day (and we didn't even drive the four days we were in Calgary). The front of the minivan and car top carrier were encrusted with dead bugs. We felt similar. But we tore down the bed and put almost everything away before the end of the day.

The final trip mileage

Thousands of miles of bug splatter

It was a great trip. Exhausting at the end, but a true adventure. I'll write up some general impressions and lessons in a final blog post.