Our Trip: Friday

We left the house at 4:30 AM on Friday--just to try to get a jump on the traffic. Everything went along quite well. We got to the Mackinac Bridge while it was still early--so early, in fact, that the bridge was enclosed in fog. It was a bit weird to look ahead and see--or rather, not see--the tops of the towers above the roadway. Traffic was still extremely light when we crossed over. After the bridge, I went to sleep.

I woke up before we got to Flint. I had told C that I would call her just before we crossed over, as I didn't want to have to pay roaming charges from Canada. (Little good it did me--A and I kept in contact the whole while we were in Niagara Falls by cellphone.) We stopped to have lunch and gas the Jimmy before crossing the bridge at Port Huron.

We had to pay a toll to get across the bridge at Port Huron and I have never seen anyone so unfriendly as the toll-taker who "waited" on us. Not only did she NOT SAY A WORD to us--NOTHING--but her face, literally, would have fallen off if she had even tried to smile. The look she gave us was the very definition of "if looks could kill." The customs agent who "interrogated" us before we got into Canada wasn't much better than the toll-taker. Neither one of them made us feel very welcome or wanted--if you don't want tourists, put up a damn fence!

Again, I went back to sleep and was very happy until I woke a few hours later as we were passing Brantford. Now, I had thought the biggest city in that area was London, and because we weren't getting too close to it, I didn't think traffic was going to be too big of a problem. Well, I was wrong! Brantford wasn't too bad at a population of 86,000, but then we got to Hamilton. The population there was 491,000 and by this time we were racing at speeds I don't want to think about and were surrounded by eighteen-wheelers doing their best not to crowd us too terribly. I came very close to a full-blown panic attack, but I calmed myself by saying this wouldn't last too long. HA! We still had to go through Burlington (151,000) and St. Catherine's (130,000). The traffic, I'm sure, was normal for a Friday afternoon, but I grew up in a town of less than 1,000 people, so I was not a happy traveler! Niagara Falls, at 79,000 people, was a cakewalk compared to what we had just gone through. Thank goodness K has no problem driving in that traffic.

We got to our hotel before 4:00 PM--much earlier than I had expected. We used the valet parking--so glad we did--and had a bellhop bring us to our suite. All of that was very nice. The suite was nice enough--probably not worth what we paid. It DEFINITELY was not as clean as it should have been, but I don't think any hotel room would be clean enough for me! I'm anal that way.

A and her fiance were already in town, so we went out to dinner with them. Afterwards we went to the casino. It was very cool--I've never been to Vegas, but I would imagine this was very much like it, only on a smaller scale. A had never gambled in a casino, so we put her in front of a nickel slot machine and had her go at it. She didn't win, but she had fun.

So, that concluded our first day of the trip. Eventful in some ways and easy in others.