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I traveled to Maine to visit family. Here’s a short recap of some of the events.

We stayed in a small house overlooking Union Bay. Here’s the view from inside the house.

And here’s the view from the backyard.

Our first Maine activity was hiking around Jordan Pond. Everything associated with it had the prefix “Jordan Pond”, so that became a short-lived running joke. To get there, you drive up Jordan Pond Drive. You know you’re there when you see the house, which is named Jordan Pond House. Etc, etc.

It was cold in Maine, but since everything there is ocean salt water, we mostly saw liquid water. Jordan Pond was the first place where a body of water was actually frozen. And it was a good frozen too – several inches thick, we could see a few layers. Other people were running and skating about, so we ventured onto the ice.

We went there not to slide on the ice, but to hike the trail around Jordan Pond. It was called, of course, Jordan Pond Trail. We started going north along the east side. It was a scenic trail, fairly well maintained, like this:

About the halfway point, there was a bridge, I’m guessing to cross over the Jordan Pond river that feeds it.

After that, the trail became less of a trail and more of a suggestion. It was just a bunch of rocks piled along the shore, and you had to guess where to go next, mostly judging by the shoreline.

The amount of effort to scramble over snow-covered rocks was more than we anticipated for our group, so we made up a plan B – just walk across the water.

It was the shortest distance between two points. The snow-covered sections were ok, but the bare ice was polished smooth by the winds, so that was pretty slippery.

When we got just past the point of land that jut out, we could see that the shoreline was no longer rocky and there was a path we could walk again. So we decided to abandon plan B and go back to plan A of hiking the trail. The trail for most of the rest of the time consisted of a boardwalk.

The boardwalk ended right near a bridge for the carriage road. There are a few carriage houses and various old bridges leftover from the Rockefeller days, before it became Acadia National Park.

We also visited Bar Harbor quickly. There is not much to do there in the winter. And a swing by the LL Bean outlet. Trying to fit in a bunch of typical Maine experiences. Including buying food at Shaw’s and perusing Marden’s for whatever we can find.

This is the third of a two-part series, like the fourth book of a trilogy. You can also read about the first part of our trip here.

After we returned from Canada, we had one day to unpack then one day to repack, then on the third day we left for the shores of Lake Michigan, where we vacationed with purpose.

The first thing we noticed is that the old dirt-and-mulch pathway between houses was upgraded. As far as we know, this is a volunteer effort by the one homeowner, so I just wanted to note that it looks good.

We arrive Saturday, get setup, have dinner, then go to the Saturday concert. Afterwards is a walk down to Lake Michigan to see the sunset. Here is the view at the beach that first evening.

That’s not just overcastiness, that’s the effect of the Canadian wildfires. They were going strong while we were in Canada, but you couldn’t really tell while we were there. Then we came back to Michigan and got a much stronger effect.

Here’s a shot from the same time of day but on Tuesday rather than Saturday, and it’s more how it should look.

We had our usual array of activities during the week:

Tie-dye T-shirts

Crafts

And a shuffleboard tournament

My team did not win the tournament, in case you’re wondering.

Maranatha has a weekly event of the Staff vs. Guests Basketball Game. Our kids have never played on a basketball team, but they have been known to shoot baskets in our driveway setup. For some reason this year, both Alpha and Beta decided to join the game. Guests were ahead for a bit in the first half, but ended up losing by about 9 points.

And we always participate in the sandcastle competition. We had no good ideas this year, so we went with spray cheese.

We did not win first place this time.

A new thing this year was they had one day for a food truck to come in for lunch. Chick-fil-A. Gamma and Delta wanted to try it. I agreed, because we were on vacation. But if they want to do it next year they’ll have to pay for it themselves.

But overall, everyone had a good week. There was only a small amount of sunburn.

Our morning speaker for the week was Karl Clausen, mostly known for hosting a show on Moody Radio. He has lived a very interesting life, and thus has a variety of interesting stories to tell.

I can’t remember if it was him or the evening speaker (Dr. Winfred Neely), but there were two quotes from that week that I remember. One is “Don’t just GO to church – you are to BE the church”. The other one is “There is no inherent merit in poverty.”

The End

This is the second of a two-part series. You can also read about the first part of our trip to Canada here.

Day 4:
This was a half travel day. We got up, finished as much of the leftover dumplings as we could for breakfast, packed up, and headed west. I wanted to drive a bit before filling up on gas. Good thing I did, because there was a noticeable price drop once we crossed from Quebec into Ontario.

Nothing too much eventful, just driving along the freeway. Our goal, because we were going to get to Toronto before the rental place said we could check-in, was to go to the St. Lawrence Market and pick up some more fresh food.

However, as we got closer, Some Wife wanted to check something, so she went to their website and discovered that they are closed on Mondays. So over to Plan B, which is ask for an early check-in. They never did respond, so we just parked at the place and walked along the waterfront for a couple blocks. Our place was only a couple blocks from the waterfront, so that killed the 45 minutes or so that we needed.

The place was just what I was hoping for. We were up in a high-rise, the type of place we don’t have around here and thus the kids haven’t really experienced.

So here’s what part of it looked like.

And here’s the view out the window. Yes, it had balconies if you didn’t mind being 400 feet above the ground with a thin railing and sheet of plexiglas to keep you and other things from falling.

And here’s the place itself. We were a couple floors above the bridge thingy.

Our plans were somewhat in flux, but it was nice weather, with not the best forecast for the next couple days, so we decided to go out to the Toronto Islands right after dinner.

Even though I’ve been to Toronto before, I was not familiar with the islands until this trip. They are a nice place, highly recommend.

It was a walk of about 10 blocks to get to the ferry station. A long walk, but we noticed that Toronto has a streetcar system, so I suggested we could ride that on the way back. The ferry runs once an hour, so we had to wait a bit at the station for the next ferry.

We rode over, getting a nice view of the skyline from the water, then made our way to the far side of Centre Island, because that’s where the beach is.

The Toronto Islands are a great place, I wish we had more than 1 hour there. But if we didn’t catch the 9:00 ferry back we’d be stuck on the island until the 10:00 ferry, and we did not want that.

But I did get a chance to go to the shore on the close side of the island, where there is no beach, to get a shot of the Toronto skyline, which is one of the more iconic skylines out there.

As it was, the 9:00 ferry was late. All the families that wanted to get back before dark were waiting in the line, and people seemed to be either worried (are we going to get home today?) or impatient (come on, let’s go already). My favorite was the family that looked to be from India, but not much of an accent so probably 2nd generation. They had young kids, and they passed the time by singing “Oh where is the ferry” to the tune of the hairbrush song. Very catchy.

The ferry finally arrived, and we headed back. The Toronto transit authority website said that you could buy a single-use streetcar pass at any station, and there was a station a block from the ferry landing, so it should have been perfect.

But the streetcar station did not have a kiosk for buying tickets. Only some main stations have them. So it was late, people were tired, and we had to walk the 10 blocks back. But it let us get this nice shot of the CN Tower.

Then it was evening, then morning, the next day.

Day 5:
This was to be our main sightseeing day for Toronto. First up, the hockey hall of fame.

We drove there, and parked in a lot close to that and our lunch destination (the St. Lawrence market that we tried to visit on Monday).

Be warned, they stamp your hand when you enter, so you can leave and come back later that day if you wanted. But the ink they use is some weird non-drying ink. Mine was still wet after 20 minutes. Gamma had fun with his wet ink and gave me another stamp on my forearm once he figured out it could transfer because it was still wet. He also ended up with half a stamp on his cheek. And I had to be very careful with mine because I was wearing light-colored khaki shorts. I did end up getting a little bit on my pocket, but it was mostly inside the pocket so no real harm done.

The HHoF was well done, and had some interesting things even for those not so interested in hockey. Like the masks.

And if you are an older hockey afficianado, you’ll appreciate that a certain hockey puck was enshrined in the hall of fame.

And of course there is the Stanley Cup.

The cup is kept in a building that used to be a bank, and it was a fancy old bank. The outside still looks like a classic bank, and they kept the inside fancy too.

After that we walked a couple blocks over to the market. There was a nice park in between, with some sculptures.

The St. Lawrence market was packed. Lots of meats and breads for purchase, plus a variety of places selling meals. We could barely find a place to sit. These types of markets are great, because of the variety and people can chose different foods. But with younger kids, it’s a mess because there is choice overload, and some do not like making decisions when hungry.

But we eventually all got something to eat, and it was pretty good food. Then we bought some things to take with us, including some souvenirs from the souvenir shop downstairs.

Then back to the van and back to the apartment.

The afternoon consisted of nothing. Just relaxing in the apartment – reading, napping, playing Legend of Zelda, etc.

After dinner, which we made in the sparse kitchen, the weather was good enough that we could go to the CN Tower. So we did.

So we went up into the tower, and the clouds provided some enhancement to the view.

But we probably spent most of our time watching the roof of the Rogers Centre finish opening, and then seeing part of the first inning of the Blue Jays game.

Hint: you can see the players moving, including the pitcher winding up, but you can’t see the ball itself.

After we were done in the tower, I wanted to check out the old railyard right across the road.

It had some stuff, but the kids were done and wanted to get back, so we only spent a couple minutes looking at things. Plus we’ve visited the rail yard in Greenfield Village, so this was not a novel thing to see.

A short walk back to the apartment, then it was evening, then morning the next day.

Day 6:
Our last day, with two main events: 1. visiting the Royal Ontario Museum and 2. Going home

First up, the ROM. We packed up and headed out after breakfast. The ROM is basically a natural history museum – exhibits on birds and animals and plants and people.

We haven’t gone to a museum like this with the kids before, so it was interesting. Now they can appreciate a movie like Night at the Museum a little more.

And they had fancy displays, with things you couldn’t touch.

Then we were done, and ready to leave Toronto.

We loaded up in the van and drove about 40 minutes to a Chinese buffet. If you’re ever in Etobicoke, I recommend the Mandarin restaurant. Make reservations though, otherwise you’ll have to wait for a bit like we did.

They had a large variety of things, and most of it was yummy. Like multiple dessert tables, and several scoop-it-yourself ice cream tubs. And standard Chinese buffet stuff, plus a sushi guy, plus pizza and spaghetti and salads.

Don’t order the lemonade though. It was some carbonated thing, and my kids are not fans of carbonation.

Then 5 hours of driving (with stops) plus 1 hour of waiting in the border crossing line, and we made it back. It’s always fun to hear the border guard say “Welcome home.”

The End.

Our vacation plan this year was to go to Canada, as you may recall from my earlier post about things I learned in Canada. Now here’s a recap of what we did, rather than learned, in Canada.

Day 1:
This was a travel day, basically driving 9-6. I like to travel different ways to and from vacation destinations, so to get from Detroit to Montreal I went south of the Great Lakes. A full day’s drive got us to Syracuse, NY. Not much there, other than dinner and sleeping at the hotel.

For those who like seafood, I suggest visiting the Clam Bar in Syracuse. We went there, and it’s not what I’d call a classy place. It’s a classic bar, with a full menu. Some Wife chose it because they bring in fresh seafood daily. The food was good, and plentiful.

Oh, on the way to Syracuse we had to go through Cleveland. We ended up there around lunch time, so we stopped at a park to have a picnic. Some Wife also chose this stop, called Squire’s Castle.

It’s just for show. It used to be someone’s residence, but now it’s an empty shell. Still, it’s fun because it’s open for people to wander through. And the grounds are expansive, plenty of place to picnic and throw a Frisbee.

So lunch in Cleveland, then dinner and hotel in Syracuse. We didn’t get to see much of Syracuse. Gamma was hoping to see the downtown skyline, but we were actually in Liverpool – outside Syracuse – and our drive never involved going into Syracuse.

Then it was evening, then morning, the next day.

Day 2:
This was mostly a travel day. Breakfast at the hotel, then drive to Canada. We went over at the Thousand Islands crossing, and it was a fairly simple affair. We had passports for me and the wife, drivers licenses for Alpha and Beta, and birth certificates for Gamma and Delta. Just a couple questions from the Canadian border guard, and we were in.

Here’s a photo of the river at the Thousand Islands area, just before the border crossing.

We drove for a bit, then stopped by a Real Canadian Superstore, which was right next to a Walmart. In case the border guard was having a bad day, I didn’t want him to be able to nitpick on any food we had with us, so our plan was to go into Canada with a minimal amount of food, then stock up for the week before we arrived at the rental house. We did have peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, plus chips and some grapes – that was our lunch we ate in the car just after the border.

Anyway, we got to the RCS and we had fun looking at various Canadian products, all sorts of brands we don’t get at home. Plus some we do have at home, they just look different.

This is also where we got the bag of milk. And when we got to the checkout line, with enough food to feed a family of 6 for four days, we realized that they do not provide bags for you at all. So we paid $1 for 3 re-usable bags to stuff most of the things in. They’re cheaply made, but we still have them and I’m trying to get my money’s worth out of them.

Another drive, for maybe 1.5 hours, and we got to the province of Quebec. It was easy to tell when that happened, because the road signs were French only, instead of English and French. But we had been observing the bilingual road signs for long enough at that point that we could handle no English.

Then another hour or so and we arrived at our rental house. Here is the street it was on, a nice neighborhood. This is looking out from the place.

We unpacked, setup the kitchen, relaxed for a little bit, then made dinner, and then headed out to our first tourist stop in Montreal – Mount Royal.

Mount Royal is a tall hill kind of in the middle of the island of Montreal. Fun fact – Montreal got its name from a pronunciation of “Mount Royal”.

Our destination was Mount Royal Park, specifically the chalet, as it has a plaza that overlooks the city.

And then, because we didn’t have any other plans for the evening and because I paid to park for 1.5 hours and we spent only 20 minutes so far, we went on a little hike. There are plenty of paths throughout the park, and there were plenty of other people walking, running (ambitious, since there’s a lot of elevation change there), and biking.

The hike was a good change from sitting in the van all day. After that, we went back to the rental house and I read a bit before bed.

Then it was evening, then morning, the next day.

Day 3:
This was the day to walk around downtown Montreal. We drove into the city, and the parking garage I had picked out was closed, so we had to go to plan B, which was to park at King Edward Quay.

The plan was to walk through the piers, then walk by the Notre Dame Basilica, then grab lunch at the Underground City. Then figure out what we wanted to do after that, maybe something downtown would be of interest once we came across it.

So we parked at the quay. Here’s the view from there looking north to the Vieux Port.

It was pretty hazy, due to the wildfires in our host country.

And if we looked east, we could see the biosphere, which we didn’t know what it was at the time, just that it was an impressively large object.

Downtown was a nice place to walk, it reminded me more of Europe than of North America.

Once you saw the Ferris wheel and the zip lines, there actually wasn’t much to the pier. There were plenty of people out and about, but maybe they were mostly shopping?

Then we headed up a couple blocks to the cathedral.

As it was a Sunday, and it’s a functioning church (services in French), we didn’t go in to see what it looked like.

Then it was over to the Underground City, and that is where things started to go bad. You see, I had seen the promotional literature and pictured it as a nice big place, like a giant mall. Here’s an excerpt from mtl.org:

Explore Montréal’s famed Underground City as you shop: this pedestrian network right under the heart of the city links metro stations to shopping plazas for over 33 kilometres (about 20.5 miles). It’s a lifesaver when you want to stroll, shop and eat away from the hot blazing sun or the freezing snow, but it’s also a go-to destination for the whole family anytime. It opens up a world of entertainment.

In reality, you just go to the places that are worth it aboveground. The “underground city” is really just a subway system but without the trains – you walk through tunnels, and the maps are confusing. We wandered around for a while, got lost, and thus our lunchtime got pushed back and back, making people unhappy. We gave up and walked on the normal not-underground sidewalks to the Eaton Centre and had lunch at the Time Out Market. That was a good place – it’s a giant food court with a dozen or so restaurants of all different styles.

Lunch really helped. Now everyone could manage the walk back to the van. We swung by a couple stores on our way out, including a Dollarama, but that was it for Montreal. No one wanted to do anything else, so we headed back mid afternoon and had some down time until dinner.

Then it came time for dinner. There were no solid dinner plans. The house was walking distance from some shops and restaurants, so we picked a restaurant that looked to have a decent variety of things (plus poutine) and we headed there. Foreshadowing – it was called a pub & grill. On our way there, we passed a Chinese place. Alpha decided he’d rather have dumplings than pub food, so he and Some Wife (because she had money) dropped off to eat there. I took the other 3 kids to the pub and grill, and as you may have already read, we got kicked out, so we headed back to the Chinese place and we all got dumplings. Except for Delta, who got basically chicken tenders.

Then we walked back to the house, and it was evening, then morning the next day.

To Be Continued…

We just got back from a family vacation to Canada, visiting Montreal and Toronto. Due to our family size, we stayed in rental places for a couple days each. In our vacations, we usually end up doing that because most hotels don’t like to accommodate a family of 6. And in general we use both VRBO and Airbnb. Just watch out for the cleaning/service/security fees.

Anyway, here are some things I noticed or learned in visiting our neighbors to the north. If we had visited Windsor, that would have been our neighbors to the south.

• Canadians drive just under the punishment, not the speed limit. Like most places, the freeways there have a posted speed limit, usually 100 kph. But they also have other signs, more like billboards, that list the punishment for speeding: 120 kph is $X, 130 kph is $Y, and 140 kph is $Z. And another one that said 20 over is 2 points, 30 over is 3 points, etc. It seemed to me that the punishment for speeding didn’t start until 120 kph, even though the limit was officially 100. Because everyone was driving about 118 kph.
• Toronto has the worst traffic of anywhere that I remember driving If you though Canadians were nice and friendly, try driving in Toronto. Chicago has bad traffic, but it’s bad in that it’s just clogged and slow. New York has aggressive drivers, but Toronto seemed ruder and more of a get-ahead-at-all-costs attitude.
• Canadians don’t like locking their bathroom doors. In the places we stayed, there were a total of 5 bathroom doors. Only one of them had a lock.
• The toilets were very low. I’m sure families with small children would appreciate that, but we’re out of that stage now and would like adult-size toilets. Everything else about them seemed normal, I don’t know if that’s the style in Canada.
• Not since our trip to Seattle have I been exposed to so much marijuana. Oh, and the college football game I attended two years ago. The public square in Montreal would have been nice to linger in, but I was worried about second-hand effects. We were in Canada during some of the time when the air quality alerts were active due to the wildfires up north. But the wildfire smoke was negligible compared to the weed. Toronto was even worse, as there was a cannabis store just about every block whenever we walked anywhere.
• In Canada, milk comes in bags. We went grocery shopping the first day. Normally we pack a bunch of food and then buy some more, but to avoid any complications crossing the border, we brought as little food with us as possible, so we had to buy a bunch in Canada. We bought a bag of milk, and it was always very awkward trying to store and pour a floppy bag. I still don’t know how you’re supposed to do it.
• If a place says “bar and grill” or “pub and grill” then don’t take the kids. All the places in the USA that say “bar and grill” means there’s a resturant with a bar area. Anyone can go in the restaurant area but only adults in the bar area. Canada must have different rules, because they did not let us in. We chose it because it was the only place where we were staying that had poutine on the menu. So we went without on this trip.
• Stores don’t give you plastic bags at checkout. At both the grocery store and the dollar store, we had to buy the reusable bags to be able to carry our stuff. On the plus side, we have some cheap bags at home we can use for whatever now. One says “Dollarama” on it and the rest say “Real Canadian Superstore”.

This is the last of a series. You can also read about the first part of our trip to Colorado here.

Day 6:

We had 1 main event planned for this day, which was a late-ish start, so we had a slow morning. By this day though, we had adjusted to local time so it wasn’t a problem to not be early.

USAFA : US Air Force Academy

Well, first of all we noticed the construction happening just outside the entrance gate. A new hotel is coming soon. Then on through the gate and we went to the airfield overlook.

The airfield was a long ways from the gate. The academy is a big place. But anyway, we got there at a good time – the weather was good and the skies were clear so the cadets were doing all the activities they could. We got to see gliders being towed up, being released, and landing. We also got to see parachute practice – planes taking off, planes landing, and people jumping out, and people landing (some rougher than others).

Then we drove to the grounds overlook. The large white box is the chapel, closed until further notice for renovation.

The grounds are surprisingly open. We helped ourselves to the NCAA Div I athletic facilities (i.e. we walked on the track).

Then we wandered through the visitor center and gift shop. One of the things they’re constructing at the entrance (besides the hotel) is a new visitor center. So if you want to see the old visitor center before they retire it, go soon.

After that, we made our way to the planetarium.

We were there at a time when they were showing a movie rather than an astronomy show, but we did get to see a bit of astronomy stuff before the movie.

Then it was lunchtime. We drove back into downtown Colorado Springs, and our plan was to go to the fancy food court. We parked in the parking garage, walked a block or two to the storefront, and found it was closed because they close on Mondays.

So now we had a hungry family and no plan. After consulting our phones, we decided on an Asian place. After walking a block or two to there, we found it was basically carry-out only, and we wanted a place to sit and eat.

The grumbling increased.

We then decided on a Mexican place a couple blocks away. We walked there, and since it was a sit-down place and they could take us, we didn’t check anything else, such as menu or prices.

Don’t worry, that’s not foreshadowing – the menu had all the typical Mexican restaurant offerings, plus slightly more. And the prices were inline with other downtown places.

The food took a little while to get there, but of course that didn’t matter since they kept bringing us chips and salsa and drink refills.

Once the food did arrive, I would say it was worth the wait. Everyone thought the food was good, and not just good but much better than a typical Mexican restaurant. Like fresh ingredients and stuff. Some Wife is the type of person who is not impressed with restaurants because she can cook better for cheaper, so to have her comment on how good the place was meant something. And Delta told the waitress it was 11 stars out of 5. So, rave reviews of Jose Muldoon’s all around.

Then back to the house for a rest and to digest all the chips and salsa. We decided on one last activity in the evening – a hike at a GoG trail we hadn’t done yet.

GoG2 : Garden of the Gods again

We found a trail that was not too long and not too short. It also happened to be a horse trail, as you can see by the variety of shoeprints and hoofprints on the trail.

The views from the trail weren’t too different from other parts of the park, but it was still scenic.

The difference this time was that we were there later in the evening instead of the morning, so the light was different, and there was rain in places that we could see in the distance.

And there was more wildlife on this trail than we had seen earlier. That was probably a function of the different time and also fewer people on the trail.

We got back to our house to pack for leaving the next day, and that was it.

Then it was evening, then morning the next day.

Day 7:

We really had one main thing planned for this day – get home to Michigan. But we had some extra time to kill so we filled in with an extra activity.

DR : Dinosaur Ridge

We had breadkfast, cleaned the house, packed the van, made sure nobody left anything in any room, then we left. Checkout was 11 but we were out of there shortly after 10.

Because I don’t like the uncertainty of traffic, we had decided to find an activity in Denver rather than Colorado Springs. There is a lot to do in Denver, but I wanted to find something we couldn’t do at home (zoo, museum) or didn’t already do in Colorado Springs (mountains, hiking).

That left dinosaur tracks. Denver has Dinosaur Ridge, which is a place with fossilized dinosaur prints. There’s a business that’s setup to run tour buses to take you up and down the I think 2 mile trail, for a fee. Or you can park and walk for free, so that’s what we did.

It was very hot, and very dry, and very windy. The complaints started pretty quickly, as it is a bit of a walk to the first artifacts. If you’re going to walk it, be ready for a half mile of walking uphill.

One of the things that bothered me, was this sign.

How can the rocks fall on you from the left, when the cliff is on the right?

They had a display of ripples on the sea floor that were petrified. Or fossilized. Not sure the right term.

And then lots of dinosaur tracks. They seem to have enhanced them by coloring them darker than the surrounding rocks.

It was somewhat interesting, especially because it was free and was nearby. Not exactly on the way, but something memorable so it was worth the short stop.

Lunch : Lunch

We had packed lunches to eat on the way. Since we still had a bit of time, we thought a good plan was to stop at a park in Denver and sit and eat there, rather than in the rental van.

We also thought it was a good idea to drive for a little bit, get closer to the airport and also keep our stomachs full later since dinner wasn’t going to be until after we landed in Detroit.

The only problem was that there aren’t that many parks near the airport. So we picked one in the middle of Denver on the way to the airport.

Probably not the best choice.

We had to drive about 3 blocks off the freeway to the park, and the houses and the church we passed had bars on the windows. We pulled into the parking lot and there were two minivans, looking very much like they were occupied by homeless guys. Plus there was a shabby-looking guy sleeping on the ground not too far (i.e. about 20 feet) from where we parked.

So we drove back a block to where there was a community pool and some picnic tables. We sat and ate, and it was fine. On our way back to the freeway, since it was just a few exits from the airport, I also filled up the minivan.

DEN : Denver Airport

Then back on the freeway and to the airport. I took the exit (off I-70, to avoid tolls) for the Denver airport, and we drove for miles and miles before checking the map and concluding that yes, we were on the right road. If you haven’t been to the Denver airport, it is way out of the way. We finally made it to the rental return and the gas gauge still said Full. Then we hopped on the shuttle bus for a ride of a couple more miles to get to the terminal. Then we were met with this sight:

The lines to get through security were the longest lines in an airport that I ever remember seeing. In the whole lobby, the line snaked back and forth, all the way back to the entrance doors. It took a while, but we made it through eventually (and without incident, unlike on the way out when the X-ray machine found the can of bug spray that was accidentally left in a bag and thus was confiscated).

We found our gate, and sat down to wait out the next 2 hours. I had a book to read, so no problem. But first, I had to get the seats assigned. Because we had the cheap seats, we just had boarding passes and needed the gate agent to give us our seat assignments.

It was 2 hours until the flight, a little early but that’s not usually a problem. I went up to the agent and she said she was working the arrival flight and I needed to wait for the next agent.

The flight from Detroit arrived, which was good because that’s the plane they clean and refuel and send back to Detroit. The other agent also appeared, so I checked with him and he printed off some tickets with seats assigned for me.

It was odd, each time I had to get seats printed off, the procedure was more relaxed than I expected, because they never asked for boarding passes or ID or anything, just verify my name.
Me: “Hi, I’m here to get seats assigned.”
Gate Agent: “Oh, are you Some Guy?”
Me: “Yes I am.”

It seemed to me that I could have easily passed for anyone else. But chances are the only other people who don’t have assigned seats at that point are in the cheap seats like we were, so it’s not like I’d get any sort of an upgrade. Plus no one else is flying with 6 people, so we’d still have to check in as ourselves to get enough tickets.

At this point I had new boarding passes, and I made sure everyone had everything ready to go, since boarding would start soon.

Half an hour before flight time, and people were lining up. We didn’t get too excited, since we board last. But the odd thing was that the gate person never announced that boarding was starting.

Finally, as people were milling about in front of the gate, the gate agent got on the loudspeaker and announced “We are sorry, but the 3:00 flight to Detroit is cancelled.” It was interesting seeing everyone (including myself) go through the five stages of grief in the span of a few minutes.

Denial? Definitely – no way can they cancel the flight 30 minutes before takeoff. The announcement itself was hard to hear, because it’s an airport loudspeaker. So the information was being spread by word of mouth, and as soon as someone heard it, they immediately looked up the flight info on their phone just to make sure it really was true.
Anger? – Don’t they know we have to get home?
Bargaining? – Look, that other flight is going to Grand Rapids and they’re boarding now. Oh, it’s another airline. Can I get somewhere else? Can I rent a car instead?
Depression? – well, I guess we’re stuck here.
Acceptance? – They rebooked us for 8pm. Everyone make yourself comfortable for a few hours.

So this was our second vacation home of the trip:

We got food vouchers from the airline, since they stranded us. Others who got rebooked for the next day also got hotel vouchers. Note: the vouchers are single-use only, so if you don’t spend at least $15 then you’re leaving free money on the table. So Beta came back from his choice of restaurant with an extra bottled water, just to full up his voucher.

Here’s what I got: a sandwich and a shake from Quiznos. It was about $16.50, so I had to throw in a little bit of my money.

Everybody ate, the food wasn’t too bad, and we eventually made it on the 8pm flight. To Salt Lake City, where we had a layover before getting on an after-midnight flight to Detroit.

Then it was evening, then morning the next day, all while we were flying.

So that travel day started at 10am Colorado time and we got back to our home about 7am Michigan time. That’s a long time with about 30 minutes of uncomfortable sleep total. But we made it home.

The End.

This is the fifth of a series. You can also read about the first part of our trip to Colorado here.

Day 5:

We had 2 main events planned for this day, which started early again. First, Pike’s Peak, which bills itself as “America’s Mountain”.

PP : Pike’s Peak

Pike’s Peak wasn’t too far from the house, I think about 20-25 minutes to get there. We got to the base of the mountain (the entrance gate) about 9:00. Then it was a slowish drive up the mountain. The whole road is 19 miles, but because of limited parking at the top, they make you but a parking pass for the top and it’s for a specific time. We went with the alternative, which is drive 16 of the 19 miles, park at a larger lot, and take the shuttle bus the rest of the way for free. Well, free other tha hte gate admission we paid at the bottom.

The drive up didn’t really need a speed limit, because anyone with a minimum amount of self-preservation would take these curves carefully anyway.

Because of the switchbacks, half the time we were on the inside of the curve (nice) and half the time we were on the outside of the curve (tense). Oddly enough the tense feeling of feeling too close to the edge was there on the way up but not so much on the way down. Either I was more used to driving on the mountainside, or maybe the effort of thinking about braking distracted from the thought of going over the edge.

The lower part of the mountain wasn’t so drastic; there weren’t such cliffs close to the road. But the upper part, which was a few miles long, was nerve-wracking.

I didn’t get a picture of the shuttle buses, but they were school buses, and the drivers were school-bus drivers who took this gig for the summer. I thought it was bad driving a minivan up the mountain, but at least it wasn’t a school bus.

Oh, if you didn’t want to take the shuttle bus, you did have the option of hiking or biking those last 3 miles. One thing that amused me was the sight when we got to the top – a small tour bus that people were just getting out of and they were wearing biking gear. Apparently you can hire a ride up to the top of Pike’s Peak so that you can bike down.

With my driving, then our getting on the shuttle bus and riding the last 3 miles, the total time from entrance gate to walking into the visitor center was 1 hour.

We took a quick tour of the visitor center, then walked around outside. They have a sidewalk that circles the parking lot and lets you see from all sides of the summit. This is what the ground looks like at the top:

The first area outside the visitor center is a popular place for people to go scrambling over the rocks.

If you look closely at the above picture, you can see some people out there, in the center/right section. That’s what I’m calling the closer ridge. Now here’s a picture that I zoomed in on the farther ridge, and I circled where Beta ended up.

And here is a view from a slightly different angle. Lots of good views from the top of Pike’s Peak.

Then we got to the official summit marker, and I couldn’t tell why they chose this particular rock out of all the others lying around to be the summit.

After all, I could have taken any of the other rocks and stacked it nearby and made a slightly higher summit. There must be some reason, but I couldn’t find it. The summit is well marked though, and a popular place for photos, like the “Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas Nevada” sign.

We finished up by stopping at the gift shop and the restaurant. The main attraction there is the donuts, which were tasty. They are supposed to be a special recipe adapted for the high altitude, and rumor has it they will deflate at lower altitudes. So Delta bought an extra donut to take down the mountain and see if that really happens. Here is the before picture, taken right as we got in the van after being taken back in the shuttle bus.

Then begain the drive down, which as I said was not as white-knuckled as the drive up. There was still plenty of opportunities to get into trouble though, like taking this turn too fast.

We were planning on staying out all day and eating the lunch we packed. As we were driving, we were discussing when and where to eat.

Then we came to the brake-check station about halfway down. We failed the test, so we had to pull over and wait 30 minutes, so we took that time to eat our lunch. Everyone has to stop at this shack, due to the stop sign. There a park ranger has a non-contact thermometer that she pointed at the front brake rotor. The threshold is 300 degrees F, and we were just above 400.

There’s a large parking lot, and some picnic tables, and a gift shop area, so it was a nice place to have our lunch. From where we were sitting, we had a good view of the brake temperature check stop. It seemed that vehicles with more than 2 people usually failed, and vehicles with 1 or two people usually passed. Driving down Pike’s Peak is the perfect opportunity for a hybrid or electric vehicle with regenerative braking.

Also, it seems to be on the honor system. As I was watching other people being stopped, I noticed the ranger would tell someone that they failed, then she went on to the next car. There was no one ensuring that we stayed in the parking lot for the 30 minutes. And when we left we didn’t have to go back through the temperature check.

But I had no reason to put anyone in danger, so we followed the instructions. After a few miles, we came to the Crystal Reservoir. It was being remodeled or something, so they had drained it and it was not as scenic as it should have been.

Then we got to the end and left Pike’s Peak. We had aleady eaten our lunch, so our next stop was Manitou Springs, as it was on the way home.

MS : Manitou Springs

Manitou Springs is a tourist town, built upon the several mineral springs that occur naturally there. The springs were natural, but they have had fountain-type things built around them so they don’t seem it.

Our plan was to stop at the town visitor center and get our free cups, then drive to the middle of town and walk to the various springs. The visitor center went fine, but then finding a parking space in town was very difficult.

Manitou Springs likes their parking revenue, and they have a lot of spots, but they were all full. The first lot we tried was full, the street parking around that was full, and I finally found a spot the next block over.

We walked to the first spring, which was just outside a gazebo. It didn’t have much of a taste, just plain water.

Then we walked to the next spring, and it tasted nasty. As we walked from spring to spring (all the rest tasted nasty too), we passed by a lot of downtown shops. Like a good tourist town, there were multiple T-shirt shops, ice cream shops, souvenirs shops, art gallery, restaurants, etc.

It was hot, so we skipped the last two springs because they were farther away, and we headed back to the car, stopping to get ice cream along the way. Some Wife wanted a slushie thing instead of ice cream, so she went to the slushie shop next door, but they were out of ice.

We got back to our house in time to make dinner, and that was it for the day.

And if you’re wondering if the Pike’s Peak donuts deflate when taken to a lower altitude, I’m still wondering that myself. Delta ate that experiment before we got there.

Then it was evening, then morning the next day.

To Be Continued…