BAYFIELD ONTARIO TO AUBURN INDIANA: SNOWY START BUT THE DAY GOT BETTER

A DUSTING OF SNOW ON THE GROUND THIS MORNING
Checking our live Exeter internet weather feed late Friday night I saw a large amount of rain overtop our area and sticking my head out the door I could see that it was indeed raining.  ‘Not good for our morning departure’ I thought, figuring all that rain is going to freeze by morning and ice everything up.  About 7 hours later I ventured a peek out and saw the rain had turned to snow and the ground was all white again.  Venturing outside it didn’t seem quite as cold or as bad as it looked.  With only a light snow falling and no wind to blow it sideways our travel plans were a go:))

‘ALL ABOARD’
It was probably our latest morning start  ever for the southwest but we at last had the big wheels rolling at exactly 8:38 A.M.  As expected we were soon on wet salty roads with a bit of slush along the edges.  The roads remained wet all the way to the Sarina/Port Huron border.

AND WE’RE OFF
Expecting a big line up at the Canada/U.S. border I was pleasantly surprised to see one of the shortest line ups of ever with only 5 cars ahead of us.  Within five minutes we were across the border without any problems and on our way.  But we did notice heavily congested traffic on the other side coming into Canada backed way up. 

CROSSING OVER THE BLUEWATER BRIDGE BETWEEN CANADA AND THE U.S. AT SARNIA AND PORT HURON

A VERY SMOOTH BORDER CROSSING
Up until we reached the border I found myself in a very apprehensive mood about our whole southwest trip but once across the border and with each mile fading fast behind us I quickly came out of that mood and settled down to the task at hand with re-focused thoughts looking optimistically forward.

About 20 miles out of Port Huron on I-69 roads dried up and there was no sign of snow anywhere.  In fact, with the overhead cloud cover it turned into a perfect driving day.  No sun glare, no wind, rain, or snow.  Traffic was extremely light with very few trucks.  Hardly any traffic at all going through Flint and Lansing.  Where was everybody??

Decided to call it an early day and looking back in the blog to our first day on the road last year on December 22nd I see we pulled into the same Cracker Barrel, in the same town of Auburn, at about the same time of day.  Only difference this year is that we are in the Cracker Barrel lot for the night and last year we decided to stay in a Home Depot lot within walking distance of Cracker  Barrel.  No snow anywhere but it sure feels cold.

I DON’T NORMALLY CARE FOR GIFT SHOPS AT ALL BUT I’VE ALWAYS LIKED CRACKER BARREL’S COZY LAY-OUT

NOW THIS IS HOW I LIKE MY RESTAURANTS, THE FEWER PEOPLE THERE ARE THE LESS NOISE THERE IS
First thing I had to do after we stopped for the day was grab the Windex and crawl up our rear ladder to clean off our rear view camera.  It was so coated with road grime, sand and salt I couldn’t see the Jeep on the dash screen.

We do love our Crackle Barrels and it’s very rare for us to ever complain about anything but this Cracker Barrel was just not up to par and I will leave it at that.

GREAT OVERNIGHTER SPOT FOR PHEEBS WITH LOTS OF ROOM AND LOTS OF GRASS TO RACE AROUND ON
GROANER’S CORNER:(( An 85 year old widow went on a blind date with a 90 year old man.  When she returned to her daughter’s house later that night she seemed upset.  “What happened, Mother?” the daughter asked.  “I had to slap his face three times!!”  “You mean he got fresh?”  “No”, she answered.  “I thought he was dead”.
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