Arizona 2024: Day 39-40: Home: De-winterizing

Day 39 started with a nice walk to Canatara Park, in Sarnia. It’s a nice 5km round trip from Camp Mom. The weather was perfect and lake Huron was perfectly calm.

Rest of the day was spent with family doing stuff. Did go to the “B” chip truck option with my sister and mother. I found the “B” option to be perfectly good. We abandoned the “A” option, Alberts Rolling Lunch (which no longer rolls) as the line was too long. Too long at 1235 on a Wednesday. For those not familiar with Sarnia (a nice place to visit), chips under the bridge is a long standing tradition. As a child, we would wait up to an hour in line for our $0.25 cup of chips. The scenery was wonderful under the blue water bridge where Lake Huron drains into The St Clair river.

The forecast for Thursday (travel day home) was for heavy rain so I drafted our camp host (aka Mom) to help me drain the van’s tanks (Mrs Milddogs was visiting Mrs Dendog). Mom revised her Captain Morgan pose and performed her role perfectly. No spillage!

Thursday morning I abandoned my walk as the rain was heavy and the concept of having wet stinky clothes in the van for the 700km drive home was even less appealing than having stinky clothing in the van for the 700km drive home.

We hit the road at 0912 and picked up offspring #2 at our nieces place. We had a break in the rain and were able to load the cargo without soaking everything.

Oh, one last thing. I have de-winterized myself.

Off we went to the 402 and then the 401. I must say, after >10000km, the trip on the 401 is the worst. Our drivers are shit in Ontario. They fail to understand the purpose of the passing lane and insist on darting into any gap slightly greater than 1 car length. I have often thought about a practical experiment where you enter the Toronto area, with adaptive cruise control set for the minimum distance setting. Then, try and stick in the center lane. I suspect that you will quickly come to a standstill as people move into your forward gap, thus forcing your car to slow. Continue this and you might end up going backwards. If you try this, let me know how it goes.

We arrived home around 1630 and started the great van unload. Fortunately it was not raining at home.

Supper, what to do about supper. No taco trucks, no Sonoran hotdogs. JJ’s Shawarma to the rescue. I love a good shawarma! Now let’s think back, I had not yet done my daily walk and at 1408 consecutive days, I was not about to miss it. Right after consuming dinner I headed out on my walk to beat the rain. Advice: Walk should not follow shawarma. Fortunately dinner stayed where it was supposed to, my walking pace was great, without any extra urgency.

Our neighbourhood is getting fiberoptic lines installed. It’s a bit of a mess here with stubby orange tubes poking up all over the place. But, soon(ish) we will have internet speeds greater that 25 Mbps available.

Totals for the trip:

Item	Value
Total Distance	10375.4km
Total Time Driving (hh:mm)	117:24
Average Fuel Economy (l/100km – mpg)	14.41 -16.32
Average Moving Speed	88 kmph
Extrapolated Litres of Fuel Used	1495.1

So what’s next?

The battery on Steve Harvey (our Honda CRV) is dead. Have to charge that up and determine if we need to replace it. Still plenty of clean up to do. Clean the van inside and out. Start to get the house ready for spring. Perhaps start opening the cottage. Basically, we are free of constraints. Let’s not forget I have 15 Munch peanut bars to consume. We shall figure it out.

Next trip? Perhaps the east coast of Canada late summer, early fall. Various short trips through the summer.

What’s next for the blog? I shall do a summary in the next while about favourites and must do items. Things that worked, things that didn’t. So, check back every now and then if those things interest you.

To all of the wonderful people that said “let’s get together when you are back”, well, we’re back.

Oh, I de-winterized. That was mission #2 right after unpacking.