Our View From The Road

Heading West to go East?

Welcome to the first in a series of posts in which we will share with you a trip to the Canadian Maritime provinces. We’re traveling in our 2022 PleasureWay OnTour 2.2 camper-van again and plan on staying at a variety of campgrounds along the way. It’s late May 2023 and our plan is to complete this trip over the next four weeks arriving home ahead of Canada Day (July 1st). We hope you enjoy reading about our travels and will check back often as we add to Our View From The Road.

It’s Friday. It’s early. It’s day one of a new adventure. We’re excited. We’re off…. But wait, why are we heading West? I thought this was a series of posts about going to the East coast? Remember I said, it’s late May? That can only mean that it’s time again to head to Indianapolis for the 107th running of the Indianapolis 500 !!!!! That’s right, we’re heading back for a 2nd year.

7:00am and I’m out for my 5km walk, a beautiful morning. 8:40am and we’re out of the laneway. Towards Prescott and Hwy-401. Our first stop was the Mallorytown OnRoute service center for fuel and breakfast. Not a huge Tim’s fan but it does fine for this morning. The driving is good for a Friday, the usual compliment of trucks setting the pace whilst impatient drivers try to carve around them.

Toronto comes and goes. Early Friday afternoon traffic slows us a little but soon we’re cruising past the airport and on our way out of town.

Our next stop is the Cambridge OnRoute this time only for gas. $1.709 / litre for regular, ouch. We’re getting hungry but decide to push on.

Woodstock OnRoute and we stop to take a break in the picnic area. This is a wonderfully quiet, shady spot to take a break and enjoy a sandwich in our van. Not much further today so we finish up and get back on the road.

Past London, West Lorne and finally we pull off of the highway at Blenheim. Our stop for tonight is the Red Barn Brewing Company. As a Harvest Hosts location, we stay for the cost of trying some of their goods. They are fairly new based upon the nice barn structure in which they are situated. They have a nice outdoor patio and some activities to enjoy such as the game of cornhole. The beer selection is quite good and we buy a few to enjoy whilst traveling about.

Tomorrow we cross into the US of A. Sleep well everyone.

Sorry but there are no pictures from today, we were just to focused on our destination and forgot to pickup the camera.

Recap and Statistics

It’s been a week or so since we arrived home after our 47 day US Southwest tour and I thought I’d share some specifics about the trip.

The first question tends to be about where we stayed each night. Did we find suitable camping locations? So, here are the stats for that.

15 nights free camping (Cracker Barrel, Walmart, Harvest Hosts, BLM land & family laneways).
12 nights at private campgrounds (serviced).
19 nights at US state parks (serviced).

As you can see we mixed it up a bit and tried a variety of places. Favorites?

Harvest Host: Bar Z winery, Canyon, TX. Great wine & canyon views from their patio.
BLM camping: Angel Peak picnic area, Bloomfield, NM. Great views.
Private campground: Lazy Days RV Resort (KOA), Tucson, AZ. Free citrus fruit for the picking along with swimming pools and other resort activities.
State Park: Picacho State Park, Picacho, AZ. Great hiking and views from everywhere in the park. Wonderful wildflowers and cactus.

The next question is about where exactly did we go? Here’s a map that shows you our route.

Lastly, given the price of fuel, how much fuel did we use and what did it cost. Here is a table for you to review.

So there you have it, a few statistics about the trip. Hoping you find them interesting.

Day 47: The road home

Days 45 & 46 were spent visiting family & there was no specific post for those days.

This is it, the last day of this trip. We are up early and it’s cool. We enjoy breakfast and say our goodbyes (for now) and hit the road. Our first stop is just a few blocks away at a public dump station where we empty our tanks for the last time.

We drive cross-country towards Cambridge, ON where we join Hwy 401E towards Toronto. The traffic is steady but being a Sunday there are few trucks on the road. This allows traffic to flow easily and before we know it we’re in Toronto passing the airport.

Traffic comes to a short halt a couple of times as we cross the city but nothing that causes any real delays. We stop at the highway service center near Port Hope, ON where we grab a sandwich and coffee before filling up with fuel. Argh! Canadian fuel prices are harsh.

The drive towards Eastern Ontario goes smoothly and we arrive at home by mid-afternoon. The tree damage from the recent ice storm looks severe and will take some time to clean up, but that’s for another day.

This trip has been amazing, we’re both tired and looking forward to resuming our home lives but for now, we sit and reflect on the sights and experiences we’ve shared in recent weeks.

As mentioned in my last post, I hope to post a summary of our trip in the upcoming days so watch for it. Thanks again for coming along for the ride & we hope you join us again on our future trips.

Day 44: It’s nice to be back, Eh!

So this is it, our last day of this trip in the USA and it starts with another beautiful morning. We enjoy a quick breakfast and pack up the van for the drive.

We head out and immediately have a small issue, our phones (used for GPS mapping functions while on the road) are not connecting to a network. Luckily as this is the last US leg and we’re somewhat familiar with where we are going we can push on. We figure out over the next few hours that it’s only an issue with AT&T, if we change our phones to use Verizon they work fine.

We head towards Fort Wayne, IN and have to decide which route to take. Detroit or Lansing. I’d prefer to avoid Detroit because of traffic and construction, but Lansing will add about an hour to our drive time. We’re tired of driving and so Detroit it is. At Fort Wayne we head NE towards Toledo, OH and hope that we don’t get caught up in any major delays.

We’ve already noticed the lack of leaves on the trees when compared to our drive of yesterday. Spring is only just beginning in the Northern states.

Toledo, OH is under construction, or at least the I-75N is. It gets better as we cross into Michigan, but then in Detroit it feels as if they’ve decided to completely redo the entire highway system. We muddle on and emerge the other side of the city unscathed. Yay!

A quick lunch stop at McD’s and then a stop at one last US gas station. It seems like just a few minutes later and we’re paying the bridge toll (Debit/Credit only, cash no longer accepted). Over the Bluewater bridge and into Ontario.

Canada Border Protection Services happily allow us to re-enter Canada with a minimal delay (less than 5min total from bridge to Hwy 402). Yay, we’re home, Eh!

Our last hour for the day takes us along the shore of Lake Huron to Grand Bend where we stop at Tim Horton’s for a coffee (Mmm, Timmies) before heading to Exeter, ON where we are spending a couple of days with Barb’s parents.

This marks the end of daily posts for this, our 2023 Southwestern US tour. I will put up a post in the upcoming days about our drive across Ontario towards home as well as one or two posts summarizing the trip in the next week or so. Whether you’ve followed us regularly or just found our blog, thanks for reading. I hope that you’ve enjoyed our view from the road.

BTW, we are planning a tour of the Maritime provinces in just a few weeks, so watch out for another series of posts starting soon. Cheers.

Day 43: Northward bound

A nice quiet night at the Walmart parking lot in Russellville, KY. We’re up early with the sun again and soon all set to get back on the road.

A short drive to Bowling Green, KY where we stop at the Crumbl cookie store. We’ve been hearing good things about their cookies so thought we’d give them a try.

We joined the I-65N and headed toward Louisville, KY. Lots of trucks again and the terrain means I’m passing them uphill & then they’re passing me downhill. A couple of hours in and we cross the Ohio River into Indiana.

From here the road is flatter and the driving easier. We stop for a quick break and bite to eat at a rest stop and then head onwards toward Indianapolis, IN. We take the I-465 around the city and veer off on the I-69N towards our stop for today in Anderson, IN at Mounds State Park.

The park is tranquil and fairly quiet with most sites being empty. We back in, have something to eat (Chick-fil-a chicken) and then both enjoy a late afternoon nap.

Tomorrow we plan on completing our Northward trek back to Canada and should be crossing the border back into Ontario in the afternoon. check back again to see how we get along!

Day 42: Russellville

We awake in Russellville. Tonight we sleep in Russellville. Huh? What gives?

This morning we started in Russellville, AR. Tonight we are about 450miles further towards home and are staying in Russellville, KY. It wasn’t planned this way however.

The day started fairly normally and after breakfast we rejoined I-40E towards Memphis, TN.

Once past Memphis we head towards Nashville, TN stopping to do a little shopping in Jackson, TN and have lunch. Rejoining the I-40E the traffic increases as we get closer to Nashville. I then notice that the Waze GPS app is re-routing us because of traffic issues in Nashville. It does this a few times and then Barb notices that on Google maps in the city of Nashville traffic is a mess! Time to divert.

Barb determines a route cross-country toward our intended destination, Bowling Green, KY. I take the next exit and avoid the traffic. Barb then tells me that we could actually stop for the night in a town with the same name as where we started, Russellville, KY.

And so here we, ‘back where we started’ as it were. Ha ha ha.

Tomorrow, we head North. We’ll leave Kentucky and head into Indiana. See you there.

Day 41: The start of our drive home

So here we are, the beginning of the end. Today we begin our drive towards Ontario & home. It will take a few days, but compared to the past few weeks our pace will seem meteoric as our goal is to cover distance and not dawdle about.

The sunrise was beautiful as we watched through the Mesquite trees while eating breakfast. We packed up the van and headed out. The Bisons politely congregated near the entrance to the park allowing us to take some final pictures.

We headed North across country towards the I-40E. This route had us driving through some small towns that for the most part are now almost ghost towns as most of the Main Street stores are sadly vacant and boarded up. One of the towns, Memphis, TX has all of its downtown streets paved with cobblestones which have it a really charming feeling, that is until you see all of the vacant shops. Sad.

Once on the I-40E we quickly cross into Oklahoma. Near Hydro, OK we stop to look at our last Route 66 site, Lucille’s gas station was operated by Lucille Hamons from 1941 until her death on August 18, 2000, the site was added to the US National Register of Historic Places in 1997.

We are accompanied by strong crosswinds as we cross Oklahoma; however, the grasslands slowly disappear and by Oklahoma City many more trees can be seen including now large leaf deciduous trees and larger conifers. Large-scale farming has been replaced by smaller farms interspersed throughout the wooded hillsides. By the time we get to the Arkansas state line, the farms have mostly disappeared (as have the winds) and now the scenery is forested hillsides amongst the lakes and waterways that will become the Ozarks.

After almost 9hrs on the road, we pull off at Russellville, AR and pull into the Cracker Barrel parking lot where we will have dinner and spend the night.

Day 40: Caprock Canyon State Park 2

I’m up at 6:45am to turn on the propane and then the furnace. This means going outside at 6C in my shorts. Brrr. However, the warmth from the furnace feels nice and by 7:30am the inside of the van is a toasty 18C. Time to make some coffee.

We move from the Wild Horse campground to the regular campground today but first it’s time for eggs and sausage cooked on the griddle. We figure this will be the last griddle cooked meal for this trip so a little extra time is spent cleaning after we’ve eaten.

We pack most items into the passenger area of the van as the move to the new campground is only a few kilometers. Once ready, we back out of our site and leave the campground turning away from our destination as we want to briefly explore the deeper areas of the park. Some of the road is very steep and not accessible to those with trailers. The tenting campgrounds look nice but remote; however, they have fantastic views of the red canyon walls.

We see a few Bison grazing near the road and taking a drink in a lake.

We visit the park office to get our tag for the new campsite but we can’t occupy it until 12:00pm. Off to the showers! Ahhhh, hot water. This is nice. We both are less smelly as we arrive at our new campsite.

We’ll only be here for the day and overnight, but we both agree that this is the nicest state park campsite we’ve had all trip.

We have lunch and go for a walk along the canyon edge and take a few photos. We see a herd of Bison not far away, but watch them to ensure they’re not looking our way and potentially blocking our return to the van. No problems, they’re busy grazing and are far enough say that we pass without them paying us any heed.

Sitting under the shade structure writing this and I just got blasted by a dust devil that blew right through our site. Might need to clean the van out again as the door is open!

We spend the remainder of the afternoon planning the last few days of our trip and chatting with friends and family.

Day 39: Caprock Canyon State Park 1

A warm night last night and neither of us had a good sleep initially. Then the temperature dropped and we both slept really well into the early morning. Uncharacteristically we didn’t wake until around 7:30am.

I decided to go for a walk along the Wild Horse trail and explore the lower portion of the canyon. Initially the trail starts at the top of the canyon wall with some lovely views across and along the canyon. It then descends down into the canyon where it wanders along the bottom crossing a dry riverbed several times.

It was while descending into one of these crossings I turned and saw a small herd of Bison. They were about 100m from me but the bull saw me and turned to look at me. I stood still and took a few photos before quietly retreating back along the trail I had walked.

Returning back to the campsite I passed Barb who was going on her own exploration. She found some interesting plants to take pictures of.

We cooked bacon and eggs for breakfast and settled in for a quiet day of reading and relaxation. I finished the book that I had picked up in Albuquerque and Barb finished what was her 6th book of this trip.

We watched as others left the park and new neighbors replaced them. We even witnessed a couple riding horses towards the canyon as they passed through the campground.

The winds returned around dinner time and we were forced to eat in the van to avoid having Texan dust added to our meal as a seasoning. It sure is windy in these parts.

Last night and tonight we are staying in the Wild Horse campground of the park. It is an area designated for folks who camp with their horses as each site has a corral for Horses and is fenced from having the Bison wandering through the sites (evidently Horses and Bison do not get along). We chose to stay in this area because there was no available sites in the regular campground. Tomorrow we move to the regular campground within the park where the sites have electrical connections as well as water. There are also showers which we are very much looking forward to using.

That’s it for today, check back tomorrow to see what we get up to.

Day 38: Palo Duro Canyon State Park

The winds died down overnight and it was calm by the time we woke. Today we will stop at the Palo Duro Canyon State Park. We had originally wanted to camp there but they had no sites and thus we will become day visitors instead.

We’re leaving the winery at about 9:30am and the state park is only a 20 minute drive. There’s a small line up of cars entering the park so it only takes a few minutes and we’re in.

Our first stop is an overlook that provides a picturesque vista of the canyon. We also visit the gift shop and interpretive center to learn a little of how the canyons in this part of Texas were formed.

Access into the canyon is down a steep 10% grade with several switchbacks. At the bottom the main park road encircles the canyon bottom and is several miles in length.

It is hot. 31C hot. I’ve heard people say “Yeah, but it’s a dry heat”. OK, but hot is still hot so sunscreen, hats and bottles of water are a must as we set out to do a little walking on some of the trails.

We choose an easy trail that is near the river and only about 1 mile in length. We took off down another trail by accident and when done had walked over 2 miles with little to no shade. Oops.

For lunch we parked the van in one of the many picnic spots that have shelters over the tables to provide shade. Lunch was yummy and a nice reward for completing the hike.

Leaving the canyon we head southeast towards our next camping spot at Caprock Canyon State Park in Quitaque (pronounced Kitty-quay). On the way from Canyon to Quitaque the landscape changed from flat (really flat) agricultural grasslands to less flat central Texas plains where there are trees and things seem to be much greener than up on the grasslands above the canyons.

We are staying at Caprock for 3 nights and plan on hiking some of the trails and relaxing. This is our last ‘destination’ for this trip. On Monday we begin our eastward drive toward Ontario. I will blog along the way, but before then come back and see what we get up to here at Caprock.