Driving Home For Christmas

One might well ask, 'How is it possible to drive from England to the Untied States? There's that pesky little bit of water in between.'

The answer, of course, would be, 'Start in Canada.'

Yes. Canada. Why Canada? Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time.

Rather than going to Georgia or Texas and then up, I went from London to Calgary, Alberta. I was supposed to connect to Denver and then to Billings (yes, I know. It's ridiculous.) However, we were an hour late leaving Heathrow, and then we had to circle the airport for half an hour before we could land. I'd nearly missed my connection before I even left the plane! I got through Canadian customs very fast (I ran to be at the front of the queue) but then got stuck waiting for 30 minutes for them to decide to deplane our luggage. Finally got that, walked over to the connecting area, and they said, 'Your plane is gone. You'll have to rebook.' Nice. That was the last plane Stateside for the rest of the day. After quite a long discussion with the airline personnel, we came to the conclusion that they couldn't actually get me to the US for 48 hours. Uh huh. 2 days. Ummm... it's only an 8 hour drive!!!! So, we decided (the reservation woman and I) that it would make most sense for me to cancel the rest of my flight, and drive to Billings. So, I canceled my remaining flight (and got a refund). [color=red]NOTE! DO NOT DO THAT UNTIL AFTER YOU'VE DEFINITELY FOR SURE GOT ALTERNATE BOOKED!!!![/color] Then I went over to the car rental desks and tried (note the word TRIED) to get a car. Umm, turns out you can't rent a car in Canada and return it to the US. Or, you can but it's very difficult and quite expensive. So, there I am, in a foreign country, no way out, jetlagging major time. I didn't actually burst into tears, but it was an effort. I called my folks (again) and just as I was starting to tell my mom the full situation, the manager of National Car Rental comes up and said, 'You'll never believe this. We've just had a US car returned, and we need to get it back across the border. I can give it to you for 1/2 the price of a domestic, turn up on the day rental. That's $150 plus tax.' (Canadian dollars.) Umm... YES! I'll take that! :D So, I drove out of Calgary last night.

Stayed the night in a tiny little . . . I hesitate to say town . . . just north of the Canadian/US border. It was that small. It was a hotel over a bar. The room had a bed, a light, and a sink. That was it. (Everything was very clean, just very spartan.) Smelled faintly of smoke. Didn't care. It was 10.45 pm local (6.45 am London!) and I was tired. Very tired. I was asleep before 11. But, by 5.00 in the morning, the random plink-plink noises the radiator was making got to be too much for me. I got up and hit the road.

And then, the border crossing. For the second time this year I've managed to confuse a US Customs Officer on the US/Canadian border. Last time it was because my answer to 'Purpose for visiting Canada' was 'To get a haircut.' This time it was 'Driving from England to the US.' Ok, so what I actually said was 'In transit from England to the US.' But, I got an equally blank look. (The answer to the previous question - How long were you in Canada? - was, 'Over night.') So, then I had to explain why I was now driving, instead of flying to Montana. Eventually he gave up trying to understand and just sent me on my way. It was funny.

Finally, I got to Billings a little before noon today. Yeay!! I'm home!! We immediately drove up to the airport to return the car, then stopped off at WalMart for necessary supplies (DIET COKE!!!!), and now we're back.

I'm tired!!!!!

The Great Drive -- Or, The Long Way Home (Pt 3)

So, on the 10th, we got through North Carolina, Tennessee, and we were in Kentucky, when I finally got a hold of my family to wish Mom a Happy Mother's Day. Lois was up visiting, and I was telling them about not feeling well, and we started comparing symptoms. We've got the same thing! And I found out where I got it! One of our other friends had it, and was round for 3 days at Lois' house. Both of us caught it from her, as did the husband of another friend. He went to the doctor, and was told, sorry. It's a virus. You'll just have to let it run its course. So, since I felt fine, if not able to swallow comfortably, we decided to revert to our original plan, which was going to be a heck of a lot more fun. So we headed northeast from Kentucky, skirting past Cincinnati, OH, stopping for the night about halfway between Cincinnati and Cleveland (better?!? I got told off by him for spelling it wrong earlier) for the night. Oh. My. Word. I've never had such a miserable excuse for air conditioning! It was constantly going on and off, really noisy and didn't ever really cool the room. I was up every 2 hours. It was horrible.

On the 11th we got up and drove the rest of the way to Niagara Falls, Ontario (through Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York). We decided to stop off there and see the falls on the 12th. I got up this morning and felt pretty rough. Much worse than I have done. But, at least had slept much better. So, dragged my feet and finally got out the door around noon. I felt miserable, though. Really poorly. Sitting in the restaurant waiting for lunch to arrive we were discussing the possibility of just heading straight home, possibly even today. I got a hold of Lois, and we re-compared notes on our symptoms. Seems like I do, in fact, have the same thing. It's just miserable. And, since I felt quite a lot better after lunch, we decided we'd see how I feel in the morning. If I'm really miserable, we can just pack it in and go home. If not, I can still get to my appointment on Thursday. I've also got an appointment with Grandma's doctor for Friday afternoon.

We also found a health food store that sells essential oils. Thyme and tea tree oils are both natural anti-viral/anti-bacterials, so I'd wanted to get some. They get absorbed directly into your skin, so if you put it straight over the lymph node, it gets to work in the most important spot! (You ought to mix thyme with something else, like grape seed oil -- my favourite -- or olive oil, because other wise the thyme is likely to feel a bit like it's burning your skin.) They also recommended this cool stuff called Lymphdiarral. It's specifically designed to drain the lymph system and reduce swelling in both acute and chronic lymph problems due to infection or injury. Well, that pretty well made my day! I've been using it all day, and I can feel a reduction in the swelling. I'm hoping I wake up and it's much better tomorrow.

We also walked around the Falls for a bit. Really pretty. But let's be honest . . . how long can you stand and look at a river? We spent about half an hour, then came back to the hotel. Just taking things easy today.

Just a couple of seconds of the roar of the water falling over the side.


We've got this really sweet little Australian Rosella Parakeet (a real parakeet, not a budgie that we just call a parakeet!) who lives in our hotel. Her name's Paris (since the Hampton chain is owned by Hilton. . .) She's a doll. Click on the video to see a short bit of her. You can hear her chirp. It's very sweet.