January 30: Road Trip

Kevin worked up at school all day on Saturday and then we went to church.  So good to come home to the pot of chili.  Then on Sunday we both started the day by working on individual things - Kevin was working on sketches for a wall cabinet to hold his planes, and I was attaching the last of the bindings to all the table runners I quilted earlier.

About 10:00 AM, I got a wild hair to drive to Canada just so we could check out the Champlain Isands and actually use our passport cards. By 10:30 we were out the door.  As we got close to the turn off for the Islands, it was snowing but we decided to continue for a while since snow was not part of the forecast.
As soon as we took this exit we were in unexplored territory for us.  Then as we crossed the first bridge and entered the island the snow disappeared. There were lots of people ice fishing, which is not an uncommon sight to people who grew up in the northern Midwest, but there was an awful lot of open water, too. This phenomenon was true both in the USA and Canadian water so maybe these people knew that the ice was thicker and safer than either of us were guessing. We have had lots of warmer days and there are plenty of ice flows on the rivers, so..... Anyway here are some photos of of open water and some of these hardy souls out risking their souls for some sole.

open water

more open water

The little dots out on the ice are ice shacks.

When were crossed into Canada, I was busy with something and then realized I did not have anything to show that we really were in Canada, so I snapped several shots of road signs.  Always too late, except for this one.  As we were re-entering the USA I did take two photos at the border just for the sake of recording the first time we have used our passport cards.

Almost immediately after entering the USA we were in familiar territory.  Think we were both really surprised at just how close we are to the border.  It was a great way to get perspective.  We have both loved taking these little excursions.  I know that Canada is a very large country and that the only Canadian that we spoke to was the border guard, but were we drove seems like many places in the USA with the exception of the signs being written in French.  Maybe later in the Spring we will have to really go to Montreal and get a bit broader sampling of the country.  (Our only other experiences in the actual country of Canada were as teenagers doing some boundary water canoeing northern Minnesota.)
**** A curious point to mention is that Vermont, at least a great deal of what we have seen is either valleys surrounded by mountains or mountain.  There are very few places where both of these don't exist together.  However, one we entered the islands, the small part of New York we drove through and where we ate lunch, and the 1+ spend in Canada had much different scenery. - LOTS of farmland or that is what this city girl perceived it as being.