Saturday, October 31, 2009

Day 27 - Palm Beach to Sedona


My chauffeur is having another night of exhaustion and so the navigator is writing again. Actually with the advent of the GPS I kind of lost the title of navigator although I've given it up reluctantly. I find myself arguing much to Greg's aggravation with the lady inside the GPS. We are using the Australian Lady the American one was too bossy.

We awoke very early in Palm Springs this morning and caught the rising sun light on the hills behind our hotel. The hills were lit up in an almost neon pink. It started our day off on a good note. Palm Springs looks lovely although we just slept there and did a quick tour through the downtown this morning. There seems to be a lot of empty stores and it has probably seen more prosperous days.

We entered the desert and began to see some of the huge cactus, the ones that seem to be giving you the finger. Big hills of brown dirt that looked like larger versions of the ones you see at a construction site. A bit of a downer after the majesty of the rugged Pacific Coast. Slowly the big cactus were replaced by a different type, smaller ones in clumps with flat leaves and closer to the ground. Then the cactus were gone and we started seeing small pine trees.

Early in the afternoon we started noticing red (rusty) streaks in the hills. Just before we approached Sedona we rounded a corner and saw the most amazing site - big red mountains in the most interesting shapes rose before us like monoliths rising out of the earth looking like something from a Science Fiction movie. It was a very exciting scene. Our first view of Bell Rock, Cathedral Rock and Coffee Pot Rock. We found our Comfort Inn, checked in and immediately (before email) went out to explore. We found many galleries filled with the work of local talent and went into the Tlaquepaque area....a collection of restaurants and galleries made from stone and adobe and filled with Arizona Sycamores. It was lovely. We passed many businesses of psychics, aura readers, angel guides and all the other new age businesses you can imagine. Can't wait to explore closer to nature tomorrow.

Friday, October 30, 2009

Day 26 - L. A. to Palm Beach

Today was just a plane old travel day. We got up earlier than usual and were on the road by 8:00. We stuck to the main highways and quietly drove past any and all of the things there were to see along the way.
It felt weird to be back in traffic, particularly through the north end of L. A.

The scenery changed from the huge ocean and big cliffs to regular highway and then desert highway.

About 20k out of Palm Springs we drove past field after field of wind turbines. There were thousands of them. The same kind as we have back home by the CNE or Darlington. It was amazing to see row after row and them look off into the distance and see every hill top covered as well.

We got to Palm Springs about 2:00 and went our own ways for the afternoon. I think we need a break soon from driving and a bit of a break from each other too. Tough being this close together for this long. We're both pretty independent folks who like a fair amount of solitude, more than 5 minutes in the washroom which is about all we get these days!

Our next planned stop is Sedona. Lynne has wanted to go there for years now. Sedona is about 600k from where we are now. Phoenix is 400k from here along the way. My guess is that we'll do the 600 and take then next few days off and lay low there over the weekend before heading down to Green Valley to see Ron and Bev at their Arizona home.

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Day 25 - Pebble Beach - Carmel - Big Sur

Lynne and I both thought the same thing when we woke up this morning. We're tired of driving. We want to go lay down in our own bed somewhere. We want to go the store and buy some food, bring it home and cook it. We talked a bit and decided to put some miles behind us today. There are tons of beautiful things to look at, but at this point and time, we're tired "Enough of this beauty, lets get somewhere!"

Well, it was a good idea, but the wrong place for that decision. Pebble Beach, Carmel, and Big Sur! I think this stretch of highway holds the most beautiful scenery anywhere.

We took our time and drove the 17 mile tour through Pebble Beach. Carmel is just beautiful, even if it is the most expensive town in America, and Big Sur! 90 miles of the most coast line vistas!

We got through Big Sur and decided to drive on for another hour to Morrow Bay. We passed more beaches as we got close and, at one beach we both looked at what we thought were hundreds of dead seals on the beach. we pulled in and found they were seals, elephant seals to be more exact. We met a guide on the beach who filled us in on the story of these seals. Their info is at www. ElephantSeal.org The short story is that these huge seals, travel 5,000 miles to breed. When we saw them today, they were females, just resting on the beach., getting ready for the males and breeding season which starts in a month or so.

We'll see if tomorrow gives us less beautiful views. maybe we'll make some miles tomorrow. Our plan right now is to try to make Palm Beach by dinner time.

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Day 24 - Santa Cruz and Monterey

After the excitement from yesterday, today was far less eventful!
We parked in the loading zone at the front door of the hotel last night so no one could get near it without being caught. It worked! We checked before heading for breakfast.

Lynne went to the gym. I sat and got fatter and then headed over to the camera shop to get a replacement camera. I found the exact same model so that's what I got. The guy at the shop was great. He showed me all kinds of stuff. i could have spent the day there, but Lynne was back at the hotel waiting for me and we had a lunch date to get to.

We headed off about 11:00 to meet our old friend Gord. We've known each other for going on 25 years now! We don't see much of each other anymore. Gord lived abroad for years and lives in the US now. It's great seeing him whenever we do though. There's never enough time to catch up completely!
We headed off to Santa Cruz after a great lunch. We drove around a bit and then headed out to Monterey for the night. Off to Cannery Row for some sight seeing and into Bubba Gumps for dinner.

As we were pulling into town, we got lost a bit and saw the most amazing thing. We were on a little side street in town. There were woods on the other side of the narrow street and there at the side of the road was a deer eating. It wasn't 15 feet from the car. we pulled right up and took a few pictures. Amazing to be that close and not have it run away.

I think we'll do some exploring around town before heading out tomorrow. We only managed 185k today. Our daily distances are getting less and less as we get into better weather! We had 6800k on the old GPS. With today's @ 200, I guess we're at the 7000k traveled mark. I plugged in our old Aurora address into the new GPS - we could get back in about 4500k! It's getting tempting. We're both having fun, but starting to miss home and friends. We'll need to stop driving and get settled somewhere fairly soon.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Day 22/23 - Berkeley

We spent Sunday walking around Berkeley, through the town and around the campus. We went to the local theatre and watched Michael Moore's "Capitalism - A Love Story". What a great town to see that movie in! We loved the movie and we loved the town so much we decided to stay an extra day.
What's the point of a trip like this if we don't just hang out a bit where ever the spirit moves us to do so.

We had a great sleep, headed out for breakfast in the hotel, came back to the room and talked about whether we would go to the gym or head outside for a bit of a run. It's cold here at night so it took a bit of discussing.

As we were talking I saw some people out front looking around at our car. They looked a bit odd, or, I should say the were looking oddly at the car, so I went out to see what was going on.

First I saw the glass on the ground, then I saw the bits of glass left in the drives door, then I saw the wires dangling from where the GPS was attached to the front window. I remembered that I hadn't brought the camera in last night, but had tossed a jacket over it. A quick glance at the jacket in the middle of the drivers seat told me the camera was gone too.

SHIT! Now what!

We got the front desk to call the police, we called the insurance folks and then . . . . . . we waited. And waited. And waited.

It took about 2 hours for the police to call. They wouldn't come, but if we thought of anything else that was stolen, call back and leave a message!
We were tired of waiting for the insurance adjuster to call back, so we called again and got through. "No, car insurance doesn't cover the items in the car, just the window, but the deductible is more than the window will cost". "No, you canceled your homeowner insurance when you sold the house, the items stolen aren't covered either" I'm beginning to feel like I'm trying to make a health claim to an American Insurance company!

By now, 3 hours have gone by and it ends up there was no reason to call or wait for any of these folks. We found a window guy who will come and replace the window. It's now 2:30 pm and there's no sign of him yet.

I always think it's important to look for a silver lining somewhere. I guess the fact that both the camera and the GPS are about a year old and have both dropped by about 50% is a small blessing.

The funniest though it Jordan's girlfriend Sara facebooked and wrote "Wow - I didn't expect that to happen until you got a little further along on your
journey!"

Yea - Us too! Berkeley sure looked a lot nicer yesterday from outside walking around then it does today from inside this hotel room, waiting!

Monday, October 26, 2009

Day 21 - Wine Country - Napa Valley - Berkeley

Saturday morning. It’s our third weekend on the road. The first weekend that we’re not stopped for a few days visiting family or friends. I don’t think I like the idea of just driving and driving from here on in.

We’re stopping in Berkeley tonight to meet up with Alex Platt. Alex is one of Lynne’s cousin’s sons who are going to Berkeley and who is also an amazing guitar player. I was kind of hoping that he was playing tonight, but apparently he’s not. I don’t know any of the nieces or nephews very well. I’m looking forward to getting to know Alex a bit over dinner. (Just back from dinner – what an interesting guy!)

We decided that we’d have a real easy day today, and stay overnight two nights in Berkeley. Knowing there was some sort of break from just driving felt good.

We left Santa Rosa and took our time driving over to Sonoma through the Napa Valley. We kept pulling over to the side of the road to let people pass. They had places to o, and we were doing the ‘old folks’ tour! Lynne grew up on a farm in St Catherine’s. She knows about crops and stuff. We passed a field. I wondered what that was growing. She knew it was strawberries, without waiting to see a sign!

The drive to Sonoma was only about 30 minutes. Gentle rolling hills mainly covered in grape vines. I guess they had been harvested already. I didn’t see any grapes until we got to town where a small bush was growing on some ones front yard beside their orange tree. We passed a farm from sale. I grabbed a picture so I’d have the web site address to look it up later. Turns out it 13.5 . . . . Million. We decided that, we don’t want a grape farm!

Sonoma was amazing. It reminded us both of Niagara-on-the-Lake, but maybe on steroids. The town just kept going and going, not just the little strip of town along the Niagara Parkway. There were a number of old historical buildings. The town looked old, but very well kept up. We could have stayed for a couple fo days instead of the hour or so that we did.

There was a group of folks with a 350.org sign at the town hall. I didn’t know what that was about, but I took my ‘memory’ picture and checked them out too. Who knew that today was the day that 181 countries came together for the most widespread day of environmental action in history. We stumbled upon one of 5200 events staged around the world today. I wish we’d known. It would have been cool to have joined in. http://www.350.org/

We drove fron Sonoma to Napa, but we didn’t like it as much. The town seemed to be newly constructed, pretending to be old. We walked a bit, had a bite of lunch and slit. I’d wished we’d stayed longer in Sonoma, or even stayed there for the weekend.

We drove on to Berkeley. It’s a great town. I’d driven though it once before, but hadn’t spent any time there. We drove around looking for a nice hotel. We’d decided that we were going to spend two nights there. We’d meet Alex for dinner, I’d finish off some work in the morning and then we’d just hang out in the afternoon.

Americans and college football! Again, ‘who knew’ the town would be full because of “THE GAME” that night. There were no rooms there, but we found a ‘bit too expensive’ room at a Marriott in Emeryville, just a few kilometres out of Berkley. It’s interesting to see how much nicer the service is in smaller places than larger. We’re near some big box store hell here. Lynne is going to go explore them in the morning while I finish off a job. We’ve got a room booked in Berkeley for tomorrow night. We’ll check out the Michael Moore movie in the afternoon and then head over to recommended pizza joint!

Saturday, October 24, 2009

Day 20 - California Dreamin' - by Lynne

Greg is tired tonight. He did a lot of driving around crazy hairpin turns with nothing separating us from falling hundreds of feet into the Pacific Ocean except the Grace of God. Greg's driving was superlative. At no time did he pretend to be Mario Andretti. But I'm jumping ahead of myself.

We woke this morning early as Greg had a business call to make and we had a "free" breakfast to eat. It was a good "included" breakfast....hard boiled eggs, yogurt, raisin bread, yum.....you will notice that I talk about food much more than Greg does.

Then we left Garberville and the smell of burning hemp to play in more big trees. The one we drove the car through today was 2400 years old....that means it was on earth before Jesus was born. Yes, it was another drive through tree and drive through it we did. We met a lovely Canadian couple at the drive through tree site and exchanged travelling stories. They hail from Salt Spring Island.

At this point we left Highway 101 and entered what they call the Shoreline Highway. The first 22 miles took us about an hour. The S turns just kept coming and at some points there was absolutely no guard rail. Big lumber trucks come barrelling along those roads as though they are at the Indies. Was the fright worth it? Absolutely, hands down, that's a big affirmative......what views, wild Pacific surf, huge cliffs, sand beaches that go on forever, Arbutus trees, unique to the Pacific coast....they shed their bark not their leaves in the Autumn. We did those S curves from 10:30 this morning until 4:30 this afternoon. We stopped in Bodega Bay and thought we'd stay at an Inn right on the sea but at 250. American with NO included breakfast we thought we'd better pass on the "room with a view."

We drove inland to Santa Rosa, found a little motel and checked in. There's an Applebees across the street. Dinner for two for twenty. We went for the special. Had a much too big American dinner and then I played being American even more by browsing in Target and Marshalls, but with the car loaded to the roof top I didn't buy a thing. That's it for today.


Friday, October 23, 2009

Day 19 - Redwood Forest

We got away about 10:00 this morning after a breakfast of stuff we'd bought at the local grocery store the night before and kept in the tiny room refrigerator. Neither of us noticed that it wasn't turned on when we stored stuff away in there. Lucky, it was a tiny fridge and the stuff we put in stayed cool anyway.

We drove for about a half hour and found ourselves in the Redwood Forest. I remember pictures my dad showed me growing up of where he'd driven his car through a tunneled out tree out there, about 50 years ago I guess.

The forest was absolutely amazing. We turned of the main highway and drove through the trees. We stopped to walk at one point for about an hour or so. We took a ton of pictures again today.

I kept thinking of friends who cycle through the woods at home. (Hi Ramona and Louise) They would have LOVED these trails. I think I was bugging Lynne after a while as I kept asking her to go here, or stand there. I wanted her in most of the pictures to give them perspective. The trees were unbelievably huge. Apparently the average age of those Redwoods is 600 -700 years old. Some live to be over 1000 years old.

We drove out of the forest and into sunshine! We still hit some foggy area's along the coast, but anywhere inland was sunny, bright and warm!

We only drove 180k today. We've stopped in Garberville. It's about 350k north of San Francisco. I think we're stopping there tomorrow and seeing if we can meet up with Alex Platt at Berkeley and take him out for dinner. I want to spend a day there myself. It just doesn't seem right to be there and not get something to eat at Fisherman's Wharf!

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Day 18 - Welcome to California!

 We didn’t get away from the hotel in Newport until noon. Lynne wanted to go for a long walk on the beach. I had work to do before heading out.
It was a pretty uneventful day. The scenery along the pacific was amazing in spots, but the weather was very overcast and very misty along waters edge. Inland wasn’t much better.

We found a place to stay in Brookings Oregon. It was the last town in Oregon. We found a great looking place right on the beach again, but they wanted 50% more for a room with a partial view than the room with a complete view last night. We decided to carry on into Crescent City California, about 45 minutes away.

This town seems to be one of the many poor towns that we’ve traveled through. Not our first choice of places to stay, but it’ll do. We’ll head on out to the Redwood Forest tomorrow. It looks like we’ll make San Francisco by the weekend some time.


Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Day 17 - Aberdeen to Newport - Southbound on Hwy 101

 I had a bunch of work to get caught up on so we stayed until 11:00am at last night’s hotel. It was a good morning. I got lots done.

We headed on out to Highway 101 and followed the Pacific Ocean all the way down through Washington State and into Oregon. What a difference Oregon is from Washington. Maybe it was just the towns that we went through and, we didn’t pass through Seattle, but Washington seemed very poor and run down. We didn’t see anywhere that looked prosperous. Oregon, so far, is totally different. The towns for the most part look like folks are doing OK. Maybe it’s being beside the ocean. Maybe it was having the sun shine almost all day, but today’s drive was a pleasure from what we had just passed through.

I guess we’d make better time a bit further inland, but driving down 101 is great. We love the small towns, amazing ocean views, lush forests, roads twisting and turning everywhere. We’re not making great time or big distances along this route, but the views are breathtaking.

We thought we’d make it to Coos Bay when we headed out, but traffic was much slower than it had been. We readjusted out destination to Newport. We passed through some beautiful towns just before we got here. We wondered if we should stop a bit early at one of these towns but we’re glad we kept going. We found a hotel right on the waters edge. All we see out our window is the ocean. The tide is going out, so the beach keeps getting wider. We’re hoping it will still be out in the morning so we can go walk that beach before we head out.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Day 13 -16 Victoria Weekend and into the US

We arrived at Ron and Bev’s house in Victoria about 3:00 pm on Friday. Ron and I have been friends since back when we were both married to our first wives! I think that’s getting close to 30 years ago!
R&B moved back out to Vancouver Island about 15 years ago and we haven’t seen a much of each other over the years. Lynne and I both commented when we left them this morning (Monday) that it a sign of a great friendship when, after not seeing each other for so long, that we all felt like we’d seen each other just last week and carried on from where we left off. Comfortable, easy, and having fun!

We hung out all weekend long. Bev made a great dinner for us Friday night. Wonderful to taste a really good home cooked meal again. It’s only been a couple of weeks, but it feels like forever! Saturday Bev and I went for a 6k run together. Bev is nursing shin splints and I’m carrying around an extra few inches around the waste. We took it easy but it felt good to get back out there a bit again. Saturday afternoon we went and looked at condos. R & B are considering downsizing and there were a few open houses in Victoria. The live in Sydney now, about 25 minutes away, but they both work in Victoria. We stopped for a late lunch near the yacht club. It’s always good to be looking at sailboats! Saturday night they introduced us to Dominos. I’d never played before and had not even seen them since I was a kid. What a blast we had!

Lynne and I are on the prowl now for a set for ourselves.
Bev went to church Sunday morning. I went out and did that 6k run again. I thought of the gang back home either running the half or the full or the 5k of the Toronto Marathon. I blasted through my 6k. Looking back, and still feeling these burning quads, I would have been better to take it easy again. Oh well! One day I’ll pay attention to what I’ve learned! Ron, Lynne and I walked all over town after I got back. We walked around downtown Sydney; through the wood carver’s shop, around the yacht club and round the main streets until we got to Ron’s favourite weekend breakfast place. Eggs Benny was GREAT!

Bev was home when we got back. They drove us out to Suke (pronounced souk) We drove a couple of Bev’s Tri bike courses (pretty hilly!) and went to a spot at waters edge that was simply amazing. Huge cliffs but with paths that allowed us to walk down to the water. Ron and I both took some amazing photographs. I’ll try to process them tonight or tomorrow morning. We walked and talked for a couple of hours out there before we came back for Pizza and Dominos again!

Lynne and I left shortly after Ron and Bev left for work this morning. We too the Ferry from Victoria to Port Angeles. Port Angeles is a bit west of Seattle). We were both worried about the customs guys ripping our car apart. The back seats are down that the SUV is totally stuffed with clothes, books, guitars and god knows what. The agent at the far end looked surprised when he looked in the back, but I guess he wanted to go for lunch rather than tear the car apart so he waived us through.

We headed immediately to Hwy 101. That will take us right down the west coast along the Pacific Ocean. The “Pacific Coast Highway” is one of the most beautiful drives I’ve ever been on. I drove from ‘Frisco to San Diego once and I LOVED it. I’ve never driven it from top to bottom before. We headed west until we got to the ocean; played at an amazing beach as we turned south. The beach (see picture soon) was fog bound but beautiful We crawled around through the huge pieces of driftwood for a long time before we headed out again. I’d past a sing that read “Big Cedar” earlier and didn’t turn. I saw it again, but this time we turned. 500 meter into the forest we found the biggest tree I’ve ever seen. We got tons of great shots of it with Lynne standing in front, or in it. I walked in and took a couple of shots straight up through the inside. Absolutely amazing!

We finished off the day at a crappy little hotel in Aberdeen Washington. We went out for diner and found “Duffy’s Bar and Grill” I HAD to eat there seeing as that’s how I answer my phone most of the time. The food sucked, but it was fun to be there!

I’ve got work to do for a couple of clients so, I may stay here later tomorrow morning to get some work done before we hit the road. If I don’t get caught up, we may opt for a short travel day. I should have worked on the weekend but, we really enjoyed catching up with our buds! I’m going to post this, get caught up on my work, then process the pictures. I’m thinking those pictures may mot make it up until tomorrow (Tues) night.

Monday, October 19, 2009

Day 12 - Penticton to Vancouver

I got up at 7:00 and went out and drove the Penticton Ironman bike course. I started at the waters edge. I thought of sticking my toe in the water, just so I could know that I’d been in that water but, it was still pretty cool outside. I decided to just take a picture. I’d read the course description on the website, but it missed some things that struck me as important as I drove.  Yes, the first 35 – 40k seem fairly level. Yes the climb into Richter Pass is high, as is the climb into Yellow Lake, but there were two things I didn’t see explained. Firstly, of no real importance, but of great interest is how amazingly beautiful the course is.

The first that stood out for me was the huge mountains, incredible vistas through the Okanogan Valley, rows and rows of grape vines through the vineyards and peach tree orchards along the way. The scenery in the Adirondacks around Lake Placid are paled compared to the scenery along this course.

The second thing that stood out for me was, unlike Lake Placid, were the number of great downhill runs along the course. There were a lot of spots that I thought were a bit close to the downhill into Keene. The road surface was in good condition all the way. I’m not sure I got the out and back picked properly. If I did, the roads were a tiny bit rough, but still very good. I suspect this course is going to be a faster one for all the LP gang when they get out here next year.

Lynne stayed back at the hotel while I went for the ride, but we went out along part of the course on our way out of town. I was pointing stuff out as we went. She asked if I wanted to come back and do this course one day. I’d love to be in town when the gang were here to do a training ride with them. That would be a blast. I don’t have a sense of wanting to do another Ironman. Not yet anyway.  I have nothing but great memories of every aspect of the training and the races I’ve done, but I found it impossible to keep any sort of social balance in my life for those four years. So far, I’m enjoying this new life without all the training. My expanding waistline is proof of that! I plan to start running a bit every day starting next week.

The drive thought the mountains was breathtaking. That’s the only word for it. Valley after valley and mountain after mountain just kept popping up with every turn in the road. We took Hwy 3 rather than going back up to the Trans Canada. It took longer, but it was far more picturesque.  We took lots of pictures. I’ll process them over the weekend.

We got to Vancouver about 4:30. We had reserved our hotel online from Penticton the night before. We got a good deal on the price but what we didn’t know until we got here was that it appears to be in the middle of hooker heaven! Life teaches us every day. Today we learned to not book ahead! Hopefully the car will still be hear when we wake up in the morning.

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Day 11 - Banff to Lake Louise to Penticton

We looked out the window from the hotel this morning and saw the most amazing sight. 20 feet from our window was a small enclave of trees. There stood a doe and two fawns, eating the leaves off the tree. We took a lot of pictures from our window, but they didn’t come out. I’m glad I walked out and was able to get a couple of shots from a few feet away.

Lynne Green Lake Louise
We left Banff and headed to Lake Louise. There were a couple of inches of snow in Banff and all the way to Lake Louise. Lake Louise was beautiful. I found it unbelievable how clear the water was. I could see the bottom a good 40 meters out.  The Asian tour group were loud. We were a bit sorry that we weren’t alone. The chatter took away for the majestic serenity of it all. It was still amazing though.

The rest of the day was relatively uneventful. We drove on to British Columbia, down through the Okanogan Valley and into Penticton.  We’re in Pacific Time for the next while. The time changes coming across the county every few days messed up our internal clocks a bit. I imagine we’ll be in Pacific time now for the next two to three weeks until we enter Arizona.

I’m going to head out tomorrow morning and drive the Penticton Ironman bike course. We’ll drive thought to Vancouver when I finish that drive.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Day 10 - Computer Repairs in Banff

On one hand, I like having a few projects to work on while we’re on our trip. At the same time, particularly when I’ve got software problems, it would be nice to have nothing to do!

I made a mistake a couple of days before leaving Toronto. I had Jordan install some game on this laptop and then I installed some new printer drivers. I’m not sure what screwed up my computer, but Photoshop, a tool I use every day, was running slower and slower, to the point that it was virtually unusable.   I tried rolling back with a system restore, but it failed. I tried removing the software and re-installing, but that filed too.

We decided to spend and extra day here in Banff so that I could deal with all of that.  It took most of the day to get things running properly again, but, they are!
Lynne BanffThis morning, Lynne and I went our for a walk around town. There is ice and snow everywhere. Not a lot of it, but just enough to make it touch to walk around without slipping. We love this town. The scenery is to die for. I’d love to see it one day in the summer though. We both felt like the tops of our ears were frozen when we got back to the hotel about an hour later.

We went to the movies tonight. Couples Resort is a funny movie. Great to go and see something light and fun. Great to go to a movie where it cost $10.00 to get it, and they give you a drink and popcorn along with your admission.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Thanksgiving Weekend in Calgary

It was great to stay in one place for a little while. We checked into a hotel at the south east corner of Calgary. Christine, Evan, Emily and Aidan came Friday night for dinner. We had a good chat in the restaurant and then had tons of fun at the pool until way after Aidan’s bedtime!


Saturday we slept in, had a nice leisurely breakfast and then went and met Ron and Patty for a late lunch. Saturday night the kids all came back over and we did the pool thing again.

Emily slept over with us Saturday night and Sunday we drove to the Langley Golf and Country Club for brunch. It was when we woke up in the morning that I realized we had to unpack most of the car to get one of the back seats down from Emily. We decided to drive slowly. Lynne and Emily shared the front seat. Sure glad they are both thin!

Jane and Tom and Ryan met us for brunch as well. Lynne and I came back to our hotel after brunch. Lynne caught a bit more sleep. I worked for a few hours until it was time to head out to Jane’s house. Jane was my first wife. We get along fine now that it’s been years since we were married! They live in a beautiful, huge house out in Langley. Langley is about 25k out from Calgary. Jane and Tom cooked an amazing meal. Ryan’s girlfriend Danika was there also. Danika and Ryan helped get us a deal on the room that we are in now in Banff.

We visited with our friend McKinley for a couple of hours this morning before heading out to Banff this afternoon. The drive from Calgary to Banff has to be the most beautiful drive in the world. I love watching the mountains appearing on the horizon and then driving into them.

We took picture, but I can’t post them for a bit. I’ve got software problems on this computer. I think I loaded too many games and odd printer drivers the day before we left Toronto. I’ve been trying to fix it over the weekend but, it’s getting worse and worse. Photoshop has totally stopped working now, as has Dreamweaver. It’s pretty hard for me to get work done without those tools so, I’m formatting the hard drive tonight and staring over! I'm glad I can still nhand code to write this anyway! Not really what I want to be doing out here in the ice and snow covered mountains, but, oh well, we don’t have the clothes here to get outside for long anyway!

There’s a nice view out of our hotel window anyway!

Monday, October 12, 2009

Day 6 - Regina to Calgary through the snow!

We drove down the road.  We drove down the road.  We drove down the road.  We drove down the road.  Then there was a hill and then, we drove down the road and drove down the road some more.

Thank God we ended up in Calgary tonight. We can see the mountains on the horizon. That means the end of these straight boring drives!

Greeg & Lyyne Panama TripIt snowed last night in Regina. This is what it looked like from our window this morning. The temperature was -7. Unbelievable weather for early October!

We drove to Medicine Hat for lunch and then on to Calgary after that. It was a very uneventful day today.  Christine, Evan, Emily and Aidan came and met us at the hotel for dinner. We went and hung out at the pool afterwards.

It was great being able to just hang out and talk to Christine and Evan. The kids had tons of fun in the pool. Emily and another boy her age spent the night throwing a ball at us. Aidan, with his little life jacket on, never went deeper than his waist. Well, except for the time he fell in and floated like a stick man on his back until even jumped in and pulled him back to the edge. He was a little freaked, but fine. He went back in the water straight away!

We’re going to try to meet up with Steve and Patty and McKinley tomorrow mid day, and then spend tomorrow night and Sunday with the kids before we leave on Monday. It feels good knowing I don’t have a bunch of driving to do in the morning again!

We took a couple of pictures today, mostly weather shots.  We couldn’t believe the snow storms we went through.. I’m not going to bother processing them tonight. I’ll take lots with the kids over the weekend and post them again Sunday night or Monday.

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Day 5 - Winnipeg to Regina, with a Great Stop in Brandon

We drove down the road. It was straight and long. We drove down the road. It was straight and long. We drove down the road. It was straight and long. We drove down the road. It was straight and long. We drove down the road. It was straight and long.

If that was boring to read, you wouldn’t believe what it was like to drive it for 5 or 6 hours today!


We pulled out of Winnipeg at about 8:00am. 2 degrees and overcast, raining just a bit, but that rain didn’t last long today (for a change). The sun broke though the clouds for most of the drive in the afternoon.

We heard the craziest thing on the radio today. The courts in Windsor Ontario found a truck driver guilty of smoking in a workplace and fined him $300.00. He was alone, driving his truck down the road, and smoking. I find it unbelievable how far the government goes to stick its nose in everyone’s face. I wonder how much tax payer’s money will be wasted when this gets move up through all the court systems.

One great thing that happened today was, just before the Saskatchewan border, the speed limit changed to 110kph. Nice to be able to move at a reasonable speed without worrying about getting a ticket. I think that difference cost us abut 15% more for gas though.

The temperature never rose above 4 degrees all day long. We saw a few flakes of snow near Winnipeg, but the real snow came when we got to Regina. We were having dinner somewhere, looked out the window and there was a blizzard outside. Luckily it only lasted about 15 minutes, but it sure came down during that time.

We drove through Brandon Manitoba today and stopped for a few hours there. Lynne’s dad was stationed there for about 5 years during the war. He was a mechanic with the Air Force. He’d told me a few stories of life out there. We wanted to go and see if we could find anything left from those days.

There is still a big base in Silo, about 20k east of Brandon. We drove onto the base and found an Artillery Museum. It was pretty cool looking at some of the cannons and tanks they had around there. One of the officers on duty told us that we were at the wrong location. We needed to go a bit north of town to the airport. The Air Force Museum was on the same grounds as the public airport.

We got there about 30 minutes before it opens, but the girl who runs the place saw us and opened early for us. The museum is Hanger 1 of the 5 original hangers. The other 4 are long gone. We spent a couple of hours looking around. It was very unique, partly because it didn’t have the commercialized polish that any other museum I’ve ever been too has. It was an old hanger with cement floors and draftee dirty windows.


There were a couple of rooms with uniforms and radios and bits and pieces from those WW II days. The hanger was full of old planes and parts. I knew early planes were aluminium and wood frames covered with canvas, but it was amazing to look at a big plane, and then to feel how flimsy if felt. We can only imagine how cold it was for the pilots. There was a turret from a Lancaster bomber. Again, it was made of very thin Plexiglas. Thoughts of all of those old WW II movies came to mind. It’s unbelievable to think about how thin those planes are; how unprotected the guys were.

There was an interesting story about why the Commonwealth aircraft had targets painted on them. The ‘Roundel’ was developed in WWI by the British for identification purposes. From a distance, the British and the German flags looked similar. Pilots couldn’t tell if the planes coming towards them were friendly or enemy. The British took the colours from their flag and created the Roundel. They placed the image strategically on the plane to cause minimal damage if it were used as a target,

Lynne spent a long time looking through the Barbers Books. The barber on the base cut every new recruits hair when they arrived. He had them all sign his book. By the time the war ended, he had 4 large binders full of signatures of everyone that sat in his chair. Lynne looked for a long time to find her dad’s signature, but to no avail. It was pretty amazing to be walking around in the hanger thinking of Jack working there for all that time, so long ago.

We me Archie just before we left. Archie was the pilot trainer during WW II. He’s pushing 90 years old today. He talked about how, when a mechanic signed a plane off as being repaired and fit to fly again, he had to take it out for a test flight. He made the signing mechanic fry that test flight with him. He figured that made for pretty good insurance that no mechanic would fluff off a job. Jack told me once about being taken out for a flight. The pilot scared the hell out of him apparently. Was Archie that pilot? Who knows? We asked Archie if he remembered Jack Green. “It was along time ago” was Archie’s response.

It was a quiet drive for the next hour or two after we left. It was amazing for me to be that close to that part of history. It was amazing for Lynne to be that close to a part of her dad’s history!

We passed a couple of farms with Buffalo on our way into Regina. I took a real double take when I first spotted them! We got to Regina at about 5:00, which turned out to be 4:00. We’d crossed our second time zone since leaving home.

We’ve traveled 2750k so far over 30 hours of driving. We’ll get going early tomorrow. We want to get to Calgary and to see Christine, Emily and Aidan as early as possible. We’ve got almost 700k left to go.

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Day 4 - Dryden to Winnipeg - Where are the natives?


We got up and went for a run this morning. We headed out in different directions. I wanted to run a bit faster and longer than Lynne. Lynne didn’t want the pressure!

I took off over the overpass right away. Not my smartest move. I’ve hardly run anywhere for a while. Starting out going up a hill hurt! It sure got the heart going quickly though. I ran down to the mill. The wind was blowing away from me, so the smell wasn’t a factor. The fact that it was about 2 degrees outside sure played a factor. I almost didn’t bring running tights. I sure didn’t bring gloves. My hands were cold! There is a nice boardwalk that runs along the side of the river. It reminded me of running along the Rideau Canal with Michelle last year. The scenery along the river was beautiful. (Really glad about the wind direction though!)

I ran out for about 20 minutes, turned and came back. I didn’t put on the heart rate monitor or the Garmin. I don’t know what distance or pace I did. All I know is that, I need to get my ass out the door every morning again!

We knew we had a couple of stops along the way coming up so we didn’t go anywhere for breakfast. We packed up the car, grabbed a Fibre 1 bar and got going. Louise’s friend doesn’t start work until noon so, sorry, we weren’t able to hang in and say Hi.

When Lynne checked out at the front desk, the receptionist grimaced about something. Lynne asked if she had a toothache. “No”, the woman replied “I was ‘doing wood’ on the weekend” Lynne came out tot the car and told me the story. I almost peed my pants. We finally figured out that she was chopping wood for the winter. It sure wasn’t what came to mind for me!

We pulled out of town, heading down the highway once again looking at green trees and rocks through a rain sprinkled windshield. Lynne spotted 3 deer at the side of the highway. They were almost crossing the road. They ran over to the side of the road when we went by. We stopped and turned around. The just stood there until we were maybe 25 meters away before they darted off into the woods. We got a picture. I haven’t checked yet, but I think we only caught the tails!

Our entertainment while driving, besides not committing suicide as we listen daily to a Learn Spanish CD (How do you say “Good morning”? . . . I say “Good morning” you bitch, now leave me alone!” – I’m not doing well with this Spanish stuff!)
Oh yea – the entertainment – We’re on a quest to take pictures of all of these strange huge statues that every town seems to need to put up.

We stopped for a moment in Minnitaki and got a picture of the giant sheep. We got a picture of a starving King Kong in Vermillion Bay. We got a great picture of a VW bug on our way into Kenora and, then, pictures of Husky the (40 foot) Musky in Kenora.

We crossed into Manitoba at about 1:00 and got a picture of a sign showing us we were in the centre of Canada.

It was amazing how, within a few kilometres of leaving Ontario, the ground levelled out so that we could see for miles ahead. Shortly after that, most of the trees disappeared too. We watched Winnipeg get closer from the horizon. I think the next couple of days are going to bring sightseeing boredom to it’s highest possible level!

Lynne and I did notice something as we were driving today. We were stopped, or slowed down a good number of times by the road construction. They seem to be widening or straightening the road all along today’s route. We noticed that there was not a single native person working on any of the construction jobs. We must have seen a couple of hundred or more regular white guys working, but no Natives.

It seems odd to me that I hear news reports about job equity for the police force in Toronto, but the where Miller Paving sends folks up north to make highways, there is no rule about hiring the native folks. Maybe I’m wrong. I don’t mean to single out Miller Paving; I just noticed a few of their trucks. Maybe the native folks don’t want to work construction. I just find it very odd that they tell us that the native suicide rate here is extremely high. The Chief wrote an open letter to the newspaper in Thunder Bay asking for any help for his people that anyone could give, that there weren’t natives on the jobs sites. OK – enough of that!

We stopped for the night in Winnipeg. It’s cold and windy here. We’re into finding a good place to eat tonight, but I hope we don’t have to walk much.

The drummer from our last band, Chris Brown, lives here in Winnipeg now. I’ve lost contact with him over the years. We looked him up online, but there are 45 of them in the phone book. It doesn’t look like we’ll b e able to find him.

Tonight’s experiment will be seeing if I can tack on today’s photos to the album I made last night, or do I have to re-create the thing all over again?

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Day 3 - Nipigon to Dryden – Moose Street Party?

It was a pretty uneventful day today. I’d stayed up until about 1:00am working on a web site for a client. The bed was a bit too soft. I woke up at 8:30 with a sore back and a burning desire to get out of that town. The wind was blowing the light cold rain around us. I think the temperature was about 5 degrees. The skies were overcast, again! That’s what the weather has been like all the way so far.

We drove straight to Thunder Bay and searched around for a while to find a decent place for breakfast. A Western Omelette, 2 glasses of milk and some toast and 30 minutes and we were off again! We headed straight north along 121 to 11. I was supposed to head west for about a half hour to visit Kakabeka Falls. That’s the second travel tip that Wilf has sent me, and I’ve missed them both. Send one more Wilf – I’ll make it to the next one. I promise!


We drove past the Arctic Watershed and got a picture. We stopped at “The Beaver Post”. I HAD to see what that was. It was somewhat disappointing to find they sold souvenirs, moccasins and hunting stuff. We got a coffee, a coke, heard a story about “Good Christian Community” and got the hell out of there. We both had to pee. They had an old fashioned outhouse over by the trees. That’s a smell I won’t forget soon!

We put Winnipeg in the GPS as our waypoint when we headed out this morning. We switched that to Kenora part way through the day, and then settled on Dryden when we got to it about 3:30 in the afternoon.

We’re starting to get bored of the same old scenery. I’m sure the flat open prairies are going to break that boredom for about an hour. Not sure how we’ll get through the next couple of days after that!


We saw a lot more of those 'Night Danger' Moose signs. I got to wondering about moose hunters. I must admit, I’ve never gone hunting but, from the little I’ve seen, they seem to get all dressed in camouflaged clothing. Then they put on a red vest and hat (presumably so they don’t shoot each other, but, I think the moose can see that red stuff too) Then they go walk through the woods like camouflaged stop signs, and spend days and week looking for a Moose. It looks to me tat the moose wait until dark and then come out onto the highway and run up and down the road. Wouldn’t the hunters be smarter to just drive, in regular clothing, and shoot them when they pass by!

Maybe I’m spending too much time thinking of dumb shit while driving 6 hours a day!

I remember Dryden from the Polka Dot Door days. (Kathie, I’ll post that story soon). We’d traveled up this way a few times on tour. It looks pretty much the same as I remembered. I’d posted something on Facebook when we got here and, wouldn’t you know it, I have a friend who grew up here! I’m glad I hadn’t gone on one of my rants about the wonders of the place. I’ll go say Hi to Camille in the morning Louise.

It seems every town has its own big frickin’ statue up here. I went and got pictures of the BF Moose, from the front, side and back. The back faces south, towards Toronto. Are these folks telling us something?

I found a great bag of cheese curds at the grocery store and quickly devoured them. I thought they’d make a good snack along with a half quart of chocolate milk, and then I’d pass on dinner. That should help me loose a few ounces, I thought. Then I read the side of the bag. 880 calories to a bag of cheese curds! No wonder I’m blowing up! I’ll bring in my running gear from the car tonight and go pound the pavement for a wile tomorrow morning to see if I can get rid of some of those curd pounds!

We should hit Winnipeg tomorrow. I’ve got the center o Canada marked in my GPS. I hope to get a picture of that tomorrow too.

Monday, October 5, 2009

Day 2 - SSM to Nipigon & He Who Hesitates . . . .

Day 2 - SSM to Nipigon - He Who Hesitates . . . .

It was a pretty uneventful day today. It shouldn't have been, but we had a lesson to learn I guess.

We got a tip from a friend that the Agawa Canyon Train Tour was a great thing to check out from Sault St Marie. We looked into it when we first got to the hotel. We lucked out even in the hotel we happened to check into was just across the road from the train station. My buddy told us it left early in the morning. I got the impression it was a half day thing. we both thought it was a great idea. We checked at the desk and there were only two seats left available. It left the station at 9:00am and would get back about 6:00 - 6:30pm. It cost just under $200.00. We were of spit minds on doing it or not. We both immediately went to the "Holy Crap" we can't start spending $200.oo a day at each of our stops over the next 6 weeks. The we did the - Oh, we can't spend all day here or we'll never get to where we want to go.

We looked the tour up online and it looked pretty good. Grand vistas over 180k of land north of town on a great train ride. We talked about it and decided to think about it over night. I got a couple more messages from friends who read our plans online and told us that the trip was amazing. - Decision made, we'll go for it. We called the desk for tickets but, too late. The last two seats were gone. Stupid us. We blew a lifetime adventure worrying about a couple of hundred dollars. Dumb = oh well. Lesson learned!

The drive out of the Sault was beautiful. We could only imagine what that train trip would have been like. There wasn’t a lot to see today. We stopped in Wawa and took a few pictures of the goose. I think northern Ontario holds some kind of record for making huge statues of dump shit. A big nickel, a huge goose. These folks have too much time on their hands over the long cold winter months thinking of crazy things to build. I just checked. The huge fish is in Gananoque. Not Northern Ontario, but long cold winters too!

We stopped in Terrace Bay for a delicious A&W hamburger. If you also wondered where the A&W chain disappeared to, they are alive and well in Northern Ontario. We came up with two unanswered questions today.

1. What makes some leaves turn bright red as apposed to just orange or bright yellow?
2. We passed a great number of sign that read’ Nightly Moose Warning – Next x number of kilometres” What’s with “Nightly” Are Moose nocturnal?

We got to the town of Nipigon by about 5:00 pm. We were really tired of driving. The fall colours in the trees were amazing around Sault St Marie, but since Wawa, they were pretty much just green and yellow. We think it was because we were north for anything other than pine trees and Silver Birch. I guess that’s the third question for the day. Where did all the colour go? Anyway. 5:00pm, tired and bored. We stopped about 100k short of Thunder bay. We got a room at a motel at the side of the road. We drove downtown where we had to make a dinner choice between a run down looking Chinese food joint, or the sub shop. The sub shop won. I think tomorrow needs to include a good meal at diner time!

Sunday, October 4, 2009

Day 1 - Is that my life in the rearview mirror?

We took a quick picture of Lynne on the front stairs of our Toronto apartment and got in the car to head out at 9:15am. We weren't rushing, but I was glad to see we were leaving about the time I wanted to be going. I don't know why it mattered, but it did a bit. Even after all of our packing and unpacking and driving more stuff up the storage unit yesterday, we still had too much stuff to travel with. We got everything (except for two sets of bar bells) into the car, but we couldn't move, or see out anything but the front and our immediate side windows. Off we went to the storage unit in Newmarket on more time to drop off a bit more stuff! We got away from there about 10:15. Headed over to the 400 and headed north.

Goodbye stuff, goodbye fiends, goodbye chiropractor, goodbye . . . yea, we really did say goodbye to everything as we passed by. Goodbye upper Canada Mall. We were remembering how small it was when we moved into Aurora a bit over 20 years ago.

My friend Wilf phoned us as we were just south of Barrie. We talked a bit about how we were feeling. We, or at least I, was pretty excited up until a day or two earlier when I started thinking about all the cool stuff we did and the friends and family that we were leaving. I did look in the rear view mirror and think, Holy Carp - everything we know and love is back there. Up ahead, the sky was dark and dismal. The weather report was calling for rain on and off all day. It looked like we were just heading into a huge storm.

As soon as we got north of Barrie, the trees were all turning colour. Bright red and orange. Beautiful. We commented on the rock at the side of the road where the road had been blasted through. Great coloured veins in the rock and the curves in the rock in this "Canadian Shield". For some reason it stood out more, and looked more beautiful than in the past. The rain came and went all day long. One minute hot and sunny, two minutes later, a bit of drizzle, 30 seconds later pouring for a minute. I spent the better part of the day adjusting the windshield washer.

We got to Sudbury, the Home of the Big Nickel (image)at about 2:00. We filled up with gas and decided that it was too early to stop driving so we headed straight west, out towards Sault St Marie. Strange the trees haven't changed colour much along the way here. There were patches of colour, but for the most part it was all still pretty much green. We past a town called Echo Bay. Those folks obviously have no sense of humour. If I were the mayor, I'd rename it Echo Bay, Bay Bay immediately!

We found a hotel across the road from the Agawa Canyon Train Tour station. Wilf tells us this is a wonderful tour. We're going to see about getting tickets and checking it out tomorrow.

i wonder how long we're going to do what we did here tonight though. We got into our room, immediately unpacked our laptops, got online and started checking email and writing. We're both pretty happy doing that, but I feel like we really should be putting off getting online and get our butts out the door to explore the town a bit.

I have been here before. Back in the Polka Dot Door days we played here a couple of times. The town seems vaguely familiar too as the town where Kevin and I played flip. Flip is where you take out your cigarette package (it was OK to smoke back then) and sit it on the table on an edge. You reach around to the far bottom corner and 'flip' it around so that it turns at least 360 degrees and, if it landed on it's edge, you win the flip and nothing happens. If it falls to the back or front of the package, you had to down a shot of . . . . whatever we had with us at the time. Kevin was good at that game. I remember laying with head on my arm which was grasping to hold on to the top of the toilet seat and being so sick I was wishing I could die. Kevin, Gerry and Cindy got me a blanket, laid it over me because I was freezing, and then left me their while they went out dancing. I woke up the next morning. I don't remember the next day's shows as being that good! I'm pretty sure that was in this town!

So - day 1 is out of the way. We got further than we'd planned to, and it looks like we'll have a 'play day' tomorrow! I expect that soon we'll be back to getting excited about what's out the front window and not that rearview mirror!

Thanks to everyone for their email, Facebook and Twitter 'bon voyage' wishes.

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Final Packing day - Goodbye Gang!

Saturday - Oct 3 -
Final Packing Day - and what a week it's been!

I stopped near the end of Lake Wilcox the other day. I was running around town looking after last minute stuff and was heading over to see Nadia for a few minutes. I stopped the car at the east end of the lake, near where we always got into the water.
I thought back to the first swim in that lake. From the dock, out to the first buoy and back again. Maybe 200 meters. I'd watched some other folks who got in after me and had swam to the far end and back. I was totally amazed, unable to imagine ever being able to swim that 1k lake. I thought of all the solo swims, before the sun came up. Swims with different folks, small groups, big groups, folks who dropped out for of group, folks who went on to decide that Lake Wilcox is a cesspool and they'd never get in again.
I thought back to the first swim at NTT. How scared I was to walk into a group of real athletes, not being able to swim. I remembered walking into the Running Room, meeting Henri and talking about how I'd signed up for an Ironman. She asked me about how I did in each sport, and her look back at me when I explained my skill level (or lack thereof!). I remembered swimming with Steve B one morning. The fog rolled in behind us as we swam to the far end of the lake. We got lost on the way back. God only knows how many circles we swam in before we came up on the south shore (instead of the east end!)
The 4 years that I "Tri'd", in some ways went by in a flash, and in some ways seem to have gone on forever.
The best part? no question here! The folks I met and encouraged me along the way. I don't want to name names for two reasons. 1. I'll miss someone or 2. I'll list them all and the internet will run out of space!
The 'gang' is a big group. From NTT to NYAC, the Ironman gang, the running gang, the weekends from Sharon bike gang, the Timberlane gang, Lake Placid and Wisconsin. The winter running gang. My condo buddies from a couple of Lake Placid trips this year. Amazing folks, all of them just a little nuts, but all of them, I'm proud to know, and honored to have been included with.
Lynne and I loaded the car this morning with everything we're taking along with us on this trip. Then we unloaded the car, and packed in everything that wouldn't fit, and I drove it up the the storage joint. I had to stop in town (Aurora) to pick up something and thought of dropping in to see Willem and Bryan on my way home again. I feel like those two guys were my brothers over the last year as we all trained for LP. I HATE "goodbye's" so I decided not to. I'm a lot better with simple "see you later's" or just disappearing from site.
I did drive a few of our biking and running routes. They didn't seem like such a big deal just prior to Ironman. Today, they felt like amazingly long distances even to drive in the car, let alone to run or bike. I think we loose touch with what it is we actually do out there.
Anyway . . . . . I got all leaky faced thinking about all the close friends, friends, acquaintances and folks I know to say hi, or folks I trained with, but don't see anymore for one reason or another.
I've been pretty excited about the adventure ahead of us and hadn't thought much about the folks we're leaving behind. Most of the folks are training folks only because this sport is so absorbing there was not much room for anything else.
Lynne and i have been able to get together with our non-trainng friends and family over the last couple of months as well. It's been great. The only problem of late is that we've been out for lunch and dinner so many times, particularly in the last couple of weeks, were both gaining weight like crazy and quickly turning into alcoholics!
So - tomorrow we're off. The plan is to be in Calgary next weekend, Victoria the following weekend, then down the Pacific Coast Highway to San Fransisco, across to Sedona, down to Green Valley and then get our butts through Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and then, on to Boquete Panama.
We'll write everyday and post ever day we have Internet access.
Oh yea, while my sensitive feminine side is still showing. To all of 'The Gang' - "Thanks, you guys ROCK!"