Finally Escaped New York

We spent a not-so-quiet night in the Krystal Dodge parking lot. There was a contractor there until midnight working on building renovations and a parts delivery around 4 am. Actually the contractor was quite friendly and let us plug into his power cord, so we had air conditioning on a rather warm evening (asphalt certainly holds the heat). The parts guy we never saw only heard a loud and rattling cart of parts being rolled about.

The service department opened at eight and we were ready and waiting. They determined that the brake hose on the left front wheel had been shifted at some point and rubbed against the suspension, eventually rubbing through. We are not sure how that happened, but it may have been when the van took to the air over a large bump on our trip back from Tennessee. We damaged a tire and broke a water tank holding strap in that escapade.

The service tech ordered up a new hose, installed it and sent us on our way by noon. After a short detour in Warrensburg for fuel and lunch, we headed up Rt 28 into the depths of the Ardirondacks once more, wending our way back through Blue Mountain Lake (again!), then Tupper Lake and out of the Park to Canton and finally the Canadian border at Ogdensburg, NY.

The bridge over the St. Lawrence River was a bit of a surprise. It was about a mile long, has two curves in it and has a completely metal-grate surface. Even the van tires wobbled a bit going over it. It would have been extremely interesting on the motorcycles. After a short wait in line for the border check on the Canada side, we were off to the Rideau River Provincial Park for the night. We were looking for showers. They have them. The sites overlooking the picturesque Rideau River were all taken, so we opted for a site with electricity -- a treat because it was still hot and sticky.

Just to make sure that we didn't have a day without excitement, we stopped a bank when we got off the highway near the park to get some Canadian cash from an ATM. I could not find my bank ATM card, which I last used about two weeks ago. I did this last year as well, prior to our trip to Nova Scotia--I've got to stop going to Canada! We (I) was a bit leery of using Ellen's card, since when we tried to use it at a branch of the same bank last year, it ate the card. Hopefully, the bit of cash we had left over from that trip will last through Ontario.

We don't expect to make all the way tomorrow as it is over 500 miles from here, but we'll see