Another Long Lonely Drive

So the morning was actually pretty eventful. Josh was supposed to wake up and leave for work at 6 AM, so when I looked over at my phone and saw it was 8:30, I knew that was bad. He popped right out of bed and start pacing around the hotel room yelling about how he was a dead man. He was going to be 3 hours late for his Dad, who is his boss, on his Dad's birthday. Josh and Tiffany left in quite a hurry, and as quickly as Josh came into my life, he was gone. I decided to take my time and shower and straighten up a little before heading out. I was not really in any sort of rush since it was going to be a very lonely day.

Today, I was headed back into Canada, which meant no cell phone service. Surprisingly it took me almost 6 hours to even get into Canada. I drove up along the coast of Lake Michigan, and then through the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. It was actually a very pretty drive, but I was pretty out of it still from the night before. I got out a couple times to enjoy the scenery, but couldn't spend too much time since I had a lot of ground to cover. The majority of the drive was pretty uneventful as I neared the border. I decided to stop for dinner before heading into Canada and instead of getting fast food (again), I stopped at an Applebee's to grab something healthier.

I sat down at the bar, and immediately gave into the urge to have a beer. I ordered a Shock Top and it was probably a 24 oz glass, so I had my work cut out for me. I got a chicken caesar salad which was very good, and then headed off for another Canadian adventure. I called Steve to see if he wanted to do my border patrol interview via speakerphone, but I honestly didn't want to take the chance of getting charged international roaming. As I pulled up to the booth, I was rehearsing the questions they had asked Steve so there were no problems. I started off fine, but when he asked me what I did for a living, I stumbled on my words. Not sure whether it was the rough night before plus the 6 hours I had been driving plus the beer with dinner, but my response was "I'm in dental sh-tudent." Combined school and student, and probably sounded like an idiot. From there the border patrolman was on alert, and started drilling me about where I was going, who I was seeing, was this my car, had I every been charged with a felony... I think I saved myself when I told him that I had been fingerprinted for a noise violation in college. For whatever reason, he found this to be quite humorous, saying he had heard stories about us dental students and told to be safe and have fun. Phew, that was close!!

The rest of the days drive was nice, with a beautiful sunset, but sadly, it was in the rear view mirror. I stumbled upon Espanola, ON and found the Roadside Motor Inn. I made this my home for the night, and passed out pretty early since there was no one to call, and I felt like I was just killing time on the computer. Not going to lie, this much time with zero communication is definitely tough, but I am getting better at the harmonica. ULTRA day 37/39: COMPLETE

JM