The Journey Begins

July 23
Thursday morning. After a lovely stay and a great breakfast we leave at 10:00 AM in the pouring rain. The QEW is horrible to drive on. White knuckle ally with hard rain and poor visibility all the way. The 401 isn’t any better only that the traffic slows to a crawl which makes driving a bit more manageable and certainly safer. Four hours along we stop for coffee in Whitby. It’s still pouring. Another hour and we turn off onto route 33 down into Prince Edward County. Had enough of freeway driving in the rain. We stop at the bridge across the Murray Canal at Carrying Place. Very interesting. We meet Jim the guy who runs the swinging bridge that lets the boats through when they arrive. He explains that this eight mile long canal built around 1900 cuts 120 miles off the trip for boats entering the Bay of Quinte. It also turns Prince Edward County into an island. From there we travel Welland and into Bloomfield. We stop and meet Rick at his bicycle shop and check out his bikes. We have a bike rack but no bikes. It’s still raining a drenching kind of rain and we can’t test ride them so we agree to hang around town and come back tomorrow. Rick suggests that we check out Sand Banks Provincial Park for a place to go and cook supper. He directs us to a remote place outside the park at the end of a remote access road where we can admire a beautiful terrazzo floor that’s all that’s left over from a former dance hall overlooking Lake Ontario. He also suggests we go to the Mustang Drivein north of town to watch a movie and meet his friend Paul who owns the place. He says Paul will probably let us stay there for the night for free. So just like on our first Honey moon we again went to the drive in. We saw Harry Potter the Half blood Prince, I didn’t like it, to creepy and evil, and some comedy called something like the Hangover, I liked it cause it was stupid mindless humour. And yup Paul let us stay right there for the night. Like Rick and his Bike Shop, both Paul and the Drive in were a real throw back in time. Paul and Rick and their wives are sort of like hippies only Rick likes to call it “Free people” It made for a nice end to the first day. And yes it was still raining.