Day 13: End to End
Day 13 of the 2019 Prefrontal Tour was a day of happy endings and sad goodbyes. It came all too soon after the best evening of the tour - dinner with Jack and Donna at their home in Delafield, Wisconsin, with great fare and time spent together, and a rare opportunity to feed their wild turkeys and learn the finer points of pullet husbandry.
The Fast Ferry begins its day from Milwaukee at 6:00 AM, which meant rising at 3:30 to pack, load and get on the road by 4:45, at a cold but dry 45 degrees. Jack was kind enough to get up and prepare coffee and we reminisced about the trip and planted the seeds for the next one, hopefully somewhere near the Blue Ridge Parkway we hear so much about.
I rolled down the driveway with a touch of sadness at going solo again, and turned left, prepared to take the quiet country lanes through Delafield and onto the slab to Milwaukee. Sunrise was little more than a rose-colored promise on the eastern horizon, and I dodged the first deer of the day at the very first intersection in the development.
I noticed a definite chill to the air halfway to Milwaukee and realized I'd left all my vents open in the jacket, but there was nowhere to safely pull over so I decided to live with it. The sun cracked the horizon just as I turned the corner at the port, and after the now-routine loading, strapping down, and finding a seat in the cabin I settled down for the two and a half hour ride, the engines thrumming away and a gentle sway that made working on the tablet just a little uncomfortable.
We reached Muskegon on time and I pulled out of the port at 9:45 AM, now in the Eastern time zone, teeth clacking together due to Michigan's finest roads, and still a bit of a chill from the morning ride.
It was a clear blue sky but the thermometer never strayed from 55 degrees all morning and I definitely felt cold an hour in. Using human nature, I set up a "rabbit" on the highway and followed him almost all the way across the state, only slowing once when a state trooper approached from behind, that funny single bubble light they still use sticking up on the roof like something from the 50's.
I made good time at 75-80 and crossed into Canada at 1 PM with little delay. There wasn't much of note, the temperature still at a stubborn 55, other than dozens of windmills, few of them turning (as I've found is normal), but maybe somebody forgot to tell them they need to turn to generate electricity? There's a joke in there somewhere... I stopped once to put the liner in the jacket, but didn't plug it in.
I came back into the U.S. at 4 PM using a crossing that was new to me, and immediately noticed state troopers all over the highways handing out tax receipts. And I thought Utah was the police state? I saw a half-dozen people pulled over during my transit.
I also saw deer trying to cross the road in every state I traveled, including Ontario, as if they knew this was their last day to try to get me. The first one having come only a minute into the ride I got more anxious as I watched my shadow growing long before me. They got only more numerous the further east I rode, one running out of the bushes at the edge of the highway, thankfully stopping when I honked the horn.
I continued to make good time and fell in with the right crowd, the sun setting its last just as I swung north nearest the port of Albany, and leaving the same rosy promise I'd witnessed 15 hours before, just on the other side of the sky.
I arrived back home at 8:45 PM Eastern to great fanfare and a cheering crowd of one, but it was the right one. You see, the 13th day of the Tour was also our 13th wedding anniversary, and even if it took 15 hours of travel and a record-setting epic day, I wasn't going to miss it for the world.
And so concludes the traveling portion of the tour, dear readers. I'll crunch the numbers and do the math and make a final post to document the details, but for now I'm on to the next great adventure and already halfway to Charlotte, NC to check out housing options. You know what they say, a rolling stone catches the worm. Or something like that.
Until next time. Onward and upward!
The Fast Ferry begins its day from Milwaukee at 6:00 AM, which meant rising at 3:30 to pack, load and get on the road by 4:45, at a cold but dry 45 degrees. Jack was kind enough to get up and prepare coffee and we reminisced about the trip and planted the seeds for the next one, hopefully somewhere near the Blue Ridge Parkway we hear so much about.
I rolled down the driveway with a touch of sadness at going solo again, and turned left, prepared to take the quiet country lanes through Delafield and onto the slab to Milwaukee. Sunrise was little more than a rose-colored promise on the eastern horizon, and I dodged the first deer of the day at the very first intersection in the development.
I noticed a definite chill to the air halfway to Milwaukee and realized I'd left all my vents open in the jacket, but there was nowhere to safely pull over so I decided to live with it. The sun cracked the horizon just as I turned the corner at the port, and after the now-routine loading, strapping down, and finding a seat in the cabin I settled down for the two and a half hour ride, the engines thrumming away and a gentle sway that made working on the tablet just a little uncomfortable.
We reached Muskegon on time and I pulled out of the port at 9:45 AM, now in the Eastern time zone, teeth clacking together due to Michigan's finest roads, and still a bit of a chill from the morning ride.
It was a clear blue sky but the thermometer never strayed from 55 degrees all morning and I definitely felt cold an hour in. Using human nature, I set up a "rabbit" on the highway and followed him almost all the way across the state, only slowing once when a state trooper approached from behind, that funny single bubble light they still use sticking up on the roof like something from the 50's.
I made good time at 75-80 and crossed into Canada at 1 PM with little delay. There wasn't much of note, the temperature still at a stubborn 55, other than dozens of windmills, few of them turning (as I've found is normal), but maybe somebody forgot to tell them they need to turn to generate electricity? There's a joke in there somewhere... I stopped once to put the liner in the jacket, but didn't plug it in.
I came back into the U.S. at 4 PM using a crossing that was new to me, and immediately noticed state troopers all over the highways handing out tax receipts. And I thought Utah was the police state? I saw a half-dozen people pulled over during my transit.
I also saw deer trying to cross the road in every state I traveled, including Ontario, as if they knew this was their last day to try to get me. The first one having come only a minute into the ride I got more anxious as I watched my shadow growing long before me. They got only more numerous the further east I rode, one running out of the bushes at the edge of the highway, thankfully stopping when I honked the horn.
I continued to make good time and fell in with the right crowd, the sun setting its last just as I swung north nearest the port of Albany, and leaving the same rosy promise I'd witnessed 15 hours before, just on the other side of the sky.
I arrived back home at 8:45 PM Eastern to great fanfare and a cheering crowd of one, but it was the right one. You see, the 13th day of the Tour was also our 13th wedding anniversary, and even if it took 15 hours of travel and a record-setting epic day, I wasn't going to miss it for the world.
And so concludes the traveling portion of the tour, dear readers. I'll crunch the numbers and do the math and make a final post to document the details, but for now I'm on to the next great adventure and already halfway to Charlotte, NC to check out housing options. You know what they say, a rolling stone catches the worm. Or something like that.
Until next time. Onward and upward!
