Road trip!

As the saying goes..."there's no place like home!"
And it was so great to be home. It was like we never left. Trevor has been living in the house part time and has kept it fairly neat and tidy (with help from my monthly house cleaners!).
We arrived Sunday night and spent Monday doing a few errands around town (we had a list!), picking up a few groceries for home and doing laundry (I had brought home all my bedding and laundry ... its free and so convenient at home!). I also did some binge watching on TV ... I confess there are a few shows I still like to follow ... so had a quiet time catching up. I also felt really tired. I think we have been going so steadily over the past three months that it hit me when I could  just sit and relax and do nothing. 
The next few days were spent going to appointments and seeing a few friends.
But the main reason we went home was for my nephew's wedding, which was on Friday October 20th. I was so excited to go and see everyone, as we had not had a chance to go into Toronto yet to visit. For those that don't know, most of our families live in Toronto, and my sister lives in Peterborough, so this was a great venue to see the whole side of my family (small as we are!). It was a beautiful day with summer-like temperatures and sunny blue skies. The Bride was gorgeous and the Groom pretty handsome too. A great time was had by all!!

Patrick and Katie

We got back to Kitchener Saturday afternoon and had a quiet night (recovering!).  I must add that it had been very quiet at home ... I hadn't heard from many of my friends and started to think that no one cared that we were home!
Sunday afternoon we had arranged to meet some friends for lunch at a cute little bistro in Cambridge.  When we walked in there was no one else in the place, except the couple we were meeting. This was funny because the last time we had been there for dinner, during a snowstorm (oh yes ... we made it despite the weather), we were the only ones there and had the waitstaff's' undivided attention that night! So I made a comment to Hugh that we had the place to ourselves again. But on rounding a corner, I noticed a friend of ours, Marty, sitting at a small table. I have to admit my poor old brain had a hard time figuring out why Marty was sitting there, when he pointed behind me and as I turned, out came all my family and friends who had been hiding. SURPRISE!! My dear, sweet husband and kids had organized a 60th birthday party for me.  It was so great to see everyone, and now I know why I hadn't heard from anyone, they were all afraid to say something to me and blow the surprise. I  felt incredibly honoured at the distance some of my friends had come to help me celebrate.  We are very blessed to have made great friends all over Ontario, partly due to Hugh's Construction Association work, and also through our Sailing Club up in Georgian Bay. Even my Mom came!!! Thank you again to everyone who came out to make my birthday so special!

The Girls. Karen,Wendy,Laurie,Janette, Cindy

The Midland Bay Sailing Club gang

The rest of the week flew by, with my actual birthday on Tuesday, which I spent with my Mom, Alyssa and oldest friend Colleen (we met when we were 5) with lunch out in Toronto, and with my "boys" who made me dinner at home that night. 
Dentists appointments, yoga, shopping for some goodies to take back to the boat, and meeting up with a few more friends, and the next thing you know, it was time to head back.
As Alyssa had picked us up in Buffalo on the way up, we enlisted the help of Trevor to take us back to Buffalo to pick up the rental car. We left Thursday afternoon with the car full of clean laundry, clothes and provisions, with a little room for Trevor in the back seat.  When we arrived at the border, the US Customs and Border Protection Officer gave us quite a hard time about our crossing into the States.  His first command was to "take off your sunglasses" and then he questioned why the car was so full, how long we had already been in the States, how much longer we were going to be in the States and asked if we had an itemized list of everything we were bringing into the states (of course Hugh did!). At one point I thought he was going to take us into the office and search us! But after answering most of the questions correctly, and asking for forgiveness for the ones we didn't, his attitude completely changed, he wished us a good trip and let us go. And I still had all my goodies!! Phew!
We spent the night in Buffalo again and left bright and early, as we had to get the car back to the rental office  before 6pm and had a good 8 hour drive ahead of us.  It was a beautiful drive through the Allegheny Mountains and most of the trees were is full color. The sunshine helped too!

The Alleghany Mountians

The Chesapeake Bay Bridge

We arrived in time to grab a few groceries, put everything on the boat, take the car back, and go over for dinner with new friends George and Bev who live right by the boat yard where we had kept the boat. They also have a Hanse 415 and spent last winter in the Bahamas. We followed their blog with great interest, and through the miracle of the internet finally connected and met for dinner in Annapolis. They kindly offered to keep an eye on Trekker for us while we were home, and invited us over for dinner when we got back. They are headed for the Bahamas again this winter and we hope to catch up with them at some point.
So early Saturday morning we left the boat yard and headed back out into the Chesapeake to sail down to Solomon's Island to meet up with Bob and Sheila. They were in Annapolis for most of the time we were home having some boat projects done, and we were very happy to be able to catch up with them.  It was quite a crazy sail down, as the winds were stronger than predicted (of course), were blowing from the south (we were going south) and the waves were quite large (I say 6-7 feet but Hugh says 3-4!). I was glad to make it to the marina and so happy to catch up with our buddy boat! Of course, dinner and beers were in order to celebrate the reunion!
Yesterday we stayed in the marina as the forecast for heavy rain had materialized and it gave us a chance to get organized and re-settled from being at home. In the later afternoon we walked 2 miles to the Ruddy Duck Brewery (I know, such a surprise) and had pizza and beer.  We came back to Trekker afterwards for a game of euchre (sadly the boys won so now they are up a set).  While we were playing cards the winds picked up and, wow, did it blow!! The wind instrument showed 33 knots at one point! And it blew all night and is still blowing! So we will spend another day in the marina. At least the sun is shining, and we will get a chance to see the town!
Tomorrow we will start to head south again and make our way to Norfolk in a few days, which is where the ICW begins (Intracoastal Waterway).  That will be the next stage of this trip, and a challenging one, as some bridge heights through the ICW are 65 feet and our mast height is 64.4 feet plus antenna and wind instruments!! But, we have a solution to get under the bridges, which I'm sure doesn't surprise any of you who know Hugh!!
I will leave the explanation of the solution for the next installment as we venture south....
One Day at a time!