Blog 10—We are now in a foreign country!

Sunday, July 15, 2015>>As we passed from the US into Canada things changed—Less people, less traffic, less business, less signs—yes, it is like we are in a foreign country, and I like it! But first, we did have to make it into the country to the north.

Going through customs, Tina told them she had a canister of pepper spray (no, not for use on me), which, we found out, is not allowed in the country. So, we had to go through a secondary custom inspection, we gave them the pepper spray, they also searched the van. Fortunately, they found nothing else (what am I hiding?) The customs guy spoke good English, but French was apparent everywhere.

The trouble for me right away was, I never took the time to learn to speak Canadian, and so, having a hard time. But, we are finding a few people who can speak American, so it is not too bad (see me smile.)

Our first travels in this country, how wonderful. There are far less people, less buildings, less cars, less billboards and advertising, very nice. Everything we have been seeing looks very cleaned up and quite presentable.

To see a sign reading “100 kilometers per hour” was something new (60mph it is.) So sad that when President Jimmy Carter tried to convert the US into using the metric system the American’s did not go for it, such a better system for measuring. Yet, it is a new language for us, learning, learning.

We both love our time in Canada, so different it is. From the part we’ve seen so far, we think it is so very beautiful. The air, land and water are very clean, a pleasant experience. I could see us living here, but, of course, only in our van. As you know, we will travel for the warm weather, so Canada only in the summer. What do you think about going to Alaska next summer, Tina? They might even have covered bridges there.

Seeing so many covered bridges in Canada, very nice. Yes, we see them in Pennsylvania, but not nearly as many, neat to see the history that it provides. We didn’t go through one, so sorry for that, next time we’re up here?

One strange thing, we have been are some of the biggest sea gulls and crows we have seen. Yes, Scary sea gulls and creepy crows, an interesting thing. Did you see the movie birds? Yes, that scary.

Arriving in St. George, it was off to the beach. We drove a lot on this day, nice to arrive somewhere. First time for a long time we smelled stinky air, city air. You might be able to tell, we like parks, wilderness and the out-of-doors much better than any city. But, we did find park locations to explore.

Off we went to Kiwanis Centennial Park and beach, where we parked on the street and walked down to the beach. Many people at the beach, we fit right in. They do have a parking lot you can pay for, but street parking so close, we had to.

Next stop was St. John. Everything closed up early, like sixish. Spent the night last night in a 24 hour open McDonalds and slept well. Awoke to a clear sky, bright sun; a great start to a grand day. In fact, the whole day has been marvelous. We spent most of the morning at McDonalds working on computer.

July 13, 2015>>The morning was spent in Rockwood Park, a splendid place. In the park was Lily Lake Restaurant, where, after taking a nice bike ride, we had a lunch on the outside deck, which was overlooking the lake. Class was in the air, we felt superb. Lunch was very classy.

With this excellent weather, we both love it!

Seeing a group of duckies swim by, and nature all around, it makes me feel so good. What a perfect day with Tina spent at Rockwood Park in St. John in NB in Canada. See http://www.rockwoodpark.ca/. We took a short walk up to falls at Rockwood Park; a beautiful site awaited your eyes.

Off we go to watch the biggest tide change in the world. This was amazing; the tide went out more and more; going out a half mile out as we watched it. We also went to something called Reversing rapids—take a look, http://discoversaintjohn.com/places/fallsview-park/ This is the biggest tide water change in the world, because of how the land is and the pull of the moon.

It’s funny, I thought the entire east in Canada was French speaking, and we are not even hearing an accent from people. I am guessing it is spoken more in the province of Quebec and in Quebec City itself, as well as Montreal.

Natural thermal heating of a pool–we had to go in. Also, it had been a couple days since the last shower, so a need. This pool held saltwater, a nice change. With the heavier salt water, it was easy to float, quite fun. Into the shower they have after the swim. Now all clean and smiling we are.

Lobster for the second time, can you believe it? This was even more special than the other day with our lobster tails. Almas is a small, quaint place hidden away and hard to get to, but worth the effort.

July 15, 2015>>Every day we are doing so much, hard to keep up.

We found Julie through coachsurfing.com and we connected and are spending the night with her. What a fantastic vegetarian meal she made for us; a new friend is made. She loved her new skill after I taught her to juggle.

So good to meet new people in this way, traveling and always having a flow of new faces. Julie went on to earn her Ph.D. and she is still studying. I am so impressed with what she has done.

Living and traveling—why did we not think of doing this a couple years ago—what a pleasing new life this is. If you do not love your life how it is currently, you can always make the changes necessary to make your life better.

As we are driving between cities we are seeing houses that are really out in the boondocks. We wonder what these people possibly do for a living, how far might they have to travel for their work, how often do they have to take a trip to the market and how far; might you have answers? But, this would be for anyone who lives in the wilderness anywhere.

July 17, we decided to rent a campsite for tonight, and I’m so glad we did. Showers, free wifi, nice restaurant—a choice and a beautiful place. Sugarloaf Mountain in Cambellton, Canada is for skiing and in the summer, then, they developed off road biking for mountain biking.

We saw many young guys there who take the ski lift up, including their bike, then bike down on the difficult terrain. One fee for the day, as many times down as you want; looked like great fun. We had our bikes with us, but no.

July 18, 2015—We have a week until the juggling convention in Quebec that we are aiming for, so, we have time to spend. What better way to spend time than to head back down to Bar Harbor in Maine? We loved our time there and there is a little island off Bar Harbor that we did not get to—so here we go!

The first dismal weather we have had since we started out, a bad day as we pass from Canada back into the US. Right away we are seeing the difference of countries: More businesses and signs and people and . . . Felt safer and better in Canada for some reason, yet more familiar in the US. So, we return from a glorious time in Canada for bad weather and people and signs?

While in Canada our GPS and Cell phones were not working. So, we went back to the old ways of using maps and guessing. On return, nice to be able to depend on GPS and cell once again, this does make life easier.

Earlier I wrote about my traveling across country in the old days by car. Because they were not invented yet, I did not use GPS or cell. Boy, I wish I would have been the one to think of these things back then. What is the next advancement in humanity? Will you think of it?

Speaking of GPS, this reminds me of when we went to see a lighthouse lweek. There was someone there who was talking with visitors about the lighthouse (being a volunteer, such a nice thing to do.) He told us that this lighthouse, as well as most others in the world, are no longer needed, these days vessels us GPS to navigate. Surprised and sad to hear this.

We arrived at Quebec City in Canada for http://ym.juggle.org/?page=aboutfestival. The first day we were there I saw four Japanese jugglers arrive at 4am, and, talk about great juggling, these guys were the top; quite excellent. They spoke no English, but were able to communicate to the three of us that they were hungry. We helped them to find some vending machines and found a way to heat water for their cup-o-noodles, so they got satisfied.

I showed these four excellent Japanese jugglers the book I wrote in the eighties, Juggling with Finesse. Of course, they could not read a word, but loved all the photos. I gave them a copy and they were all so happy for that, bowing much.

But, it seemed, the skill level of most of the other jugglers at the convention was quite mediocre/amateur/hobbyist, at best. In fact, after only being there for three days of the six day convention, Tina and I headed out. I did not see how we could benefit from being there, and, more important, did not see how I could benefit anyone. On those three days I did go around and help all I could with improvement ideas for jugglers there.

Tina has a friend who she used to work with who let her know she was going to Kennebunkport, Maine with her boyfriend to camp for a few days. So, off we went and spent a lovely evening with them last night, before we were off to yet another Walmart to sleep the night. There were many vehicles there with sleeping people, the most I have seen.

Lobster again!? We are in Maine, you know, Maine lobster—fresh from the ocean—we had to, one final time. In these three times we had whole lobster, it had gotten better every time. Sooooooooooooo good.

July 25–Whoops, yesterday, as I was backing into a space to park the van, I accidentally backed into someone. This guy was so pissed off, hard to deal with him. In fact, I said, “my name is Kit, by the way”, he would not tell me his name. We were in a full parking lot, he was three feet into my side, which I did not see. Anyway, he called the cops to have them come out, so we had to wait.

Like I wrote, I was alright with what happened, but this guy bugged me, much. In fact, that night I awoke at 1:33am and could not get back to sleep again, thinking about this guy and how he was.

July 26, 2015—Last night we ventured into a national campground that was, simply, astonishing. With my pass the site was only $5, so nice it was. We took showers in the morning and feel so good today.

We met Russ, who is also travelling in his vehicle, a big motor home. He is working toward visiting all 48 states, nice. Learn more of Russ here>>> .https://russontheroad.wordpress.com/

We are back in New York State driving again, heading up to Adirondack Park. So very nice it is to drive through. We saw another covered bridge, this time we went through it.

Wanting to get these words off to you, I conclude now.

Hope you are enjoying life as much as I am.

Bye for now>>>>>>>>Kit