Roving Reporter Joins Dog on Trip to Canada

Just a check... On my last adventure, I was fed carrots for 31 straight days as I recall. Not this time I vowed. But just to be sure, each day Ms Daisy and I ventured into the 95 degree surrounding and looked. We checked the car for carrots. None. We checked the road side stands. No carrots. We checked McDonalds. No carrots. We looked between rows of the miles and miles of short mid-west corn. No carrots! This we concluded was good. It says our outing this year will be a real adventure.

To prove this premise, let me give you just an idea what to expect in the coming days. Sal planned an outing for today. You can decide if it measured up to the standard: an adventure. We are camping at Hole-in-Rock, an Illinois State Park, so far south you are going North. Nice quiet place in the process of recovering from being ravaged by an ice storm last winter. Breakfast and a quick shower...temp 91. Pirates once lived here. Sal has maps, folders, brochures, and notes. I have Nuvi, my trusty GPS. Off we go to follow the Reader's Digest Illinois River trail. First we report to the highest bluff along the Ohio River. Hummm. No bluff. Remember this is an adventure. So we head off to a significant iron furnace built in 1830 to produce pig iron. Tale goes that the end product build cannon and iron clads. We missed that the first go round looking right into a river pool filled with swimming kids. Got lost. NUVI to the rescue. Turned around and back on track. On to a river town sporting a magnificant hotel famous for its 1800 offering to river traffic. Sal is going to check it out while I checked for carrots. I look in my rear view mirror and see my bride. She has a hose. Hummm. She is next to a cement truck. Yep, you got it. While looking left she walked into the fresh cememt. Plop...Plop. More river trail.... miles and miles. We pass a buffalo. We reach a ferry. What a treat. Our 3rd [after Texas and Alaska] free ride sponsored by Illinois Dept of Trans. Over to KY and into town. The lady says there is a terrific ice cream store. It was, a turn of the century store that looked the owner simply snuffed the candle and went home. No ice cream though. It is now a lunch/dinner cafe. Then it was off into the country side. Look, a horse pulling a 4 tine plow directed by a young man maybe a 6th grader. I suspect he was weeding the crops. Look, mom and two kids with a dozen new chicks. Look at the gardens. Look at the end of the road and the stream. Ups! Yes, we forged on and drove through the river exiting the opposite side. See two dozen Amish kids gathering in the grave yard to "meet" and play volley ball. Look, Amish fresh bread. Oh, you missed the sign along the way promulgating we were in the pop corn capital of the world!

Something to think about while siting at a red light. I counted 11 one story high yellow things running about the mid-west. The tires reach 8 feet in height and they are 1.5 traffic lanes wide. My trailer is .9 traffic lanes wide by the way. These machines have wings when folded resemble a grasshopper I use to catch trout. For the life of me, I cannot figure why they are all about at this time of year. Spraying and up to no good [think Round-up on gene spliced corn/beans].



Illinois citizens are on the ball. They found the means and then the funds to repair all SE Illinois bridges along Route 45 and Route 1. Each repair site has a traffic light and people really working hard. Not one person leaning on a shovel! But for some reason, all lights on the north side of the bridge are set on red. Must be a plot to slow Grant's march to Vicksburg.

Small towns are charming. They are the same everywhere. The people friendly. The true general store where you get gas, bread and gossip. You wonder as you ease by how they make their living -- supporting each other I guess. And it is interesting how few homes are for sale or being foreclosed by a local bank. Farms just out side the town limits are all neat and trim, ready for a white glove inspection by a commanding military general. The economy may have changed but real America still looks mighty good.