Pinery Provincial Park & Chicago
Leaving Niagara to head towards Chicago, which is about 8 hours away, we decided to break it up with a couple of stop offs and our first provincial park. We both love the driving aspect of the journey but have to be mindful of the pups, especially Miss Peaches who does not travel very well at all in the van (bit of a challenge I hear you say seeing as we are on a massive road trip through Canada and US - yup!!) So just over 3 hours away we discovered the Pinery Provincial Park - not quite wild camping but certainly has a more natural feel than our previous campsite. We love the fact too that it protects the largest remaining tract of Oak Savanna and one of the longest freshwater coastal dune ecosystems in Ontario! An absolutely amazing chilled spot and we camped up next to Lake Huron with a cool breeze and sat under the stars with a campfire to keep warm and the mozzies away. We had to buy the firewood from their woodlot as ‘transporting firewood from external sources can introduce invasive species that threaten the heart of the park ecosystems’. Love their ethos! No light pollution and the best sleep in a while!💤
So after two great nights sleep we set off towards the US border. I had already applied for our ESTAs (which was so easy by the way, all online and confirmation received within a few hours), so all we needed was our passports and the dogs documentation - oh and a relatively empty fridge as there is a long list of food and drink you cannot take in. Breakfast this morning was quite an interesting feast!
So just over an hour drive and we were at the border - interesting fact we passed through a place called Sarnia on the way to the border (for those that don’t know Sarnia is the Latin name for Guernsey and our island’s anthem is called Sarnia Cherie - Dear Guernsey 🇬🇬)
Exciting and a bit nerve wracking at the same time as we drove up to the booth, I opened my window and the guy did a double take then burst out laughing when he realised the steering wheel was the other side of the cabin. He made a joke and I thought ‘oh wow this is a cool customs guy, nice and relaxed’. But no he didn’t want my passports just $5 for the toll 😆. So onto the next section where he did want our passports and then directed us to park up the van. We then had to go into the customs office to be checked etc and we made these officers chuckle too when he asked me what the other booklets were in my hand and I said passports for the dogs … they’d never seen or heard of these before and promptly handed them around to his colleagues!!
The whole process didn’t take long at all and relatively easy, so here we are now in the US 🇺🇸
Next stop for the night was a place called Kalamazoo. It was literally half way from Pinery to our friends in Chicago and we also just like the sound of the name - plus we love the Black Keys song “Gotta Get Away” 🎶.
Next day we headed to Chicago and what a cool city it is! Set right on Lake Michigan in Illinois it is among the largest cities in the US with the most amazing bold architecture and quite a spectacular skyline too. Having not see my old school friend Kim for about 5 years it was great to be able to go visit her and Ronnie, and to enjoy their beautiful home which is only a sort distance from the city centre in a quiet residential area. We had a lovely chilled few days together involving pizza, beers, wine and lots of laughter. We were also given an amazing city tour by our very knowledgable hosts - although what they didn’t know I think they may have made up 😂 Tubbs particularly loved Whacker Drive - the place where Batman was filmed! Quite a dark and insidious space through the subterranean levels. 🦇 Next time I think he’d like to take the van down there for a photo shoot.
So having enjoyed our time in the city (thank you Ronnie & Kim for looking after us and also for letting us do our laundry🧺) it was time to head off to somewhere completely different … The Badlands
Tubbs & TA ❤️
