We can move south of the travel spreadsheet. Well actually north. 

Yesterday we took an unscheduled drive up into Canada. Ontario to be precise.

The day had started with a visit to the gravesite and memorial of Dick Winters. Dick is an American World War II hero. MOD being a bit of a WWII buff has watched Band of Brothers multiple times, where the story of Dick and many other war hero’s are told. The visit was humbling, reminding us of the tremendous sacrifices so many men and women have made to make our lives what they are today. 

A visit to Starbucks for the mandatory coffee and onwards and upwards to Canada. The night before I discovered I needed an electronic visa to get in, even though we had previously swung by Victoria on our cruise. No problems, took four minutes and $7. The Canadian border patrol were fabulous, a few questions, a quick glance at our passports and we were off. Didn’t matter that the American and the Australian, who live in New Zealand, were there to visit the Russians and the Italians. Also turns out I didn’t need to pay that $7 to get in. Easy peasy. 

Not so this morning trying to get back into the good ole US AND A.

Stopped at the border. When I initially came into the country, the nice customs people at the airport forgot to stamp my passport which confirmed that I had indeed paid my $14 entry visa. 

Our passports were confiscated and we were instructed to leave the car and head into the customs building. I’m surprised we weren’t shackled. With 11 officers at counters and one customer ahead of us we assumed this was going to be quick. Pays not to make assumptions in these situations. After all, these guys were having some pretty heavy conversations about their personal lives which was clearly of paramount importance. After about 20 minutes, he who had the most personal issues laughed at the personal advice his comrades had provided, looked down at his desk, looked up with a somber look on his face and sternly instructed us to step forward. Serious business. How do we know each other? Who was I? What was I doing here? What were we doing? The list went on. Finally he determined, with attitude, that we weren’t going back to the USA for foul means and agreed to let us in. For $6USD. Hmmmm leaving the customs building a moment or two of Tourettes may have kicked in.

Of course it was worth every moment and every utterance of Tourette’s. We spent a lovely night with MOD’s Russian friends who were kind enough to host us in their house. This morning, the delegated tour guide, our Italian friend Loui, took us to Niagara on the Lake and Niagara Falls. 

Niagara on the Lake is a quaint little tourist town established in 1780 which is located on the Niagara Peninsula at the point where the Niagara River meets Lake Ontario and across the river from the state of New York (USA). You could swim across. Loui says they don’t need a fence, the USA have that many controls you wouldn’t get your foot up on shore without being stopped. 

It rained all day here but that didn’t matter, we would have gotten wet at Niagara anyway. Amazingly, you are right there beside the three waterfalls which straddle the international border between Canada’s Ontario and the American state of New York.

After that we drove to Utica, upstate New York, with that slight pause at the border, and had a nice meal at Delmonicas, a cute little Italian restaurant across the road from our hotel.

And yes, more bread.