March 17 to 24, 2009

Life is starting to slow down for us again. People are starting to leave the park and head home, at various speeds, to their summer locations. It's still pretty cold in some parts of the country. Two couples that we spent a lot of time with this winter have hit the road today and are heading back to their Canadian homes.

With everyone leaving, there are not as many organized activities to participate in. There is still lots to keep us busy, however. We attended a Chicago Cubs baseball game on Friday. It was very hot and our seats didn't have any shade. Then on Saturday we experienced the opposite end of the spectrum by attending a Phoenix Coyotes/Vancouver Canucks hockey game. We wore warm clothing and it was still cold! Some people actually went wearing shorts. Not this guy. The game was exciting though - if you like onesided games. Vancouver showed up on paper but that's all. Phoenix played very well and executed some pretty good playmaking. Plus, we saw that shot that's probably on all the highlight reels this week - when Phoenix was getting a penalty and Vancouver put the goal in their own net, from the blue line; and the goal scorer was the same person that got the penalty for Phoenix.

We've stopped hiking as there are too many snakes around; the weather this year has been anywhere from 10 to 20 degrees warmer than average, and as a result the snakes are out earlier. We will still bike though, and will find other things to keep us busy.

We've been planning our route home. So far it looks like we'll travel along the I-40 to Oklahoma City and then up I-44 and I-70 to Indianapolis, then northward towards Sarnia where we expect to cross into Canada. We'll visit Sicard in Hamilton (where we bought our motorhome) for some maintenance, and Tech Mobile in Lindsay to check out our satellite dish. After that we'll visit family in the Toronto area and then head to Ottawa for the summer. We'll be staying at Recreationland just outside of Rockland, Ontario. We'll finally get to meet Sandra and Gordon whose blog we've been following for a couple of years now. Sandra's blog is http://srmerrikinblog.blogspot.com/ .

A dear friend of ours, who we met and got to know in Whitehorse, Yukon, passed last week. Joyce Hayden was a remarkable woman, a strong women's rights activist, and a great person. She'll be missed. Our deepest sympathies go out to Earle and family members.