Road Trip - Day 27 (follow up from last night)

Sometimes when you plan an adventure road trip you end up with more of one or the other.  Last night we got both.

After logging a good day in miles we found a nice (although crowded) campground in Gladstone MI.  We set up our tents and relaxed as a storm front moved in.  Eventually the mosquitoes drove us to the shelter of our tents where we read and chatted (and texted), and tried to stay cool (which was actually not too hard with that lovely lake "breeze" blowing in with the front).

Around 21:30 the rain started.  By 22:00 the wind was causing quite a flap outside as branches started falling from the trees and a couple of RV awnings were ripped from their rollers.  It wasn't long before the first big gust pushed our tent down startling Katherine.  But tents are built for this so I stood up and pushed the tent back into an upright position.  Piece of cake.  Then the wind got stronger.

I stood in the center of the tent holding up the windward side against the gale which worked for a while until one gust hit so hard that it nearly knocked me off my feet; queue first tent pole "snap".  The forecast called for this wind to last until at least midnight and it wasn't even 23:00 yet.  We could sleep in the tent with one broken pole, but I was losing confidence in my ability to hold the tent up for another hour against the battering wind.

Gust after gust pounded us and Katherine started to get...rattled.  She asked if the tent would blow away and I told her that it was secure as long as the tent stakes hold.  We could hear things blowing outside, branches falling (sometimes on vehicles), and there were flashes of lightning to add spark to our drama.  As the tent would lean over the rain would blow in under the rain fly getting Katherine and her bed wet.  Another pop told me that we lost another tent pole.  Then the wind picked up...again.  I'm from the Midwest and familiar with a good storm and, contrary to the Weather Channel forecast, these were not 13mph winds!

I heard a tree fall not too far away.  Holding the tent with my hand was becoming almost impossible so I let it drop onto my back and began giving Katherine instructions to pack electronics and anything that would be destroyed by rain (like her books).  Katherine doesn't handle high stress situations very well so she became a little flustered.  I told her we were fine and to just take a breath and listen to each instruction.  A little side note; it's actually really hard to convince your slightly freaked out daughter that everything is fine when you have to practically yell it at the top of your lungs in order to be heard over the wind. 🥴

She did it; turned on the temperamental lantern, packed the electronics, gathered her books, dug the car key out of my skirt pocket, and crawled through the collapsed part of the tent to find the door zipper.  She made a dash for the car while I went to check on Patrick.  His tent, smaller than ours and shielded from the worst wind by our larger tent, was unscathed, but the falling branches and tree were still concerns.

We moved to the car, but by now the rain had stopped and the wind was actually a comfortable cure for the heat and bugs.  Most of the camp was up and milling around, some assessing damage, others packing their cars to go somewhere else.  You could almost predict midwestern residents (before looking at their license plate) familiar with this kind of weather because they had secured their belongings either inside, with bungee cords, or under the heavy picnic tables.  The ones running around trying to gather their things as the wind carried it around were from other parts of the country or Canada, and many of them were leaving in their cars.

We tried to rest in the car with the windows open, but by midnight the wind died down and the heat and bugs returned...and my car doesn't have screens🦟.  Patrick relocated his tent to near the car, but none of us were finding a comfortable place to rest.  A brief discussion about how to proceed quickly brought us to consensus; load and go...drive to the next available motel or hotel and get some sleep.  Easy peasy.

In record time we had broken camp (it's surprisingly fast to take down a tent already crushed into a heap) and were on the road in search of less exciting accommodations.  The first dozen motels all had "no vacancy" lights shining brightly.  The first seven hotels were full so I just settled in for a drive; we'd clearly have to get out of the UP.  It turns out that in addition to the already higher tourist volume, scores of local campers were in the same boat we were, they just gave up much faster than we did (wimps!).

The up-side to driving in the middle of the night is that there's no traffic.  The down-side (aside from not being asleep) is that it was lonely in the car.  Patrick, who may need to drive, went right to sleep.  Katherine, who was still flying on adrenaline, needed to decompress...that means talking.  "Best camping ever!", "now I see why you always use tent stakes!" (she had challenged the necessity of such work earlier in the evening), and of course several minutes about how she would incorporate a gale storm at camp into her latest Friday the 13th storyline.  Then...zzzzzzzz.  Silence.  Just me and the hum of my trailer-hauling engine.

Eventually I had to stop for gas.  I found a 24-hour pit stop, filled up, hit the bathroom, and returned to our journey north into Canada.

At the border they ask what I'm hauling.  It's now 04:00 in the morning and I'm a little punchy.  It took all of my focus and willpower to not say something cheeky, "motorcycles".  "Like dirt bikes or actual motorcycles?"  "Actual motorcycles."  "How many?"  (pause) "Four."  A confused look crossed her face.  I am, after all, traveling with one young adult and one clearly-not-old-enough-to-drive teen.  That's two drivers fewer than the number of motorcycles I am hauling.  I was ready for the confusion this time because the same confused look came from the Canadian border guard when we drove west.  I then had to explain; haul bikes to Montana...working men...fly in for two weeks of adventure...fly back to work...haul bikes back to Vermont.  Quizzical look then back to the rest of the routine questions.  "Drive safe", and we were back on the road.  As we drove away I mumbled under my breath, "safe-LY, drive safe-LY".

Now in Sault St. Marie Canada we began again looking for a place to sleep.  We found the last room in the last hotel...on the planet.  The clerk gave us the keys, told us where to park our rig, and then asked if 14:00 would be sufficient for a late checkout.  Why do we need a late checkou...oh, it's 05:00 and normal checkout is 11:00.  I smiled, inasmuch as one can smile on ninety minutes of sleep in the last twenty-four hours, and said my most heartfelt "thank you" and then went to the car to collect some overnight things, park the car, and hike to the room.

I'm sure I took my shoes off before falling dead on the bed, but it could just as easily been a shoe ferry who laid them neatly by the chair.  We'll just never know.