Hi there.. it's Aaron from the passenger seat. Didn't intend to post but when times are tough sometimes you just need to vent. We are on day seventeen, so if you have been following the twitter updates you know three important things by now:
1. Our AC went out as we were coming through Wis Dells Wisconsin (the subject of many jokes in twitter) and heading into Chicago. Chicago was hellfire hot by the way (not that I know firsthand how hot this is).
2. We got the pleasure of 3 days on the beach in Grand Haven Michigan (beautiful city) with our good friends Ed, Heather, Eli, Hadassah, Eden, and Wyeth (beautiful people). We miss them already.
3. We left Grand Haven having dropped a "cool" G on the AC (pun intended), but we were refreshed and ready for the next part of our adventure in upper New England. Next stop Niagara Falls...
With these fact in hand you are prepared for what we will be known as the "Curse of the Wis Dells" (pronounced Wiz Dells) - be very careful all who would mock Wis Dells... it will have the final laugh, which usually involves water/liquids of some kind (it is the Water Park Capital of the World after all).
So let me recount the last 24 hours.
1. Leave Grand Haven enjoying the cool ride with the AC working fantastically in both the front and rear of our vehicle.
2. Cross the border into Canada, (the curse begins) and we discover just how painful a gallon of gas can be... 4.80/gal. Canada is not all that great (sorry for the dig Meghan), so we start changing the next days travel plans to get to Montreal via a US route instead
3. After 10 hours on the the road, we arrive into the "water" heavy area of Niagara - picture the gods of Wis Dells smiling as you trot unsuspectingly like prey into their den.
4. Camp is struck and we are just sitting down with a tall glass of "BFT cooler", when I step into the camper to see a very large puddle of water easing its way across the floor. Using my immense deductive powers, I follow the flow back upstream to its mighty source.... the toilet/shower area - which we have converted into a closet for all our clothes. Opening the door to our "closet", I discover that 6 inches of water has becomes the new habitat for our undies, towels, bras, and all sorts of necessary "unmentionables". "Wis Dells"!!! I cry, shaking my fist at the gods. Karie, looking for a positive spin on this, suggests putting all of our Canadian quarters to use in the campground's coin-op laundry. I suggest natural drying and so we leave our clothes out for the night on the picnic table. It starts to rain about 530 in the morning. Now, I don't sleep in much, but I can honestly say I have never put a load of "unmentionables" in the dryer quite that early!!
5. Off to Niagara we say... car is loaded, family fed, campground in the rear view mirror, I leisurely reach over to blast our family with a cool breeze from our fully functioning air conditioning, when to my great surprise, I am smited by the hot breath of Satan himself. "Wis Dells!!!" I cry again. Goodbye for now air conditioning.
6. Okay, stuff happens. "Move on", I say. "The BFT is an adventure and all adventures have their hiccups." As we drive into the GREAT Niagara Falls (as all the signs say), I am greeted by the hail of multi story casinos, major resort hotel chains, power lines, souvenir shops, boat tours dotting the base of the falls, and parking lots with weeds growing out of them - from the glory days gone by of Niagara as a major destination. To say we were all disappointed is an understatement. We didn't bother getting out and paying the 20 bucks for parking. We just snapped some picture from the car and kept on trucking towards the US border. "Wis Dells," I whimpered.
7. Wet backs, moist creases, sweaty fore heads, and pooling navel regions (yeah - more than you wanted to know), we are now 4 hours into our drive. With the windows down we pull over to the side of road. Karie.... not so happy. Aaron ... a little bit better than Karie. Kids... well, they're kids. Things like "I need food, need water, need to check if that sticky stretchy toy the tooth fairy gave Sydney is still in her bag, need to potty, Sydney's not sharing, McKenna hurt my feelings. And ... how much longer?" are all making their way out (although I will say they have been awesome travelers so far).
8. Last but not least... its Sunday. The warranty we have on our AC parts doesn't do much good when there are no working mechanics. To commemorate our woes, we have taken to cracking ourselves up by putting "Wis Dells" (don't forget the fist in the air) to the tune of "Roxanne". Try it, you might crack up too!
Well - if you have made it this far into the post, then you probably have time enough to pray for us. Pastor Ed anointed us all (Thank you!) with oil before we left Grand Haven...I am not sure if the anointing just takes a few days to kick in or if it simply isn't supposed to ward off curses. Either way, we would be thankful for any additional blessing you would like to throw our way.
We are having fun and learning to laugh at a lot of really odd things. (The subject of a later blog).
Take care
Aaron
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