Day 19 - Greenville, OH to Loudon, TN

Friday, we continued our trek down Highway 127. Lots of sites getting ready for the big yard sale next weekend. In 7 Mile, OH Mary spotted the bear in the photo - makes you wonder if the wife is intimidating to everyone or just the carver. We got a good laugh out of it. South of Owenton, KY we stumbled onto an Amish store selling sandwiches and all sorts of other good stuff. We got lunch and ate out front while watching the steady stream of people. It was their first day and they were doing a great business. Food was good and inexpensive - just the way we like it. The sandwiches were so big that we used the leftovers for most of our supper.


Continuing down 127, we came to Cumberland Lake and the Wolf Creek Dam. The water is low because they are working on the dam. Crossing back into Tennessee, we were in Sargent York country - It was getting late and no place to stay so we decided to return for a day trip - it is only about 80 miles from home. We made a quick stop at the grocery store for essentials and arrived back home at 7:30pm.

Some trip facts: 4320 Miles traveled. We hit 12 states: Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, Iowa, South Dakota, Wyoming, North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio. We also went into Ontario, Canada for a day. We enjoyed the entire trip and our little Sonata did very well averaging 29mpg for the entire trip. We WILL do this again but not this year - we're glad to be back in Tennessee and plan to stay put for awhile. (But Jim did email me about a couple of fishing trips.....)

Day 18 - Gaylord, MI to Greenville, OH.

This morning we pointed the Sonata due South and began the journey back to reality. Not wanting to hurry too much, we dropped off of I75 and onto US127. Most people have never heard of US Route 127 but those of us who pursue junk as a hobby know that it is the home highway for the worlds longest yard sale. Stretching from Hudson, Michigan to Gadsden, Alabama. Check out their website for all the details - the sale is August 5-8 this year and we are seeing signs along the route.

Much of our trip today was along 2 lane roads through many small towns each sporting a town square and a business section around the square. We had so much fun driving through these towns that we forgot to take pictures! We did stop at "The Winery at Versailles" just North of Greenville, Ohio for a bit of tasting of the grape. Good stuff! The boss bought some.

Day 17 - St. Ignace, MI to Gaylord, MI

Guess what Mary did in Canada today?

We got on the roar around 9am and went North to Sault St. Marie, MI and visited the SOO locks on the St. Mary River between Lake Superior and Lake Huron. After the tour and visits to a couple of souvineer shops, we headed across the bridge to see if the Canadian version was any better - just more of the same but we did enjoy a walk on the riverfront boardwalk, a walk through the Finland festival and a really good lunch at Vincenzo's on Queen Street where we had the Labatt Blue along with our Italian lunch (It seems that a lot of Italians settled in Sault St. Marie, Ontario and some of them opened restaurants).

We then traveled back to the USA (1 1/2 hours to get across the bridge and through customs vs. 15 minutes to get into Canada). That's how the government is going to keep the bad folks out - boring them to death in line! I'm glad my tank was full and my bladder empty before starting back to the US, it is probably a crime to pee off that bridge - LOL.

The Saint Mary river on the Canadian side is really swift and the wind was blowing like crazy. Check out the video below for an idea.