Toledo to Portage MI

We left the Toledo area on Saturday afternoon with no real time pressure as Bill did not have to work again until Sunday night in Portage, Michigan. We have to be very diligent about stopping at every Flying J we find as far as dumping and refilling with water. Many campgrounds are still not open and we would rather dump and fill up water for free. In fact, the Flying J in Rossford had to turn their water on for us as it is still getting cold enough to freeze it at night. I found a dog park about an hour west of Toledo that we decided to take Dozey to for some exercise. The GPS routed us on the backroads instead of I-80 which was nice on the eyes. We took US 20 west for most of the time and it must be the road with the most backyard ponds in the country. EVERYONE had one it seemed. Most were very attractive except for the ones where the owners must have spilled a little too much color additive and it looked like a bay in the Caribbean.

We never did find the fenced in dog park which was supposed to be at Harrison Lake State Park. But there was a nice picnic area that we pulled into for lunch and Bill got out the chuck it and tired Dozey out. A pretty white pit bull female came from across the way to play with Doze but he just wanted the tennis ball. From there we headed north and as traffic wasn't bad, decided to go all the way to the Target in Portage. We had no problem staying the night in the lot here except for the fact that there is a Logan's Roadhouse across the street that never turned their music off the entire night. My fibro makes me very sensitive to noise and smells so I woke up today with a headache from the all night music; Bill, of course, slept through all of it and even said, "They didn't play music all night!"

Today we went to the driving range and both hit a large bucket of balls. I bought a new driver at a Scheel's shop that we did in Appleton and it worked really well for me. It has now been three times that we've gone and Bill says I am ready to try other clubs and maybe, just maybe, someday we will get on an actual golf course!

This is the 3rd Portage that we have been in - Michigan, Indiana and, of course, Wisconsin. We have also been in 2 Sturgis - Michigan and the real one in South Dakota. I guess that will happen when you are at 8,000 miles or so on your "trip" that is really now your life. Portage is basically the twin city to Kalamazoo. Nice town but not very memorable. Tonight's set for Bill and the crew is only a one nighter -- in fact every one this week Sunday through Friday nights will be a one nighter. That means I have to go and get whatever work I have scrounged up in the area down in the morning so that we can hit the road in the early afternoon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portage,_Michigan

Finally, I hope all of us have said a prayer for the families, especially the wives and children, of the miners lost in West Virginia. Maybe if we were all a little more conservation minded and tried to save energy anywhere we can, so many of these guys wouldn't have to spend their entire lives walking such a thin line between life and death. Maybe we could get rid of coal mining altogether and not only save lives but also save mountain tops, streams and entire ecosystems in the Applachian region and anywhere mining takes place. These guys were no different than a soldier going to Iraq except they went to battle against Mother Nature due to our greed and wastefulness and unfortunately they lost. Let's all remember that the next time we leave lights on for no reason, throw away something that can be recycled or even just shop for shopping's sake. Maybe, just maybe, this could be a wake up call to us all to make every day Earth Day.