Trading Detroit-Windsor For Port Huron-Sarnia

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Starting back in June when we drove to Maple Lake, Ontario to open up the cottage for the summer we endured what was the most dreaded part of the trip--crossing the border into Canada at Detroit.

Crossing into Canada at Detroit-Windsor is frustrating, time consuming, confusing and worst of all IMO, frightening if you are unfortunate enough to to do so when it's dark.

Due to various commitments here we often did it in the dark--and I did it alone--for the last time I might add. The second to last time that we came home I made up my mind: no Detroit crossing for me. It appeared that crossing the border by driving slightly north--via Flint, MI would be viable though possibly of a longer duration. Every other trip we'd made via Detroit--six of them previously this summer--resulted in a travel time of a minimum of 13 hours. We don't dawdle or make excessive stops, either. Short stops with some brisk walking (we have a dog) and back on the road. This trip we ventured out and decided to blow Detroit off completely. The crossing at Port Huron-Sarnia was painless and fast and on the way home we made the almost 700 mile trip in 12 hours flat!

We had a superb long Labour Day weekend. We took an extra day so had three full days at the cottage. The weather just got better each day with the last actually getting quite hot. It was hands-down the best weather of the 5 weeks total that I spent on Maple Lake this year* and it was a fantastic send off for summer.

*They broke a 70-year record for rainfall.

My very favourite Maple Lake photo from summer, 2008.

 

Two weeks later this groin (the rock thing above that spouse built) help form this much beach (below w/ red canoe). There was no beach initially due to rain all summer.

   

 

Spouse is a master beach-maker!

 

 

Typical nightly sunset (unretouched)