Great Lakes Circle Tour, Part Deux (after all, we're in Canada now...)

An interesting day to say the least. Nice accommodations last night at the Super 8 in Henrietta, New York (suburb of Rochester.) Found out yesterday, though, that Steve felt we needed to get the Outback's first oil change done before Canada, as it was "almost" to it's 3000 mile mark and engine break-in period. Took over a year to get to that point, much of which was in the last six weeks between our trip to Kentucky in May and this trip.
So we found the nearest Subaru dealer, about 20 minutes away in a town just southeast of Rochester, and called to see if we could get the oil change done. They fit us in, so after checking out of the motel and going to the nearby Sam's Club for gas (and a cache, 400 feet away!) we were on our way to Victor, New York. Must say it was a great dealership, though getting the oil changed was the last thing I'd imagined we'd be doing while on vacation. Nice waiting area, though, and they even let Max stay there with us. Refreshments and wifi, who could ask for more? Oil changed and we were on our way in less than an hour.
It took us a good half hour to make it back up to the Lake Ontario shoreline. Then we had a nice little drive along. Got to one point where we decided to make an ice cream/bathroom break. Coincidentally there was a cache nearby. But the ice cream wasn't nearby enough to the cache. So went on to the ice cream, only to discover there were no restrooms. By now I really needed a restroom so we went back to the cache location (a fishing area just back down the road) and I performed my best Brent Loudin LNT imitation without rope. Thankfully the cache was not where I chose to perform and I found it quickly soon thereafter. Never did get that ice cream. Made one more stop for view/cache, in Port Vincent at the mouth of the St. Lawrence River and Lake Ontario. Nice.
On to Canadia. We had to take a couple of tall bridges over the St. Lawrence River, which connected several of the Thousand Islands. Yep, it's where that salad dressing was invented. I googled it tonight. Then on to Canadian customs. We were prepared with passports and a copy of Max's rabies vaccination record (which we'd found out we needed to take him into Canada) and all went relatively well. After we finally left the checkpoint, I saw a duty free shop and we stopped so we could change some money. Every other time we've gone to Canada, there's been a shop just after the border checkpoint. Well this one was a Canadian duty free shop, and not only would they not let us buy anything (they did change our money though) we ended up having to go back through the customs checkpoint AGAIN. Steve was not a happy camper, needless to say. And yep, you guessed it, just down the road once we were through the second time, there was a money exchange place. Live and learn. Started west on the Thousand Islands Parkway. Stopped at a scenic overlook after we drove past it and decided it might make a nice stop. Then I discovered there was a cache there, too. That made four for the day, not too bad for a trip with Muggle Hubby! Got back on the 401 (their expressway) for a while and started running into holiday traffic. Seems Canada Day was yesterday and as that was Sunday, Monday (today) is their legal holiday. So everyone was headed back to Toronto, I guess, and it was pretty much stop and go traffic. That made us get off the 401 at Belleville where we found a small motel for the night. We are at the Park Lane Motel, not the Hilton but it'll do for the night. And even wifi so can't complain. At the desk clerk's suggestion, we headed towards downtown and the harbor for dinner. There was a seafood place near the harbor that offered "to go" meals so we got shrimp dinners then walked down the main dock to a picnic table at the end. Max waited patiently with a few shrimp bite bribes while we ate a nice dinner "sitting on the dock of the bay." We took a walk in the riverfront park after dinner. Nice evening. The only drawback for me was not knowing where the caches (if any) were as I didn't have them in the nuvi. Life went on even without caching. Oh well.
Back to the motel and Steve fell asleep pretty quickly, I obviously am not asleep yet as I'm still writing this blog. Max is on the bed next to me, he's adopted bed sleeping as part of his vacation routine. Told him he'd better not get used to it, it would be back in his box when we get home! Not sure how far we'll get tomorrow - probably at least to Toronto and perhaps as far as Niagara Falls again. This time the Canadian side, to get back down to the northern shore of Lake Erie. I'd like to stop and enjoy the view once in a while. With or without a cache nearby.