Winnipeg SERVE - Day 2 Drive to Thunder Bay

Morning came early for day two of our travel time.  I awoke at 6:30 am and packed up. I then took pictures of our sleeping group. 

Here you see the boys sleeping, or trying to anyway.  

After ensuring everyone was decent, I snuck upstairs to get a picture of the girls sleeping.  I was met by a very grouchy Fontana.  Ready to pounce on me.  I took my pictures and got out of there FAST.  : ) 

 It's amazing how 6 girls can make such a huge mess in just one night.  

 Thankfully Annette was feeling better this morning.  A good night's sleep, along with some strong pain medication, helped a great deal.  She was smiling, and I was much happier too.  

We packed up our stuff, and then I asked everyone to put their stuff outside so I could pack the van again.  Amazingly, everything fit once again.  

 We prayed around the van again.  I think we'll be doing that every day of this trip.  

 Annette was feeling MUCH better, as you can tell from her facial expression here as I took her picture.    

 You get an idea here of just how crammed everyone is in the van, but they have handled themselves very well so far.  Kudo's to these wonderful young people.  

 Here is a picture of the church we stayed in.  Not a fancy church, but both Annette and myself felt that this place was a place where God was at work.  After a late meeting last night, the Pastor and 5 leaders made sure to wish us a good night, and a good trip.  

 If you are ever in Sault Ste. Marie, you might want to visit Bethel Bible Chapel.  

We were JUST finishing taking that picture of the church sign, and ready to head for Hwy 17 when Rosy remembered she had forgot her water bottle.  It gave Annette a chance to say thank you to the custodian of the church.   

 We had breakfast at Tim's, but I chose McDonald's.  Annette chose Metro, and the BRAT diet, which apparently you take when you've had stomach issues.  Bannanas, Rice, Applesauce and I forget the T, but I'll get back to you on that one.......Once breakfast was done, we headed out on the open road again. Everyone tried to pass the time away in different ways.  We listened to lots of different music, and I got to listen to my Adventures In Odyssey (yeah), and we even listened to a story from the Vinyl  Cafe that Jacob had recorded.  So much culture in this youth group.  Fontana even took along her knitting, or is that crochet?  

This is the view that the rest of the group has had of me over the past two days.  

 The seat directly behind Annette's and mine has very little room in the middle because of all the suit cases and other stuff that is stacked.  I allow the middle person to put their feet up on the stuff, but after a couple of days feet are getting a bit pungent to say the least.  Brought tears to my eyes.  : ) 

 Those were Megan's feet in the picture before, and here you see another of the many talents that she has.  Gross.....if you ask me.  

 To pass the time Annette took some pictures of the kids at different times.  Here's Ben, her son, being, well.....Ben.  

 Rosy, Fontana, Kyle and Ben in the very back seat.  Not much room there, but they all rotate when we stop, so everyone gets a turn in the back.  

Here's Kyle relaxing in the back of the van.  

The next set of pictures are of the landscape as we were driving. Today it was very nice.  I discovered that Annette likes camera's......A LOT.......She took at least 200 pictures of scenes like this one.....I mean, how many pictures of trees can you take?  For Annette, it's pretty much every tree we passed by.  At least she was feeling better, and that was a good thing.  I did have to delete many of the pictures due to blurry stuff or too dark, etc.  Sorry John, but it seems like you need to give Annette a few more lessons in travel photography.  : )  

 Some of the areas we travelled through were very nice.  I had a really fun time driving today because of all the wonderful landscape we have in Ontario.  Yours to Discover you know........

There wasn't a tonne of traffic today, but we did encounter vehicles...some quite slow..... 

We also saw several sets of cyclists.  I can't imagine biking up some of those big hills we drove today, or even down some of them.   

What would summer be without construction.  We encountered lots of that as well, with several delays.  

We stopped for a scenic view, took some pictures, and here we have Rosy, Leah, Fayth and Megan relaxing outside of the van for a bit.  

Leave it to Hannah to think of something fun to do even during a short scenic stop.   Here we are doing the giggle game.......... 

 This is just a nice picture of Fayth.  

Shortly after the scenic stop, we had another pee alert, so I found a little place off the road so we could fulfill that request.  A nice little cove down off the highway.  

 Lake Superior is a beautiful lake. This was a beautiful cove.  Annette told me that Gordon, Leah's dad, has a tradition of dipping his toes in  Lake Superior whenever he is travelling near it,  so we decided to do that while we were close to water.   

Here is Annette dipping her foot into the Lake.  Apparently it's pretty cold.   

A mother/son moment.  How nice.   

The group decided it would be nice for everyone to dip their toes in the lake.  They then proceeded to walk along the shore for a bit and explore.   

Here's Leah doing what she does when she sees Lake Superior.   

Here's Rosy....going for a swim maybe? 

Ah yes, the REAL reason why we actually ended up dipping our toes into Superior.   

This was just a strange picture.   

Apparently our  van is the killer of many a butterfly, and other bugs.  

After our pit stop, we drove for a while, until WAWA.  It's here that I have a tradition of stopping to have my picture taken with the large Canada Goose.  In this case it was the whole group.   

 Then just me and Chris.  

 As we drove along we encountered a large moose on the side of the road.....

 ...along with her baby.  We also saw a bear cub, well, actually, I pretty much only saw it as we drove past it. At our hotel tonight, I also saw a turtle slowly walk by my outside screened door.  

We kept driving and driving for what seemed a very long time.....Megan continues to pull her funny faces at every chance she can get. She even has a camera with a face setting that distorts your face....what's with THAT.   

 No, this picture was not taken with that camera....it's the real Annette face...a happy one..... a much better improvement than yesterday's face.   

 As we drove and drove, it became apparent that we were not stopping for lunch, unless the group wanted to eat a tree.  Annette broke out some of her snack stuff, and Leah went animal over the grapes.  

 Thankfully, so far, this has not happened to us.  Keep the speed limit and they don't bug you.  

 Eventually we arrived in Thunder Bay.  We were sucking fumes in the gas tank.  I filled in Sault Ste. Marie, and as we entered Thunder Bay, the warning light came on for the gas tank.  We stopped just outside the city and I put $10 to get us further into the city, and hopefully find some cheaper gas.  Prices have been as high as $1.41 / litre, but cheaper in the larger cities.  As I paid for the gas, the teenage teller saw my SERVE shirt from last year and said that she had been on a SERVE site last year and had the same T-shirt.  A small world indeed.  Cool too.  

 We/I decided that we'd eat supper first, then go to the hotel.   It's not easy getting 12 people to agree on a place to eat, and I wanted Annette to be able to eat something too.  We asked for a good place to eat, and were pointed to the NORTHERN LIGHTS TAVERN.  Annette wasn't sure about going there, but I made the executive decision to eat there, rather than Boston Pizza.  It looked ok, and different, and it was time to be adventurous. 

I had forgotten my camera, and when I came back, this is what I found......interesting.  

 Seems everyone trusts Fayth with their money.....well almost everyone.....

 Someone asked for kids menus to color, and the restaurant obliged.  Kept everyone busy.  

 Jacob really got into it.  

 Fayth and Annette laughing and having fun.  

 One of the several finished products.  It took forever to get our food, so most of the group finished coloring the pictures.  

 Megan is having pierogies.  

 I had sausage, pierogies and cabbage rolls. That's Leah's thumbs up for good food.  It tasted good.  I also ended up finishing Rosy's food and helping Annette finish hers.  

 She ordered Nacho's with hot peppers.  Her stomach certainly must have been feeling better.  

 Once the meal was over, it was time to drive to our Best Western hotel.  As we did, we saw a rainbow over The Rock, as they like to call this hill in ThunderBay.  

 We arrived VERY ready to settle in for the evening.  A nice hotel, nestled in the hills of ThunderBay.  

 The rooms were clean and the group REALLY liked them....I mean, they were excited......

 The pool was warm and great.  We spent a couple of hours in it. I eventually got out to begin the blogging process.  

Here's the back lobby of the hotel.  

Well, it's midnight now, and time to end this blog and get some sleep.  We'll be leaving at 10 am tomorrow.  We'll gain an hour as we travel and it's not as far from here, so a bit more rest will be good.  I noticed that it gets darker much later here.  It was 10:30, and as we gathered in one of the rooms to end our day in prayer it was just getting dark outside.  Crazy.  

All in all another good day.  Safe and fun travels and we continue to get to know each other better as a group. Annette is feeling better, and for that I am thankful, as I know she is too.  : )  

One more day of travelling and then time to get acquainted with a new city and surroundings before SERVE begins in a couple of days.  Thanks for tagging along today....another entry tomorrow, and maybe that Car Wash one will get on the blog this week too....we'll have to see.  

Blessings to you all. 

Good night Katrina, Sarah, and Joycegina.  

Chris says hello and we love you all.