A Very Modern Grand Tour - Day 18, Wednesday

Ah, the last day of our trip, but a full one at that. As I was up earlier than everyone else again I decided to have a wander around the camp site, camera in hand. I don't know how many stands were available for camping but it looked like many hundreds, and yet the place was all but empty. As I may have mentioned before, State Parks limit the amount of time you can camp, normally to about two weeks at a stretch, so that people don't take root as they do in commercial campgrounds, which I think is a grand idea and one of the main reasons to use a State Park. Imagine my indignation, then, when I saw two trailers with far too much clutter around them to be in transit. They turned out to be "Camp Hosts" (that's campground host, to avoid any confusion), people who get to stay on a campground all summer long (free of charge I assume) and dispense advice and help to stricken campers. I made a note that this could be a job for these intrepid toads in years to come, albeit that we'd not collect so much detritus, us being perfect and all. 

The campground ran down to the lake where there were little docking areas for your boat (Darn it! I knew I'd forgotten something) and a beach. There is, apparently, much water skiing goes on at this lake but today was quiet and only a flock of Turkey Vultures moved anywhere near the water. One of the beasts took exception to my presence, took off and made a low pass at me, albeit in a half-hearted manner; they may be ugly birds but this one looked quite impressive in flight and I wish I'd been a bit quicker with the camera.

Back at Towed Haul, the process of packing up was going on for one last time on this trip, taking just as long as ever it did, and it was 1pm before we made our way out of the park and off to Jackson Center, the little town that is the home of Airstream Trailers Inc. Curiously there was no where to park a trailer in the visitor's parking lot so we trundled around the back to the "Terraport", the little camping area used when people are in having work done on their trailers. I backed in, very badly, and walked away hoping that the presence of a car hitched to the front of Towed Haul would dissuade anyone from dragging it off for repair work!

The tour of the factory was led by Don, an ex-employee of many years standing, who took the twenty or so people that had turned up around the service area and the production plant in very loose formation. We saw parts of the fabrication process and quite a lot of the finishing process, all of which was very interesting especially given that most of the construction of these trailers is done by hand. Volumes are too small to invest in much high-tech machinery so people were bending metal, screwing wood and riveting panels manually, which probably explains why Airstream Trailers are so darned expensive! I was really impressed that they let us move around the factory floor so freely, getting in the way of workers and weaving in and out of machinery. The old sweats on the tour were admiring the way that Airstream aluminum trailer skins, internal and external, are riveted onto aluminum ribs, just like an aircraft, and formed into the curved, aerodynamic shape that makes them both distinctive and easy to tow; it was all old technology but was is well proven. We did see a European model in production, narrower and complete with lightweight aluminum frame and European style hitch. They don't fit these out with furniture or fittings at Jackson Center, that's done with local products in Cumbria in the UK, much to the chagrin of quite a few US customers who really like the idea of a proper lightweight trailer rather than the monsters sold for the North American market. Mind you, the European models are a third more expensive than their US equivalents, so may be the Yankees won't like them after all.

I'm in real danger of getting into nerd country here so I'll just say that we all enjoyed the tour and did spend some loot in the gift shop, scallywags that we are, and then we'll fast forward a little to the trip home. 

Back on the I75 we were heading north again, this time to Toledo, on the Ohio and Michigan borders. The land around is flat and scenery ordinary, unless you appreciate corn and soya beans as field crops, then it would have been fascinating. Toledo was a very industrialsed town but has been hit hard in the downturns of recent years, because like a lot if US industry, it has been unable or unwilling to move with the times. As a result, the town looks shabby and tends to fall into the category of "A Town To Pass Through", which is a shame because with a name like Toledo it ought to be an exciting place; well, in my mind anyway.

We needed a stop before Detroit so called in at a Cracker Barrel, "Half restaurant, half country store" at Munroe. This was a chain restaurant and one that we'd passed just about everywhere we'd been to on this trip. Unfortunately the fare on offer wasn't great, mostly meat, and the country store was just a gift shop; the service in both was perfunctory at best, too, which was a shame after the warmth of the southern States. Still, we were nearly home and we motored the last remaining miles up the I75 to the edge of Detroit. Now Detroit is also a city that's fallen on hard times, calamitous even, but in the soft evening light the skyscrapers of the Downtown area looked impressive, especially with the sun glinting off the Renaissance Center. Getting off the I75 and onto the Ambassador Bridge wasn't as straightforward as the the trip in the opposite direction. The bridge's owners have been in dispute with the State government about the access roads and in failing to demolish their duty free shop as per the agreements made, the east bound access to the bridge cannot be completed. This in turn means a lot of part completed flyovers (with signage I noted) and the poor bridge users condemned to a slalom of cones and pier supports in order actually get on the bridge. The irony in all this is that both the State of Michigan and the Province of Ontario are well advanced in plans to build a new bridge to ease all this nonsense once and for all, but guess what? The Ambassador Bridge owners are pushing every legal obstacle they can to prevent the publicly funded bridge being built; talk about protecting your interests.

Once we had negotiated the bridge we then went through the Canadian border formalities, where I was posed questions like "How do you know these people?" and "Where did you get these immigration papers", designed (I hope) to ensure that I was who I said I was and that I didn't have false papers, all of which the border guard had checked already on his computer system. Hurrumph. 

Then it was the last leg, 50 miles to home, uneventful fortunately, and pleasing because the trailer running lights looked very nice in the fading light. We made a real hash of backing Towed Haul onto the drive, which is what happens when you're tired, but thought it best not to get too fussy and left it slightly askew in the vain hope that it might annoy our trailer hating neighbour a few doors up.

Tomorrow the aftermath; ten tons of washing, unpacking everything, cleaning..... it's good to be home. 

My next entry will be a reflective piece on the whole trip and, even though Mrs T isn't very keen on these things, some facts and figures. Here's on to leave you with, we traveled a total of 6,755 kms, that's 4,197 miles, with only a slightly flat tire as a problem. Excellent!