Despite our Covid situation, we slept well during the night. The hotel we chose - rather, the motel - was very quiet. That's because it was mostly derelict and only one other couple was staying there at the other end. Without exaggeration the decor had not been updated since the 1950s. It was clean, but so terribly old and outdated.
Today we had 11 hours of driving ahead of us to get home, nearly 640 miles. We drove a short way north on I-93 to catch I-91 south. The morning was very foggy in the mountains that cleared the few times we got above the clouds in elevation or below them.
We had periods of rain, sometimes heavy. Soon we passed into Vermont.
We stopped at a rest stop, did a quick stretch, and kept motoring. We continued on I-91 into Connecticut where we turned west onto I-84.
Before Noon we stopped in Southbury, CT to fuel up the car and pick up lunch at Panera. Hoping the vitamins would do her good, Michele got a salad full of fresh fruit and a tomato soup. She said it would have been nice if she could taste any of it and imagined she could. We ate in the car in the parking lot, then kept going. After lunch, we had about 380 miles left, over 6 hours, to our day.
The skies stayed cloudy and we had more periods of rain during the day. Michele kept Rob up to date on his sudafed doses. Soon we were in New York and then Pennsylvania. The traffic was fairly decent during the day, although heavy at times, it kept to highway speed.
We turned on to I-81 South and then to US15 South. As we entered Leesburg we noticed how dry everything looks. Some of the Newfoundland rain would be welcome at home.
Our day was uneventful and went smoothly. We picked up Chick-Fil-A for dinner and arrived home at 6:30pm. All was fine at the house. Michele made up a batch of hummingbird nectar to attract them back, and ignored the weeds that appeared in her weed-free garden before the trip.
Total mileage for the trip including cutting it short was 5,600 driving miles. We visited three Canadian provinces, Newfoundland being the new one for us, and were on the road 23 days. Newfoundland and Keji National Park were the trip highlights. Had we made it to Cape Breton we know it would be also.
Newfoundland could easily be done by flying in and renting a car. Since it's so large and remote, we recommend spending 10 days there or even more. The must list is Gros Morne, and we only scratched the surface. We would have liked to do much more hiking there. Our day trip way up to St. Anthony's was worth it to see a huge portion of the island, but we sacrificed one entire day for it. Twillingate is beautiful, and earlier in the season (late-May to late-June) is a place to see whales and icebergs. Elliston on the Bonavista peninsula for the puffins is a must see. On a nice day we could have set up chairs and watched them for hours. There are other beautiful peninsulas we didn't get to see. The extreme southern portion of the island is accessible by only two roads through the interior and is even more remote than where we visited.
Rob was a driving warrior and did 100% of the driving, preferring to do so. We definitely will take the car on long road trips again. For this trip it was the right choice and a blessing, especially for the unexpected and unplanned issues: large amounts of rain, bad roads, and getting Covid. We think our next big trip might be Big Bend National Park with add-ons like Joshua Tree and Saguaro. Rob wants to see the famous bats at Carlsbad Caverns and Michele wants to see the Albuquerque Balloon Festival. We might be able to combine all of that into a fall vacation. Next year we likely won't take a big trip, so it may be a 2025 destination.
