On the first day Keith and I drove north on I-95 through some typical Florida summer rainstorms and by that evening we had reached the Mecca of South Carolina: the Swamp Fox Inn, one of many cheap hotels in the state, but unique among them for its name. Always before it had been full when we had driven through, and most recently we had had to settle for the Day's Inn across the street. But this time Keith and I managed to arrive before the rest of the population of 95 descended on it. Turns out, also, that the name "Swamp Fox" isn't just a kitsch-y supposedly Southern-sounding name. Instead, as it explains on a plaque on the lobby wall, it proudly takes the name from Francis Marion, a rebel who lummoxed a British colonel during the American Revolution with he guerilla tactics and knowledge of the area's swamps, and on whom Mel Gibson's character in The Patriot is based—or at least that's what the clerk at the desk said. So much for the exciting events of day one.

The next day featured not only more than sixty of the tacky South of the Border billboards and the usual rush-hour attack of Washington D.C. and Baltimore, but also two hailstorms. Small pea and olive-sized ice balls pinged off the car and crunched under the tires as we crept through traffic around clover leaves and down exit ramps while I cursed them and made dire threats against them, should any dent my car. Once the hail had petered out, the rain could then set in. It stayed with us through the better part of the length of Jersey Turnpike. It always rains when we're on the Turnpike. One good thing about it, though, is that you frequently see G.O.D. Yes, the Guaranteed Overnight Delivery trucks are fairly common in that region, and it is always an inspiration to sight one: it's good to know that someone out there who owns a lot of eighteen-wheelers has a sense of humor.

Finally that evening, having survived the Jersey Turnpike in the rain, a stop at the James Fennimore Cooper service station (of all the service stations that litter the Turnpike, why that one?), and an inordinate number of tollbooths, we arrived in Jersey City, where my friend Lisa has an apartment. We descended from the highway and drove through the scenic streets to her building, the Gotham. Truly, Jersey City is an undiscovered paradise. Go and see it while you can, before the tourists arrive in droves and ruin its pristine charm.

Leaving my car, the Yo Slick, to a well-deserved rest in the Gotham's parking garage, we chatted with Lisa, were given a tour of her abode and a spot on the floor for our sleeping bags. The view from her window was interesting: some other apartment buildings, a slice of Jersey City, industrial docks, and the grimy ribbon of the Turnpike—which was useful for judging the state of the traffic before jaunting off in the car again.

The following morning arrived gray and drizzling, but nevertheless, armed with flimsy black umbrellas, we ventured out into Jersey City toward the Path train (New Jersey's subway system) that would take us across the river to Manhattan. As it turned out, we had also ventured out into a wind tunnel, created by the tall buildings channeling the gusts of wind and rain. Fighting self-destructing umbrellas and leaping deep, dirty puddles flowing along grubby curbs, we almost made it to the station without incident: while jumping over a big curbside river, Lisa lost her footing and fell on her knees. It turned out, upon inspection, that she had torn one knee of her jeans so there was entertainment to be had while we waited damply at Grove Station as Lisa used her keys to tear a matching hole in the other one.

We got off the train at the World Trade Center and ventured aboveground to cross the street and go to the building across the street that housed Deutchebank (the company that funded Lisa's company) and Lisa's company's offices. Once Lisa had checked what she wanted to check, and Keith and I had inspected our email inboxes, we noted the rain was coming down harder yet, and we headed back to the World Trade Center for Sbarro's and an episode of standing in line at the TKTS booth for half-price tickets to the Broadway show of our choice. And it was that word, "choice," that made it so difficult. Decision-making was just as slow and ponderous a process as the line turned out to be. While waiting, though, we continued the saga of Using Lisa's Cell Phone to Call Various People in New York, specifically, the Kassoffs, who are friends of the family who live on Long Island (we never wound up being able to meet up with them) and Todd Alan Johnson, our resident goofy actor acquaintance who had said to call him if we were ever in New York (for those of you following the TAJ saga, you'll remember we had met with him in D.C. last year when Les Misérables was there). We wound up getting his answering machine, or one that said "you've reached the Johnson Supply Company" and, at Lisa's urging we called back after I'd pre-composed a message (because I am not adept at leaving messages without a rehearsal period) which included, I'm proud to say, both Keith and I talking. You may well deduce at this point that the TKTS line was a fairly dull one, the World Trade Center not being a terrorist target on that particular day.

An hour later, at the front of the line, we waffled yet some more on the subject of which show. Finally we decided that though Lisa wanted to see Les Misérables at some point, we didn't have binoculars with us so seats in the back of the orchestra wouldn't be all that good (the TKTS man agreed), especially considering we'd all seen it before. Instead we saw the (cheaper) parody show Forbidden Broadway, which lampoons various Broadway shows to humorous effect. Highlights were the Lion King send-up in which "Can You Feel the Love Tonight" became "Can You Feel the Pain Tonight" as the actors staggered under the weight of their elaborate "lion" headdresses, and the Les Misérables segment, wherein the actors scooted around in a circle, simulating the infamous revolve, trying desperately to hang onto the mike in order to escape from the moving stage long enough to sing their song. It all took place in a small semi-dinner theatre setting with tables and menus. The music was all provided by a guy at a piano. It was certainly something you couldn't see back in Florida and it was an enjoyable evening.

So, to return to that afternoon, we emerged from the World Trade Center, Forbidden Broadway tickets in pockets, and headed back to the subway to the Museum of Natural History, which was a neat museum and which had the added bonus attraction of being out of the rain. We spent the afternoon wandering through only part of the first floor—the museum is cavernous—viewing exhibits on the geology of New York, rain forests, maple syrup harvesting, redwood trees, prehistoric people, meteorites, and minerals (the minerals were very cool, and Keith, of course, was the most interested in them). When we sought out dinner, we found that the food court specialized in being overpriced, but fortunately we were not planning on eating there on a regular basis.

Completing dinner, we made our way to the part of Manhattan where Broadway is located; namely, the crowded part. And there was lots of advertising. Being careful to avoid eye-poking umbrellas and shoe-soaking puddles, we made it down to Times Square where we gazed at such American icons as a green and white advertisement for TDK video products and more taxi cabs than your could shake a really big stick at. Then we headed up to the address on our tickets, found the place (which was sort of hidden, down a flight of stairs in a building also housing a restaurant) and sat gratefully at a table and waited for the show. My knee had been giving me twinges that morning, but I had foolishly decided to be tough and forego a preventative dose of Advil, and by that point I was paying seriously for my mistake. Sitting anywhere, in a theatre, a subway, possibly even a doorway, was much appreciated.

When the play was over and we filed out up the stairs into the street, we were met by the unnaturally light glow of the city lights, intensified by their reflection off the slowly dissipating rain clouds, belaying the fact that it was not six in the evening but in fact almost eleven o' clock at night. The lights' silver-yellow glow followed us down the street to the subway and there we left it. When we emerged into Jersey City, Lisa led us over to a wooden walkway that jutted out into the river and provided a panoramic view of Manhattan. Pinkish glowing clouds drifted across the top of the World Trade Center's towers and only a few stars were visible, vying for attention with the lights generated by the city. It was the cliché view of Da Big City.

The next morning we were back at the same place, viewing Manhattan in the daytime. Then we were off to the Staten Island Ferry, for a view of the harbor and a walk to Lisa's old place on Staten Island where she had lived upon first arriving in New York that winter. To get to the docks, we walked through the financial district, along less-crowded streets than the day before, past the Wall Street bull and across Wall Street itself (not down it, though), and through canyons of tall buildings that obscured the rest of the city from view. On the ferry ride over we looked out the window to see the Statue of Liberty, which, as it turned out, was much smaller than the impression if gives when viewed on a TV screen, partially because of the tall buildings towering behind it. In the background, we could head a black woman playing her guitar and singing old country-western songs. We arrived at Staten Island and walked up a steep hill to Lisa's former boarding house, a nice small brown wooden building with a green lawn complete with bushes, trees and flowers. But, as Lisa pointed out, these had not been there in February.

Back on the ferry after missing one and having to wait half an hour in the terminal, we stood outside on the other side of the ferry and saw Brooklyn and its famous bridge. For lunch Lisa led us through Chinatown to Little Italy where a pastry shop resides, there selling extremely rich sugary artery-cloggers. Of course they were very good.

As we walked from the dock to the pastry place, we passed through a blocked-off street that had been closed to cars for a belated Bastile Day celebration. It was Sunday, and the fourteenth had been that Friday, but nevertheless French bands blared loud, loud music from grandstands and vendors under tents sold crepes and German beer (no one, we decided, would have bought French beer) while overhead tricolor flags and balloons swayed in a light breeze.

From there, we rode the subway up to Central Park, where we walked around aimlessly, passing and being passed by numerous horses and carriages carrying tourists. A few photo ops later we stopped to watch the rollerbladers do their thing in a cement arena. Couples danced while others performed tricks or glided around, trying not to collide with the couples or the trick-artists. In the end, we wound up thirty-four blocks away from our starting point at a large lake where ducks, rented rowboats and a gondolier circled while a man threw sticks in the water for his dogs to retrieve. Afterwards, it was back to the apartment and ahead into the indecision of Monday.

We were, of course, welcome to stay at Lisa's for as long as we wanted (well, within reason, of course) and wander new York ourselves, but she had to go to work, and we didn't want us or our stuff to be underfoot as she tried to go about her usual daily business. Also, the company she was working for was in the process of failing, and soon the bank funding it would pull out and leave the company to flounder off into oblivion.

So we packed and left Jersey City, unsure whether or not we'd be heading south to Florida or north to New Hampshire where the White Mountains and a truly spectacular series of waterfalls and rivers called the Flume waited. Keith was noncommittal, either way, except that he wanted to drive through the New Jersey pine barrens which are about forty miles south of Lisa's. I was extremely indecisive. We went to the pine barrens and drove though what looked a lot like the Carolina coast: stunted pine trees bent from wind and sandy ground with a Canadian-like understory. When we stopped for gas we decided, after a call to Mom and Dad, who said there was no way they'd be going on any trip to Colorado or anywhere else that summer, to take advantage of where we were (not that far from new Hampshire), and noon found us heading north again, shelling out exorbitant tolls for the George Washington Bridge, and adventuring off into New England where by common consent the hardy residents refuse to erect signs letting hapless motorists know where such necessities as hotels and gas stations are. Not that we have ever had a problem with this in the past....

Once in Vermont and into hilly Green Mountain territory, we found that the Yo Slick, with its four cylinders and automatic transmission, was no match for anything along the lines of a serious incline. So scrambling up hills, playing cat-and-mouse with a Veilleux Transport Company truck that ground gears up the slopes and sped down the other side with abandon, we made it to White River Junction, Vermont where we found a hotel about sixty miles from the Flume. And the thing that was so fascinating about this hotel was that instead of two beds, there was one bed and a giant hot tub where the second bed should be. Travel long enough in America, and no strange contrivance in a hotel room, be it an odd shower knob or a large collage of wicker fans hanging randomly on the wall, will surprise you. I have not yet reached that plateau.

The next morning the Yo Slick crossed the Connecticut River into New Hampshire and arrived at the Flume around eleven, having wound its way along the Kancamagus Highway through tourist towns and forest alike. It was a cloudy day; the sun came out in fits and spurts and made it a point to remain hidden when a particularly good-looking photo opportunity presented itself. Nevertheless, the Flume, a narrow, deep gorge cut through rock by a river where a magna flow ran thousands of years ago, was still worth the trip. The rocks are covered by ferns and moss that are watered by the rising vapor from the multitude of small waterfalls and cascades that run its length. Visitors walk along the gorge on a wooden boardwalk that's anchored to one side of the rock wall. At the top larger falls await, and then a walk along a scenic forest path littered by gigantic glacial boulders back to the visitors' center.

For an encore to the Flume, we drove down the road a couple miles and stopped at the turn-off for the Basin, which is a concourse of several mountain rivers and streams that have carved out niches in the rocks and created some interesting scenery. However, we missed the sign pointing toward the Basin (though we'd been there—and to the Flume—before) and ended up taking a pleasant walk along a bike trail, following a river and wondering just when the Basin area would appear around the next bend. Once we'd wised up, we made it back the parking lot, past the parking lot, under the road, and to the Basin. We wandered around briefly and then it started to look like rain. Since we wanted to stop at the visitors' center to fill up an empty Mountain Dew bottle with water from their drinking fountain, we headed back, hoping to beat the clouds.

Fortunately, we made it back just before the sky let lose and drenched those people still out on the walkways and trails. After it had let up, we scurried back to the car and headed out of the park, stopping at a scenic overlook for a view of a lake called Beaver Lake with some White Mountains in the background. Back on the road, back past the little hotel with the marquee sign that read "What this world needs isn't more charity, but more justice"—strange place for a bully pulpit—and eventually back on I-91, the artery that runs up Vermont to Canada and down to 95, I was again seized with indecision. When Keith said he would like to see the Canadian shield in this, a farther eastern location than the cabin in Ontario, I wasn't sure if he was serious, so first we drove north (we were fifty miles from the Vermont-Québec border), then I drove south, then I asked Keith if he really wanted to go to Canada, and he did. So we stopped to call Lisa to ask her if she wanted us to complete the drive to New York and pick her up so that she, too could see Québec.

Now, to backtrack, the reason we were asking Lisa, who at this point is ostensibly employed, if she wanted to go on a mid-week jaunt, is that when we called her on Monday night to tell her we were in New Hampshire and that when we came back south we'd be sure to take her up on her offer of her apartment as a stopping-place (in lieu of a hotel), we found that A) the bank funding her company was definitely going to yank the funding at the end of the month, resulting in Lisa's company deciding to save themselves the money they would have spent on everyone's salaries until then and fire everyone that Monday; and B) that Todd Alan Johnson had called back and left a message, and that Lisa had in turn decided to call back and found out he was in Raleigh, NC. But he gave her a cell phone number and said for us to feel free to call. I was mostly sorry but also a little happy for Lisa, because, granted, she'd had a pretty shitty Monday (the sacking was expected, but early), but she had been hoping that she could meet Todd, so she at least got to say hi—and then have to explain who the heck she was.... So we thought Lisa might be interested in Québec, especially since she, unlike Keith or I, can speak French, having had it in high school and college. Unfortunately, she was unable to come because she was trying to make the best of the use of the office, which the employees had the run of until Friday, to make free phone calls and access the internet from for job-hunting and resume-posting purposes. So, Lisa-less we turned around and headed north (again).

We stayed in Newport, Vermont that night, just a few miles south of the border. The next morning, with me driving, and therefore answering the penetrating and detailed questions of the French border inspectors (What nationality are you? Where are you from? Where are you going in Canada? For what purpose? How long will you stay?), we crossed into Canada. Not far out of Sherbrooke we stopped at a gas station, and proved once again our Addison luck in selecting exits. We were right across the street from Le Toit Rouge, the French-Canadian version of Ocala, Florida's Cafe Risque (they dare to bare). So we now know what "nude dancers" looks like written in French. The cultural exchange is truly a rewarding experience.

The other cultural exchange that any American will make, whether he wishes to or not, is the difference between Vermont's anal-retentive road-maintainence policy (two miles of road cones cordoned off a lane so workers could fill in a series of five or six small potholes on the shoulder—we are not making this up) and the Canadian devil-may-care attitude. Aside from the rough roads, Canadians also do not believe in shoulders, or at least in paved shoulders that aren't insanely narrow, covered in gravel instead of asphalt, or nonexistent. Furthermore, the typical American, upon seeing a blue limited-access roadway marked in the Rand McNally, expects that there be at least some vague attempt at creating a median to separate oncoming lanes of traffic. Not so the Canadians. For a significant distance, the limited-access highway featured all the charms that come with a dubious shoulder and two-lane roads. However, driving back that night, in the dark, would be still more fun. But also, lest we forget, making fun of the roads in Canada is a needed source of entertainment, and as long as we are not personally killed on them, we'll continue to tramp our rude, self-assured American Goodyears up and down them and be grateful for it, to boot.

Around noon we arrived in Québec (City). We would have been there a little sooner, but at Ste.-Croix we turned off the Trans-Canada Highway (known as the Jean-Lesage Autoroute in Québec) which runs roughly parallel to the St. Lawrence and got onto a smaller road, 132. It ran much closer to the banks and we drove through farmland along the river. Aside from many cows and some horses, we got some views of the river, when it wasn't being obscured by trees and tidy houses and lawns. Unlike other rivers we had passed, it had some very high, steep banks and there were no places for gawkers to pull off and get out and look. Instead you pulled over on a very narrow shoulder, being careful, as your brother advises you, to not pull over too far and bury the right-hand wheels of the car in a three-foot trench that lines the side of the road. Then you stand on privately-owned land and take a quick look.

Immediately upon crossing the Pont Pierre-Laporte and arriving in the city, however, the rural charm switched to Death by French-Canadian, as Quebecois with mini-vans tried to kill us by attempting to merge into the space already occupied by the Yo Slick. Once safely on the other side of the city, heading up into the sparsely-inhabited northern regions, we stopped for gas, and I battled with my first response to people speaking French to me: to attempt to reply in Spanish. Leaving the gas station behind, we turned off into the Jacques Cartier Provincial Park. Twenty miles from Québec was a large park with a small paved road running through it with pull-offs, campsites, several rivers and very neat and clean port-o-potties. As Keith remarked, even the doorknobs were shiny. For several hours we drove around, stopping to look at the rivers, which alternated between swiftly-flowing and slow, and walking a short way on a scenic trail that wound along the side of one of the mountainous hills that made the area look rather like parts of New Hampshire.

Around three we left the park and drove back into Québec, where we found traffic and, eventually, a parking garage. A parking garage that turned out to be in the Chateau Frontenac, one of the biggest darn buildings you could hope to see towering over a city from its perch on a steep hill. So we wound up leaving the Yo Slick in the bowels of a world-famous luxury hotel. Doubtless it was living it up while we walked around, me carrying a little map we got from a tourist information center just across the Canadian border. Mercifully, it was in English. People who have learned some Spanish can read French after a fashion, but for clarity, you can't beat the Mother Tongue.

Mainly we rambled around Vieux-Québec, which is where all the history and touristy stuff is. Your French Canadians are very proud of their history and their culture. The culture they imported from France, and then re-did in beaver fur to make it strokably soft. There are, according to the tourist map and brochure thing I had, at least two very large (read "four hundred square foot") models/maps of historic Québec, and there are many signs and historic markers explaining this or that and plenty of statues of famous people—and if they weren't political leaders or generals, they were Catholic priests of some sort (we kept getting faked out, seeing a churchy-looking statue man and thinking it was the Pope, only to learn it was someone else). That they seem to dig their past (that Je me souviens isn't a joke) is a good thing, because Keith and I got to learn who Frontenac was. We had been curious since there are a lot of things in Canada, in Ontario as well as Québec, that are named Frontenac. The cabin in Ontario is in Frontenac Township and so on. Well, he was governor of New France a long, long time ago.

To start, we tackled the steep hill that much of the city sits on. We walked along the front of it, on the Promenade des Gouverneurs below the walls of the Citadelle, a fortification that was built starting in the 1820s, and arrived at the top of the hill at the Plains of Abraham where you will find plaques to tell you (in French and English this time) about the famous French-English battles that were fought there. The narration of the events, incidentally, ended when the British figured out that it would work best if they went around the back, where there wasn't a big river and steep banks, and cut off the French supply lines. Defeat was amusingly left to the reader's inference. Now the plains are a park and the Citadelle is a museum, but since it was late in the day, we couldn't go in any of the museums and see any of the giant models of the city.

From the fortifications we continued down the hill, through gates (the city is—or the older part of is—surrounded by a wall, so at some points they still have archways over the roads which are still called gates) into streets lined with boutiques and restaurants and cafes made to order for tourists. Mostly, though, these were French tourists, because you didn't really hear English spoken at all. But we did hear some Latin from a choir. We came through a square to a Notre-Dame Cathedral (Montréal has one of these, too; there must be some ordinance—or it's just that it's a palpably Catholic region: there are pictures of Mother Mary glued to cars' dashboards) and stuck our heads in since the doors were open. I'm not a big church tourist, but curiosity dictates a quick look (unless you're in Westminster in which case you stay for hours until you can battle the crowd through to the exit). So we looked in at big, gold artwork while a choir sung faintly in the background. However, no sooner had we started to get a good look, when the lights went out. Literally. Darkness. It was pretty funny, really. See what happens when a pair of heathens goes to church?

Eventually we wound up at the bottom of the hill, by the river where boats dock, in a cobblestone-paved area where shops sold art, where restaurants had outdoor tables and where I bought a bottle of apple juice which I stood in a square and sat on the steps of a church to drink, because by that point the continental breakfast in Newport had worn off, as had the bread and turkey and cheese sandwich in Jacques Cartier Park, and I was left not hungry, but a very thirsty puppy. From the bottom, we went back up, by way of an amusing park, the Parc Montmorency. It used to be the site of the archbishop's palace, but that burnt down. So they built another one. Which also burnt down. So they left it as a park. However, the point is, the city has a lot of greenspace in the way of parks and trees, which to me makes a place much, much more pleasant. There were also many representatives of one of my favorite animals clopping around the city, pulling tourists in carriages, just as they had in Central Park. Horses galore, and after enough time walking around, you could start to recognize individuals as they passed you again...or you could if you paid attention to such things.

After several hours of meandering around, following part of a walking tour printed in the ever-useful tourist info map 'n' brochure (until I realized that I'd rather not be pegged as a stupid tourist quite that easily) the sky began to darken and the long northern evening drew to a close. We walked up the street, past another park and above the Terrasse Dufferin, a wooden boardwalk that serves as the city's riverwalk above the lowest part of the city, and back to the Chateau Frontenac and the Yo Slick. By eight-thirty we were rumbling around a brick-road traffic circle looking for the correct artery out of the old part of the city and back to the highway.

Before really putting on the burners and getting back the cheaper Super 8 hotel in Newport, we detoured along the St. Lawrence again and watched the sun set over the hills. We stopped for a photo op and also to sample some French-Canadian beer. Back to Lisa: upon hearing that her job had been yanked away from her sooner than she had expected, I advised her to have a drink. Then I got the bright idea that since French beer has a bad reputation, French-Canadian beer might be just as bad, so I offered to bring her a bottle, which served the double purpose of also ensuring that we could get rid of any Canada bucks not spent for parking or miscellaneous items (such as apple juice). The name of the beer we got her was La Fin du Monde, appropriate, we figured, because she'd lost her job. This was not a big traumatic experience for her, as she'd been expecting it, but it still rather stunk. Back to Canada: the view of the St. Lawrence was better than the beer.

Then, in the dark, among scary mini-van drivers, we made out way south through Drummondville and Sherbrooke and back across the border, stopping to be questioned by a jolly American who spoke some of the only English we'd heard that day. The next morning, after helping ourselves generously to the continental breakfast again (but passing on the tasteless cake doughnuts), we made it back to Jersey City (having failed to be squished by two different big rigs who apparently had no idea we were in the lane they were planning on entering) in time to meet Lisa and call Todd Alan Johnson to see if he was in Raleigh for a play, in which case we would naturally want to stop by not only to see him, but also the play, and him in it. The convivial Todd—I doubt we could have randomly met a nicer person and I am always amazed at that piece of lucky coincidence—was indeed in a play, and also pleased to hear from us. So the next morning we got up early, so as to be sure to make it through D.C. before the infamous and deadly rush hour set in. Arriving in Raleigh after stopping in Virginia to call the theatre's box office and get cheap tickets and directions, we succumbed to something we hadn't had to face for the entire week-and-a-half road trip: McDonald's.

Despite the icky meal (the only one I remember having that day), we had a good time. I hadn't actually asked what the name of the play was, so we arrived, looking out-of-place with our jeans and polo shirts, to discover that it was The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, a fluffy yet basically enjoyable play, so long as you don't analyze it afterwards (the songs were pretty good and it always adds a dimension of interest if you are acquainted with someone in a play). It's about the blithely happy entrance of a young aspiring prostitute into the warm and fuzzy business, and of the town's eventual shutting down of the title whorehouse at the instigation of a goofy television personality/vigilante (Mr. Johnson). We went around back to the stage door and yakked with Todd for awhile, walked with him to the Yo Slick, proudly displayed its distinctive tags and eventually said good bye and left him to go back to wherever it is that actors go when they're not on a stage or being tracked by wackos.

Foolishly, we had decided not to stop in Raleigh and get home around two a.m. on Sunday. Instead we drove starting that night (Friday), and because I reclined my seat in an attempt to sleep while Keith drove, I didn't notice that he'd passed the poorly-marked junction of I-40 with I-95, and we wound up in the Carolina coastal town of Wilmington at two-thirty that morning. As Keith said, after alerting me to possible trouble and asking where we were, "The Carolina coast? Vomit." Straightening that mess out added a few extra hours to our trip and we arrived back home at about five in the afternoon, tired out from a fun trip...the end.