Monday September 29th, 2025 - Fall trip to oregon - conclusion, Madison WI to home, no hikes

I'm writing this almost a week after our trip ended.  We actually got home on Sunday the 28th around 4 pm but I've been dating the blog posts with the day I'm writing them which is usually covering the day or 2 before the writing.  To keep that inconsistently consistent I'm dating this entry for Monday the 29th which was actually my first day back at work.

We left Madison fairly early Saturday morning.  Embassy Suites has a well known full breakfast with made-to-order eggs so we actually ate breakfast at the hotel.  The trip on I-94 to Milwaukee went well and we had a few hours to kill before boarding the ferry for Michigan.  We walked around the third ward of Milwaukee which was very charming. We had a treat at the public market, I bought sunglasses at Warby Parker and overall we got a couple of miles in walking around this very historic but gentrified section of town.  The public markets in big cities are kind of amusing to me.  Ostensibly they are a collection of unique or even 'funky' local vendors in a nice communal space.  Yet these markets are always full of high-end chocolatiers, luxury butchers and fusion eateries.  It somehow lulls the 'authenticity' seeking urbanite into thinking they are a class above the mall goer in sophistication and maybe even morally superior for supporting 'small businesses' but these look like very expensive boutique level retail spaces to me.  And from city to city these markets are remarkably similar.  I can't point to any obvious difference between Milwaukee's market or York PA's or Columbus Ohio's, Lancaster PA or any number of others we've been to in the past 10 years.  It's actually pretty funny comparing the photo we took from the Columbus market (linked to the blog post above) to the Milwaukee one.

The ferry across Lake Michigan started off sounding like a fun experience and, compared to driving all the way around Chicago, relaxing. Then I started seeing the reviews for the crossing and it sounded like about half of the people who take it get sea-sick on it.  So it was with a little trepidation that we got into the line of vehicles waiting to be security inspected and eventually onto the ferry.  We booked 'premiere' seating which is advertised as being child free and having free wi-fi etc.  They don't mention that you actually get priority boarding and offloading for your car.  I was literally the 2nd or 3rd vehicle to drive onto the boat and got the interesting honor of wedging our car into an amazingly tight Tetris-like space under the excellent guidance of the ferry staff.  They (wisely) have all passengers other than the vehicle driver board through the passenger terminal. leaving each car with just a driver.  I can NOT imagine being a mom or dad with kids or a spouse yapping away and trying to follow the somewhat tight and intricate parking directions on the vehicle deck.

 

Our vehicle was the blue minivan which, interestingly, is pointed perpendicular to the shape of the boat... Meaning that most of the cars (such as the reddish Subaru in my photo) was aligned lengthwise with the long side of the boat for a straight forward drive out at the end of the crossing but for whatever reason they chose 2 vehicles to put in this other direction.  At the end of the crossing as we all returned to our vehicles, I was really curious how on earth we would get the car out of this parking spot (which was fully surrounded by other cars almost as close as the Subaru on all sides) but this is clearly a well-oiled machine and we were about the 4th car off the boat without any death defying driving needed.  Our crossing was silky smooth.  The sun was bright and the sky nearly cloudless so the views were excellent.  We had lunch on the ferry and I had very modest expectations especially given the limited menu.  Surprisingly, the food was totally reasonable both in price and quality.  Having waiter service in our little premiere cabin was a nice touch.  Overall, I thought the ferry crossing, while expensive, was a pleasure.  If we'd had 5 foot swells or a winter storm we probably wouldn't be as enthusiastic. 

From Muskegon Michigan we drove pretty much due East-West across the width of Michigan.  There was very little traffic on the roads but since we avoided the Interstates mostly it was kind of a longer trip than it could have been.  That night we stayed JUST across the border into Canada in Sarnia Ontario.  We've stayed in Sarnia before. The border crossing was, as every single one of them have been in the last 3 years, a total breeze.  The Canadians asked about 2 questions on the way into Canada and the Americans about the same on the way back into New York.  Everybody has both different experiences and different perceptions of things but I'm again and again astonished how casual and fast the border crossings have felt in the last few years despite the constant drum beat of strained relations with the US and Canada and the alleged wholesale gutting of federal government staffing.  And we've crossed various US/Canada borders a LOT in the last 2 years via car, train and airplane.  Maybe 12 times in and 12 times out?

Sunday morning was our final day on the trip.  We left Sarnia before 8 am and drove the expressway  for an hour to London Ontario to have a bagel.  The Montreal style bagel shop had amazingly delicious fresh bagels.  I had a Montreal smoked meat sandwich and it was delectable and very reasonably priced.  I made sure to write a glowing Yelp review for the shop right from their dining room I was so impressed.  To have Montreal style bagels at all anywhere but Quebec is unusual so these were really surprising.

\

 

For whatever reason, the only good, high-speed connection between Western NY and Ontario is via Niagara Falls. I'm not sure why this is given that Buffalo is and almost always has been a much bigger economic presence than the relatively minor Niagara Falls area.  For this trip I wanted to try going directly and crossing the border at Buffalo so I tried taking Ontario Highway 3 out of London that cuts farther south than the expressway, almost along the Lake Erie side Ontario's coastline.  While it was a little bit scenic, it was also a one-time deal.  Why oh why does Canada think 80 km/h is a reasonable TOP SPEED for a rural journey of 220 km through farms and fields?  And then there were about 20 speed zones along the way where the speed was more like 40 or 50 km/h.  To get from London Ontario to Buffalo via the expressway through Niagara Falls (both Ontario and New York) is 220 km and takes about 2 hours 20 minutes meaning an average speed of about 92 km/h (57 MPH) which is great.  That's including whatever city streets Google Maps is including from city center to city center plus some amount of border crossing time.  Going from London to Buffalo on Ontario 3 is slightly shorter in distance but takes an irritating 40 minutes longer averaging about 77 km/h (47 mph) which clearly must be the actual speed people actually drive and not based on the speed limits because the speed limit never went above 80 km/h the entire way and could not have averaged more than about 65.  Maybe I was just ready to be home because it felt a lot slower than it sounds writing all this out.

The last complicated logistics part of our trip was returning the rental car in Buffalo.  It all went well and we were happy to be back in our own car and headed home on relaxing US-20.  The Buffalo Bills were playing a home game that day so the roads were nearly empty.  Those who weren't AT the game were at least at home watching it or having game-day parties which are a big deal here.

We got home around 4 pm. The house was in perfect shape thanks to our fantastic cat sitter who takes excellent care of both the cat but also makes sure we walk into a cat that doesn't smell like cat poop or cat food garbage or anything else.  The cat was very meow meowy as expected but it was nice to see Leo again.

So wraps up another vacation.  Overall this trip was a big success.  The weather was excellent everywhere we went, we had only 1 slightly disappointing hotel which only stuck out because every other hotel we stayed at was wonderful.  Our rental cars were both great and the ferry across Lake Michigan exceeded my expectations.  Frustrations were mainly limited to time constraints that made the first week feel like more of a family obligation than a joy and an Amtrak trip that just lacked the usual 'certain something' we usually feel on the train.