The Crash and Burn airways flight to Toronto from the UK arrived safely. We picked up a Mazda SUV (station wagon) which we quickly convert to a matchbox sized camper with a blow up mattress and sleeping bag.
With a plastic shower curtain cut to size to cover the windows, we deftly created mobile sleeping accommodation. This allows us to avoid having to stay in hotels every night and lets us camp in the Canadian Provincial Parks. To us, hotel and motel accommodation varies little the world over, even down to the rumbling air conditioners, and are to be avoided whenever possible.


We always miss the Landrover whilst we await for it as it is shipped between continents. It's only a small space on wheels, but it provides us with all that we need to travel relatively comfortably in various conditions. The fact that everything can be done indoors out of the elements and away from the bugs, is very much appreciated by Gael. I have assured her that the swelling, itching and red blotches from the mosquito bites she will inevitably get while camping in the SUV, will not be life threatening.


We have been fortunate enough to see a moose and several black bears whilst touring through the Great Lakes area north of Toronto. In fact one small black bear nearly ended up as road kill after leaping out from the roadside vegetation in front of our hire car. Impact would have been costly for both us, and it, and not the sort of memory you want to carry with you!


After ten days in Canada a short flight to Newark in New Jersey. We arrive hoping that the trucks release will not be delayed by US Customs. For three nights we kill time at an airbandb that we had organised near the port of entry in Newark.
Newark is an experience. There must be more police in the suburb of Newark than anywhere else we have been. One feels that at any moment it could go pear shaped. After buying a Sim card for our phone, the guy in the shop insisted on escorting me to the ATM two doors up the street to withdraw cash. I would have been easy meat!
The place is also filthy. We have been to developing countries where the citizens appear to have more of a sense of hope and pride in their surroundings.


We picked up the truck without any hassle from US Customs and hit the road only three days after it, and we, landed in the US of A. Fantastic!
We got out of New Jersey immediately and started our drive across Americas heart land to the West and the best of America for us. We could only get a three month Visa and we intend making the most of it.
It isn't until you reach Colorado that you leave behind the fields of corn and soya beans. It has taken us eleven days to drive that section from New York to and through Kansas. Probably not the most boring road trip we have ever made but it would come bloody close. However it was interesting to see how massive the farming sector is here in the US.


Amish, Mennonites and Brethren are thick on the ground in the heart land. With the Amish being the most visible as you are inevitably led to them, and their buggies, by the trail of horse manure on the highways. They also walk a lot. It would therefore, unlike the majority of the population here, be rare to find a fat one. Right to life roadside posters are front and centre on the highways. It must certainly place a great deal of pressure on the women in these rural communities.


Camping is generally easy to find in the US, and can be free in the smaller less visited state parks or forests. It will set you back about twenty Australian dollars a night if you need a shower, eleven if you slap on another layer of deodorant and keep your distance from other shoppers in the supermarket. A far cry from the forty plus Australian a night in the UK and parts of Europe. No free alternatives over there unless you can find a quiet pub carpark to camp for the night.
Whilst on the topic of pubs. They don't appear to exist in the the US towns once you leave the bigger cities. There are some ****** taverns as they call them, but the buildings have no character and appear to be very unsavoury if one were to judge purely by their external appearance. I do miss the English pub, and a good steak and ale pie. Jesus, did I just say that? So it wasn't all bad over in Old Blighty after all.


Colorado, and the first range of mountains we have seen since leaving Norway. And spectacular to boot. Great Sand Dunes NP a couple of hundred miles south of Denver gives us our first opportunity on this trip to really get out and enjoy nature. And there are actually other animal species here other than humans.