This Weekend has been a real “Drag”…

A little late blogging tonight, but I just got back to the RV from Grand Bend.  I decided this week I wanted to go the the big summer end bash at the Drag Track.  It was a blast… they had all big boys with all the toys there… here is how it looked!

Got the to track, and in 5 minutes, met Andy Koopman and his friend Sid, from Woodstock.  We all sat together and had a blast!

This is a Pro Mod Gremlin… what a blast from the past that thing is!

This guy was looking for a snow bank… not today… it was over 35 degrees C.  The track was hot!

Lots of these cars burn nitro, this one below was a 6 second car in the 1/4 mile, and fast… over 200 mph.

 

Some real nice cars out today…

This was a nitro burning Harley Davidson, all the guy could do was to hang on!  It was quick.

They had a group of Nostalgic Nitro Burning Funny Cars… this is one of the reasons I wanted to come… they are a blast to watch, loud and fast!

The Funny Cars did great burnouts!

OK, so they had a Fire Truck that could do a Wheel Stand, all the way down the 1/4 mile… cool!  (Will someone please get that guy in the front row a shirt!… Thank you)

Ohhh… and it gave off a few sparks on the way!

Below is another reason I wanted to come today… jet cars!

They were awesome… you could feel the heat… they were the fastest things on the track today at over 270 mph in the 1/4 mile… what a noise!  ( yes, I did wear my headgear to protect my ears).

If these two guys had a small pair of wings, they would have taken off!

We got through the first round of races tonight, and then some rain hit… too much actually, and they could not dry the track out enough to continue.  However, I got a nice rain check to come back to races next year! 

The rain delay, gave us a chance to go into the pits and check out the cars and talk to the drivers… what a great group!

Some of the motors are incredible…

They are fully equipped to tear them down and re-build them, right in the pits.

So that was what kind of day it was… a real drag.  I love going, and will be back next year!  Sorry about all the car pics tonight, I only took about 147 of them!

Till tomorrow…

Port Dover on a Friday???

Today was the hottest day of the week, for sure… It was well over 30 deg. C. today with lots of sun again.  We decided to take a motorcycle ride today, as maybe we could cool off doing that!

I have always wanted to go down and visit Port Dover on Lake Erie.  It is a pretty little town, and on every Friday the 13th each year, it is over run by motorcycles!  A couple guys in Port Dover started this tradition many years ago, and it has grown out of control.  I believe over 10,000 people show up now for Friday the 13th.  They come from all over Canada and the U.S.A. now.

So we took a chance and went today, being it was only the 2nd of the month, I felt we were safe!

On the way down we stopped in a little Town called Delhi, and visited Tim Horton”s, one of the most famous coffee shops in Canada for sure, however, look below to see what I found!

Cannot ever remember seeing a designated spot for horse and buggy parking… and it looks like some horse left something behind…  wonder if the Staff at Tim’s have to come and clean that up???

Yes, we are in Mennonite country, and actually, while I was the Branch Manager of National Trust and working in Mount Forest, we had a tie up for the horses in our back parking lot.

Port Dover is quite nice… here is Judy walking the waterfront down on a canal leading into Lake Erie.

Well developed water front area.

This is the lower end of the Main Street, and it would be just jammed with bikes on any Friday the 13th.

Developed Commercial area on the water…

A nice Marina to keep the boaters happy…

And how about a nice beach to keep the beach bums happy, it is obvious no one works in Port Dover on Friday afternoon, they are all at the beach…

For about $14.00 you could get about a 1 1/2 hour boat tour of the area…

Port Dover has been around since 1879, and at one time in 1814, was razed by American Troops!  When farming went flat for a while, people ran rum in boats from Port Dover over to the U.S. 

We carried on Lakeshore Drive, from Port Dover down to Nanticoke.  Below is the Ontario Power Generation Plant at Nanticoke.  It is right on Lake Erie, and is a coal fired plant.  2 of the 8 generation units have been retired, and the remaining 6 are only used during peak periods of use.  Ontario wants to get right out of using coal and may convert this plant to Natural Gas in the future.

Across the road from the Power Plant, is a very large Esso Oil Refinery.  It has been here for years, and provides a lot of gasoline to southern Ontario. 

We stopped on a bridge on the road, that went over a couple big conveyor belts at the refinery.  they led right down to Lake Erie and I am not sure what they use it for.  On the far right of the picture below, it looked like a water trough to bring up some lake water to the plant.

About a 200 Klick drive today and we cooled off in the pool as soon as we got back to the Park!  Perfect way to end a ride!

Till tomorrow…

Simply put, a blister of a day…

Wow, the hot weather continues… this has to be one of the warmest summers on record up here in Ontario… I figure by now every ice burg north of us will be half melted by now!

Took the day off of RV maintenance today, it was simply too hot, and the humidity levels were out of this world here… something we simply do not get while down in the south west!

By lunch time it was so warm and humid, I had to take a rest for a while as I was sweating just sitting in the RV.  1/2 hour snooze later I was set for the afternoon.  Kristina brought Gwenny out to the RV this afternoon in search of some cooler weather than in Woodstock. 

Judy loves to keep an eye on little Gwenny and she was do a fine job of that this afternoon.

Back in the days when our kids were first born, they were lucky if we strapped them into a car seat when travelling… now they have fancy travel systems, and Gwenny has one of the finest available.  The part Gwenny is sitting in, comes out and clips right into another docking station inside the car… the marvels of technology!

If you think back to yesterday’s blog, I had a picture of the fall display at our park… now it seems today, the lady farmer found herself a “Man”… hmmmmm wonder if they will be little farmers showing up soon!

A couple blogs ago, while we were hiking in Burgess Park, I identified the River we were walking along, as the Pittock River… well, my son-in-law Chris corrected me, indicating this is actually the Thames River!  I just ate my hat!

Till tomorrow…