It was six o'clock in the afternoon.
"That's it," said the woman I consort with. "That's the motel we stayed in on our way out. The rooms are clean, the beds are firm, and I'm tired. Let's spend the night here."
We had been driving since ten in the morning from central New York state where we had spent a week visiting, among other places, the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. But that's another story. At that moment, we were driving west on the Queen's Highway, Canada 401. It runs, with the aid of Canada 403, across southern Ontario from Windsor to Buffalo, New York.
I pulled the Chevy into the parking lot of the hotel chosen by the consort. With nary a thought of rejection, I approached the check-in desk to register for a room. The young lady behind the counter smiled as sweetly as a person can.
"Sir, " she said, "We are ALL full up and I've called every motel within fifty miles. They're full, too."
And then the fun began.
We stopped at a restaurant to eat. The food sat a little heavy on my stomach because of the uncertainty about where we would spend the night. For the next two hundred miles, we stopped at every motel along the 401 only to hear the same story, "All full up."
At 10:30 PM, the woman I consort with, who had been short-talking me since 7:00 PM, muttering something about nuclear weapons and Canada.
"Any nation that provides room and board for pigeons (she was talking about the world renowned Jack Miner Bird Sanctuary in Kingsville, Ontario) and doesn't provide enough motels for people, doesn't deserve to exist."
I tried to explain to her that Canada, though large in land mass, is small in population with only 25 million people. They can't afford, nor do they need, a motel every few miles on their freeways the way we do in the United States.
She refused to be comforted. It was at that time we saw a sign, Ridge Top Ontario Food and Lodging. [Editor's note: don't try looking for them, they're out of business.] We stopped. The price was too high. The room wasn't clean. The bed was spongy. We grabbed it like it was the Taj Mahal.
After a shower and a little TV, we were able to relax and get a reasonable night's sleep. The next morning, after pancakes and coffee (compliments of the motel), the consort was willing to discuss a reprieve for Canada.
"Perhaps," she mused, "if they will do studies concerning the feasibility of more motels, I will let them off with just a dusting of DDT."
We learned a lesson. The next time we go traveling, we will call ahead for reservations. We'll not accept what Lady Luck wants us to have.
Editor's Note:
When the hotel clerk explained the local event taking place in that area of Ontario, the lack of hotel rooms all made sense. This is Jim's version of their cranky trip. While Norma ("the consort") and Jim had a consistently strong relationship, they had a regular habit of bickering like two teenage siblings on car trips. For years, I had a front row view of their squabbles and sighs from my perch in the back seat. It should be noted that I was with Jim and Norma on this trip to Upstate New York, but had the foresight to hop on an Amtrak train running from Utica to Manhattan, making for me a far more peaceful trip.
Also, the "consort" was a huge fan of Canada and throughout my teenage years regularly crossed the border to explore the shops and tea rooms of Windsor and London, Ontario with her friends. She would never have threatened the country; that's more Jim's style.
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