I've so far left Vermont, drove through New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and I'm now in Illinois. Yesterday I never left New York and was mostly on I-90W the whole way. I stopped and looked at Niagara Falls from the Canadian side. When I say looked I mean I got out of my car, walked around for 20 or so minutes, snapped a couple of pictures, ate a sandwich, went to the bathroom and got back in my car. It was cool to see them, but I was a little dismayed at the amount of tourist traps they had. But what did I expect, it was NIAGARA FALLS not the Falls of Lana. The rest of the way was nice, farms all over the place. But nice rolling hills, well kept old barns (I have a soft spot in my heart for old red barns and get very sad when I see one that collapsed).
I ended up staying a Quality Inn in Hamburg, NY. Which had a bar/ restaurant downstairs. Looked like it was hosting the young male red neck societies weekly meeting, I decided to skip take out and ate a yogurt in my room. The place was nice, clean and just fine for the night. I had their breakfast, which was OK.
Here is a rant: Coffee. Continental breakfast coffee. The only word that I would use to describe this is fowl. Does good continental breakfast coffee exist, anywhere? I'm not asking for Starbucks here, just maybe something that doesn't taste like you're drinking a liquid that might be used to thin paint, clean out drains, or make babies throw up. I didn't think that anyone would actually want to say 'Hey look I make this fowl coffee' much less anyone who would want to serve it to their guests.
Hamburg was located just south of Buffalo. My goal was to get to Dunkirk, NY the night before, but just didn't quite make it due to a few snags which took a few minutes to get worked out. New York has these really cool service stations that are on the turnpike so that you don't have to get off to get gas, get food, go to the bathroom and walk around. I was also impressed that unlike Maine where the gas prices are much higher on the turnpike, New Yorks are lower. So you don't wonder if it would have been worth it to get off the turn pike only to pay the toll again to get back on.
I was only in New York for a little while and then on to Pennsylvania which did not have service stations so I had to get off the interstate to get fuel. One thing I did notice in Pennsylvania is that on almost every single exit there is a Subway close by. Which if I have to chose fast food, I go with Subway. So I got off and got a foot long sub, one half for lunch, and one half for dinner. I decided that Pennsylvania, the piece that I drove through was pretty, some rolling mounds (I wouldn't call them hills). Then after Pennsylvania it was Ohio.
Ohio was crap. The only thing good about the whole state were the service stations, and New Yorks were nicer. Trust me, I've been to a few. Ohio was mostly brown in color. It was also WINDY. My car got blown all of the place. I got out of my car to get gas at one point and I really had to lean into the wind. About the time I realized it started to get pretty was after I crossed the boarder into Indiana. Sorry for anyone who lives in a pretty part of Ohio, I'm sure they are there, but the northern I-90 pieces I saw... not so much.
Indiana green and had rolling mounds like New York, and was not as windy as Ohio. Although keep in mind there was a tornado warning for the piece of Ohio I was in so I'm guessing it's not windy like that all the time. There's nothing really to report about Indiana, other than that there were a lot of farms along the road.
The little piece of Illinois that I've seen so far has been my successful attempt at getting around Chicago at 4-5pm without getting stuck in traffic. If anyone is wondering take 80W toward Des Moines Iowa.
Tomorrow my plan is to visit a friend of mine in Minnesota near Minneapolis, only about 7.5 hours of driving (more when you add in stops). Friday I'm going to be coming into North Dakota with only about 5 hours of driving!! Short day! I'll keep you all posted.
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