Preparations

My itinerary for June went something like this: Chicago Blues Festival (2d), travel (1d), Maui (6d), travel (1d), Cambridge (2d), Caerdydd (7d), Boston (1d), travel (1d), the birthday party (1.5d), travel (1d), Boston (1d), Cambridge (4d), Saratoga Jazz Festival (2d) – what time did I have to prepare? The last trip for the Rangie was over Memorial Day - out to Lockport, NY to visit Bill Leacock & clan. Guess I'd better check the oil and tyre pressure.

Getting there

Friday June 21st

Two Range Rovers particpated in the offroad event at the 13th OVLR party. The other Range Rover was fitted with a receiver mounted front winch. I just came with rain-ready XMS's (read: barely road legal). There were a couple Disco's about, including a dealer demo, but neither played. Coil sprung owners were also represented by a D-90, who did a good job driving through the mud hole.

Boston to Quebec: 5 hours. Vermont officers like hanging out at open Weigh stations, and were up at St.Albans on the way up. Other than that traffic seem to know they were not about.

Bill's travel corrally 13

They ran the license, and evidently didn't like what they saw, thinking that I might be a road hazard. Concientious as they were, they started asking me about my good driving record (or lack thereof).

Has your license been suspended ?
No, Mass. never suspended that license.
Has any other state ever suspended your license?
No.
Have you ever been in front of a judge.
Yep, they charged me with trespassing for walking along the Providence and Worcester railway tracks, and fined me $50. [And kind as they were they gave me a tour of the Worcester County lock-up, and let me hang out in a cell there for a while, and fumble-fingers policeman made sure he dropped my radar detector 4 foot onto the cement floor 'by accident' when taking my personal belongings for safe keeping.]

The woman took some notes and then set me out, now they decided to have a look-see at my car. Now having a trunk full of tools is pretty normal for most Land Rover owners, but some how, mine had mostly electrical tools, wiring stuff, CB radio and car alarm bits, osram lamps, camping gear, etc. After going through most of the stuff in the trunk (but not all) the inspector moved on to the rest of the car. [I don't know what they would have thought had they actually opened the box with the complete set of auto lock-out tools in it :-)]

Sure enough the inspector was reasonably thorough, and though suspicious of the rattle in my back door didn't tear it apart. Though when she came upon the set of Ma. license tags for my '63 LR (hanging out in the RR until I actually get to the RMV to trade them for Antique plates) and decided that Canadian Customs ought to releive me of said registration tags, as they might pose some hazard to the security of the residents of Quebec. So sure enough, they bagged and tagged them and gave me a receipt.

Onward to Silver Lake

Saturday June 22nd

Then upstream to what used to be a water tight beaver dam. There was some concern if the verticle would interfere with the RR's air dam, but it did not. I went straight for the middle and got hung up, the series owners were ready (and maybe a bit over eager) with the winch cable, but I just shouted a shunt and moved a few feet over to the right where the the exit was more gradual, the footing was firm, both in the stream and on the embankment, so the real trick was the tight turning required once on the dry ground.