O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

The Drive For 5-0 is officially a multinational blog this evening, as tonight I am sleeping in Vancouver, British Columbia, conveniently located in our docile neighbor to the north - Canada. Special thanks to the Canadian member of the International Brotherhood of UNC Sports Information Personnel, David Tinson, for tonight's accommodations (even though he's off in Whistler like a big shot).

But I'm getting ahead of myself. This morning I walked down to the Lake Coeur D'Alene to take some pictures and enjoy the weather. The view along the shore is, well, see for yourself...

After lunch, I hit the road once again, this time headed for Washington, state No. 49. Not much to report from the Evergreen State (I'm saving Seattle for Monday), though there was a great scenic overlook of the Columbia River off I-90 near Vintage. I could definitely picture someone trying to float a covered wagon down that baby.

So another long day of driving is in the books. Tomorrow I'll sink my teeth into Vancouver before heading back to the United States for Seattle on Monday, with the completion of my task on Tuesday in Oregon.

Oh, one last note about today. Crossing the border into Canada is an intimidating process. I have nothing illicit in my car, a perfectly legitimate reason for being here and a passport and I still got nervous when I pulled up to the customs agent. He asked a bunch of rapid fire questions (Where are you going? Why? Who are you going to see? What is his name? How do you know him?) that I had answers to, but it still is an intense experience. I can't imagine what it must be like trying to do something illegal as you cross.

Ok, that's all for now.

Things to do in Idaho when you're dead

Dead tired, that is. Evidently communing with nature is exhausting, as I was in a funk all day Friday. But have no fear, dear readers. I made the drive from Butte to lovely Coeur D'Alene, Idaho without any trouble, despite some intermittent snow showers.

Before grabbing lunch I made a quick stop at the Grant-Kohrs Ranch, a National Historic Site that has preserved an old Montana cattle ranch. This turned out to be an unexpected highlight (I hadn't even heard of it until I saw the sign), as the views were amazing and it was awesome getting to see what life on the ranch must have been like over a hundred years ago.

I stopped in Missoula, Mont., for lunch, and did a quick drive through the campus of the University of Montana. It's amazing how much nicer a very bland campus can look when surrounded by mountains.

After a spicy grilled cheese with sweet potato fries at the Iron Horse (great value at $5.95), I made the 165-mile drive to Coeur D'Alene, where I stayed for the night. I'll take some pictures of the lake that shares a name with the town today, but it was another in a long line of beautiful towns here in the west.

No real plan for today, so if you have suggestions, give me a call. Also, I'm now in the Pacific Time Zone for a few days, rounding out the four time zones here on the Drive For 5-0.

Also, no new states yesterday, but Idaho is now red on the bobbymap.

Why don't you purify yourself in the waters of Lake Minnetonka?

Good question Prince. And so it was on to the Land of 10,000 Lakes, Minnesota, State No. 44 on this journey. I should mention that I spent a good bit of time in Madison this afternoon, mostly walking State Street and taking pictures of the Capitol. I also had to make a stop at Camp Randall (again with the football) before heading west.

I put my driving shoes on today and made great time from Madison to Minneapolis without really speeding to speak of (I rarely if ever speed much on the highway). Wisconsin is the first state since Tennessee to have any real scenic land to drive across, and the rolling plains dotted with dairy farms were very cool. One interesting landmark on the way was a place called Wisconsin Dells, which can best be described as Myrtle Beach on steroids. It was the ultimate in touristy kitsch, as evidenced by the vast number of amusement parks and other such silliness. Case in point, this Trojan Horse at the entrance to the Mt. Olympus park.

Upon arriving in Minneapolis, I parked near the Mississippi River at a place called Saint Anthony Falls. This is almost the extreme north end of the river and once featured the only waterfall on the Upper Mississippi. The falls have since been covered by a concrete apron and dams installed. Here's the view from just down river on the St. Anthony Falls Heritage Trail.

I finished the walk around the trail, had a quick dinner of fish and chips at Tuggs before heading to my home base for the night at Casey's friend Anne's house. Special thanks to Anne for the fine (and free) accommodations.

Tomorrow we start to get serious. Mall of America, lunch, then on to North Dakota.

Oh, and I know it's been the weekend and all, but don't you love me? No comments? I'm not blogging for my health here.

Tune in next time for "Hail to the victors" or "Cheer, cheer for old Notre Dame"

It's been over a thousand miles and I'm titling posts with homages to Rocky and Bullwinkle...let's just say that I shouldn't have this much time alone with my thoughts. Anyway, today I wrapped up my impromptu college football pilgrimage today with visits to Michigan and Notre Dame.

First up was Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor, the Big House.

It was raining, and the field was covered in preparation for graduation, but it was pretty awesome. It wasn't nearly as big vertically as I'd imagined a 100,000+ capacity stadium would be, but it wasn't hard to picture that many people in there. It was built in 1927 and felt like it could have looked exactly like it did today way back then. Very cool.

After a cheese steak at Mr. Spot's for lunch, it was off to South Bend. The toll road that runs east to west across northern Indiana (I-80 and I-90, cleverly-named the Indiana Toll Road) was closed due to an accident this morning, so I was forced onto US 20 from Angola into South Bend. It was extremely slow going with all the normal Toll Road traffic on the mostly two-lane road, but I did get to drive through some Amish country around Lagrange. You know you're going slow when you get passed by a horse-drawn buggy. But I digress...

I got an in-depth Notre Dame athletic facility tour from fellow women's hoops SID Chris, highlighted by the ridiculously-nice new football building which features hands down the nicest weight room I have ever seen. Carolina's football weight room is nice, but this place blows it out of the water. I was unable to actually enter Notre Dame Stadium due to construction (glad to know it's not just Chapel Hill), so I decided to walk around campus a bit.

After taking the requisite picture of Touchdown Jesus, I ventured toward the center of campus. With all due respect to Carolina (and UVa for that matter), I can't imagine a place looking more collegiate than Notre Dame. A very intimate, walkable campus with just the right combination of really old buildings and well-landscaped nature. And in the middle of it all, the famed Main Building, which you may recognize...

I made a quick pit stop at the bookstore for my first T-shirt of the trip before heading west toward Lake Michigan. It was still kind of rainy (and newly-foggy) as I got closer to Chicago, so I decided to call it a night in Portage, Ind., before driving into the city tomorrow. There is some clearing in the forecast, so hopefully I can spend most of the day walking around Chicago.

With that, good night from the Central Time Zone. Here's hoping this is the dumbest thing I do on the trip. (What can I say, I couldn't let my dad be the only one to lose money tonight).

Past Travels

Regrettably, I have almost no good pictures to speak of from my two biggest road trips to date - New Mexico and Montreal. I visited close to half of the states I've gotten so far for the first time on those two trips, but because they occurred in the pre-digital camera age (for me, at least) there is little in the way of photographic evidence. A quick scan of what I have from the Montreal trip (I literally have nothing from the New Mexico trip) shows these as the best of the bunch:

This is the Chatham Light on Cape Cod in Massachusetts. We made a pit stop in Chatham en route to Montreal to see my friend Daniel pitch in the Cape Cod Baseball League. A little out of the way, but most certainly worth the trip.

This is Lake Champlain on the border of New York and Vermont from the Burlington, Vt., side. Burlington has always fascinated me because it was always listed just above Chapel Hill on the "Top Cities That Have It All" list. I only spent an afternoon there, but I can't wait to go back and get a better idea of whether it really has it all.

So there they are, the best two pictures from my trip to Montreal, neither of which involve Montreal (or even Canada for that matter). But I promise to do better this time, dear readers. Need proof? Here are my "digital camera era" travel photos, including my most recent road trip to Pennsylvania.

Enjoy!