A Slice of Life
Bill Lites
Day 5 – Saturday July 27 (Continued)
Continuing today’s activities, I crossed the Menominee River (the border between Michigan and Wisconsin), where I visited the Marinette Logging Museum located in Marinette, WI. This museum was built in 1962 and offers information related to the history of the early homesteaders to the area. Visitors will find several authentic pieces of sawmill and ice cutting equipment, and displays of early 1900s farm and logging equipment, artifacts, and memorabilia. This museum also has the restored1897 Evancheck homestead log cabin that is filled with period furnishings. Another interesting area of the museum is their collection of Menominee Indian cultural items.
This is where the many Native Indian names of this region (many of which are spelled and sound similar) got me in trouble. When I was making my motel reservations for this trip, I booked a room, for this night, at a motel in what I thought was Menominee, MI. Now, I had just come across the Menominee River to visit the Logging Museum in Marinette, and knew it was only a couple of miles back to the motel. But when I plugged the motel address into Greta (my Garmin), she told me to turn in the opposite direction, and that it was 240 miles to the motel. What? Have you lost your mind Greta? I entered the motel address again, but got the same results. I remembered passing a Quality Inn earlier, so I drove back across the Menominee River to Menominee to find the motel.
The motel clerk said she didn’t have a reservation for me. I showed her a copy of my reservation, and she pointed out to me that my reservation for that night was in Menomonie, WI. Greta had been right. My reservation was for the wrong town. I couldn’t believe I had made such a foolish mistake. Evidently I had hit “WI” instead of “MI” and didn’t notice the slight difference in the spelling of what sounded to me like the same word. Well, balderdash! I was going to have to eat the cost of that reservation, as it was “non-refundable.” I asked the clerk if she had a room for me, she said, “No we are completely full because of the Oshkosh Air Show this week.” And I discovered all of the motels in the surrounding area were full for the same reason. So now what was I going to do? Sleep in the car? She was kind enough to call around and finally found me a room at the Best Western, there in town, so at least I would have a bed for the night.
After I got checked in at the motel, I asked Greta to take me to The Brothers Three Restaurant, there in town, where I waited almost an hour after ordering, to be served the worst Calzone I have ever tried to eat. There were lots of cars in the parking lot, and the restaurant was full, so maybe some of their other Italian dishes are better, but I sure can’t recommend their Calzone to anyone.
—–To Be Continued—–
Bill is a retired Mechanical engineer living with his wonderful artist/writer wife, DiVoran, of 61 years in Titusville, Florida. He was born and raised in the Southwest, did a tour of duty with the U.S. Navy, attended Northrop University in Southern California and ended up working on America’s Manned Space Program for 35 years. He currently is retired and spends most of his time building and flying R/C model airplanes, traveling, writing blogs about his travels for Word Press and supporting his wife’s hobbies with framing, editing and marketing. He also volunteers with a local church Car Care Ministry and as a tour guide at the Valiant Air Command Warbird Museum there in Titusville. Bill has two wonderful children, two outstanding grandchildren, and a loving sister and her husband, all of whom also live in Central Florida, so he and DiVoran are rewarded by having family close to spend lots of quality time with.
One of Bill’s favorite Scriptures is: John 10:10
Old Things R New 
I definitely know how you felt. We made a similar mistake once but it was more like a 2,000 mile error. Glad it all worked out for you.
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