We made it!!!

Yep, this is the last blog for this trip. We did not post a blog on Thursday night after we arrived because of a lack of a wifi connection and lack of time.

Wednesday night we stayed on the Navy Cruiser. That was really cool, all the scouts enjoyed it!! We saw a movie about one of the neighboring ships (USS Sullivan). We stayed on the USS Little Rock (first guided missile cruiser in the US Navy). The submarine and USS Sullivan were also available for a tour on Thursday morning at 6:30. For any scouts that wanted to sleep in, they didn’t get the tour at 6:30.

Mrs. Kilmer, Anna Kilmer, Kate Kilmer, and Nathan Kilmer met us on Wednesday night at the Navy Park in Buffalo. They brought chocolate treats for the scouts. And the scouts signed an anniversary card for Mrs. Kilmer. Wednesday was Darlene’s and my 20th anniversary. Mr. Alder seems very concerned that I was on the bike trip on our 20th anniversary. So, he provided many coaching tips on how to make it right.

On Thursday morning, we had breakfast and started our 25 mile trip to Niagara Falls. The trip was uneventful. One of the crews became a little lost, but they made it. About 5 miles away, we could see the mist rising up in the horizon from the falls. We first stopped at Goat Island on the US side to see the falls from the US. After Goat Island sight seeing we had lunch and then went on the Maid of the Mist to see the falls from the bottom. Then we traveled to the Canadian side and went through customs. We had no issues with customs going into Canada or returning to the US.

We rode down to Horseshoe Falls and then rode the 3 miles to the campgrounds. Mark Shultz had bike trouble with his derailer, but we were able to limp into camp. Once in camp, the scouts cooked dinner and around 9:00 we headed back to the falls to view it at night. At 11:00 we headed back to camp and went to bed.

Joshua Kilmer’s grandparents joined us in Niagara Falls for the day with several home made chocolate chip cookies. Thanks!! They live in western New York about 1 hour away from the falls.

On Friday we packed up and went back to the falls to visit Clifton Hill see a couple movies and at 3:00 we headed to the train station in Depew, New York.

Again the ride was uneventful. Once we arrived we ordered several pizzas and 100 buffalo wings from Anchor Bar. Anchor Bar is where buffalo wings originated. Everyone enjoyed the buffalo wings and pizza, it was a great last dinner for the trip.

We hung out until the train arrived and then had a very relaxing ride on the train back to Chicago.

Dan Herrera “I want to say thanks to all my friends and family who supported me, and helped me along on the trip. Everyone was a huge help both physically, mentally, and financially. I want to say a special thanks to my parents for allowing me to go on this trip of a life time. I know it scared the heck out of them that I was doing this. Once again, thank you to all, and I had a ton of fun thanks to you.”

Brian Kilmer "This was a very different trip then the rest of the troop's campouts. The boys were great working together on the bike rides. Thanks for everyone who helped to make this trip a huge success."