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Roadtrip 2013: Great Lakes and the Midwest

I never have time or patience to write anything longer before and shortly after Eurofurence. Or to sort and edit the photos that I need for a travel report. And it's been so long that I'm not able to write an actual report anymore, for example I don't remember most of the hotels and motels at all, hence some musing based on the experience have to do. But at least I've edited and uploaded the photos, for the first time in three years.

April, 11th to 14th: Traveling and Furry Connection North

Flying on airline bonus miles for the first time, yay. Still having to pay for fees and taxes, boo. I met my travel companions Kayjay and Lynard in Frankfurt at the new concourse A+ (or is it Z?) and we had a rather uneventful and pleasant Lufthansa flight to Detroit. All of our luggage arrived in time as well, it was just a bit confusing to find the shuttle buses to the rental car station. The car we got from the choice line was a new Chrysler 300C. While it has a lot of leg room even for the back seats, it has not much space for luggage. The only alternative would have been a convertible with even less luggage space. The 300C is quite nice to drive, though it has a somewhat cheap interior. Surprisingly, not only was satellite radio reception enabled (thank you, Alamo!), the built-in satnav worked as well. But it quickly dawned on us why they try to rent out a portable one anyway. The Garmin navigation system is nearly unusable. It receives traffic information via satellite radio, but doesn't use it for navigation. It can only find POIs within your current location (no "find me all hotels near Niagara" while we are in Detroit). It keeps sending you via state routes parallel to the freeway, except if the freeway is a turnpike. It definitely prefers toll roads. The menu system is a confusing mess. I'm glad I brought my Tomtom. But I digress.