A little culture, a lotta relaxation.

Patrick and I are in the midst of a northern adventure: a vacation that began in Stratford, Ontario and has proceeded to Clayton, New York, in the Thousand Islands area (a.k.a the home of Patrick's parents, where I will spend a good deal of my time reading on a front porch swing while taking in a gentle breeze blowing off the St. Lawrence River a block away.)

We also plan a one-day camping trip at a New York State campsite, for which I bought a super cool Coleman French Press coffeemaker that can go right on the grill. At the end of the week, we will circle back through Canada and probably stop in Toronto for lunch before heading back to Mighty Michigan.

The week should consist of (as this post is aptly entitled) a bit of culture and a lot of relaxing.

The culture came first with our stop in Stratford, a cool little Canadian town that is, of course, well-known for its summer theater festival. We stayed at a B&B called the Puddicombe House in nearby New Hamburg, Ontario. We loved the giant four-poster bed with its extra plush pillow-top mattress, the jacuzzi tub and the wraparound porch, where I got a headstart on one of the two books I'll tackle this vacation. We also loved the on-site restaurant, which was pretty polished for being less than a year old. (I had a crab-stuffed salmon and broccoli-cranberry salad the first night. Scrumptious.)

We saw two plays: Of Mice and Men and Merchant of Venice, both starring Graham Greene. Both were terrific performances, and though I love and wildly appreciate Shakespeare, I preferred Of Mice and Men. It just does a wonderful job of tugging at the heartstrings. After all, what's so bad about carrying around mice in your pocket just for the purpose of stroking their little heads...even if they are dead? (We once had a couple of mice living in the birdseed container in our garage, and while I certainly don't want to encourage them to take up shop within a few 100 feet of us again, they sure were cute little fellas.)

The town of Stratford itself was a quaint little place lined with antique stores, bookshops, clothing boutiques, candy shops, restaurants, lush gardens, etc. A journalist helped launch the now-renowned theater festival when he realized that his hometown -- an old railway junction -- was destined to deteriorate without some kind of anchor. History has it that Tom Patterson decided to link Stratford, Ontario to Shakespeare's birthplace (of the same name) and build a theater festival around that tie.

Hmm. Perhaps Detroit could embrace its old title as the Paris of the West. While it's obvious that I love my hometown (and God knows you really can't top the Motown moniker, Greektown, Mexicantown or any of the many great attractions to the D), every city could use more escargots and French pastry shops.