We were extremely pleased with the accommodation we were able to enjoy on Wednesday when we drove our two little poodles to the Town and Country Veterinarian Hospital in Ogdensburg for their neutering and spaying surgeries. The Stone Fence Resort turned out to be just perfect for our needs. And they were most accommodating to our request, that we have the use of their lovely facilities for the day, absent the night, since we planned on returning back to Ottawa as soon as we picked up our puppies, post-surgery.

They charged us a mere $50 to have the use of one of their clean, airy and attractive rooms with its bathroom and mini-kitchen facilities. And tossed into that charge a breakfast as well. We thought that was going a little too far in generosity, so when we checked in on Wednesday morning around nine, we insisted on paying for our breakfasts, as well. Even so, it was inexpensive at $6 for each of us. When we departed just after five to pick up our pups, we left a $20 tip for the maid. Altogether, a reasonable sum to enable us to relax and enjoy the leisure and pleasure of a well-appointed room and its pleasant surroundings beside the St. Lawrence River.

Irving walking about Remington's sculptures looking himself like someone who might have excited the artist's brush.

When we'd gone to the WalMart store to see if we could pick up a crate and lining, we saw people streaming past a man stationed just outside the entry, no one pausing or stopping. Perhaps they'd seen him before, on earlier shopping excursions. He was selling $3 tickets for some prize, the proceeds going to the local food bank. We 'bought' a ticket, without picking up the ticket itself, then entered.

When we completed our goal successfully there we went on to visit the Remington Museum that we'd read about online, but knew the presence of long before. My husband in the past, visiting the Glenbow Museum in Calgary, had seen Remingtons there, and in our home library we've plenty of art books featuring the American West with his artwork and sculptures featured there as well. And who isn't aware that Remington is featured in the Oval Office of the White House?

In the time we sauntered about the interior viewing the oil and watercolour paintings (and a few pastels), the memorabilia of Remington's time, copies of some of his most famous sculptures, a display of the lost-wax method of bronze-casting, we were the only visitors to the museum.

Citizens of the town enter free of charge; all other visitors pay a modest charge. In our case, that charge recognized us as senior citizens, so we paid $8 apiece for the pleasure of moseying about in that place dedicated to the art of a skilled painter and sculptor. And we enjoyed the personal attention of a docent, an elderly man whom we took to be a volunteer stationed there for that purpose who was knowledgeable and eager to impart what he knew of that famous artist's life and celebrity.

Taking into account our post-breakfast walk dockside beside the vast, blue St.Lawrence under a wide, blue sky the trip turned out very well indeed.