Where Have We Been? Part II

 5/9 to 5/17/2022 - Ronks, PA to Kutztown, PA, 52 miles, stayed 7 nights at Pine Hill RV Park, $372

5/17 to 5/20/2022 - Kutztown, PA to Mt. Pocono, PA, 64 miles, stayed 3 nights at Mt Pocono Campground, $200

5/20 to 5/23/2022 - Mt Pocono, PA to Catskill, NY, 138 miles, stayed 3 nights at Brookside Campground, $190

5/23 to 5/26/2022 - Catskill, NY to Lake George, NY, 97 miles, stayed 3 nights at Whippoorwill Motel and Campground, $310

5/26 to 6/3/2022 - Lake George, NY to Peru, NY, 95 miles, stayed 8 nights at Iroquois Campground and RV Park, $301

6/3 to 6/10/2022 - Peru, NY to South Hero, VT, 66 miles, stayed 7 nights at Apple Island Resort, $305.10

6/10 to 6/14/2022 - South Hero, VT to St. Johnsbury, VT, 93 miles, stayed 4 nights at Moose River Campground for $225

6/14 to 6/18/2022 - St. Johnsbury to North Hampton, NH, 151 miles, stayed 4 nights at Sea Coast Campground and RV Park, $165

6/18 to 6/21/2022 - North Hampton, NH to Freeport, ME, 53 miles, stayed 3 nights at Cedar Haven Family Campground, $237.40

6/21 to 6/29/2022 - Freeport, ME to Hermon, ME, 108 miles, stayed 7 nights at Pumpkin Patch RV Resort, $294

6/29/2022 to 7/3/2022 - Hermon, ME to Calais, ME, 105 miles, stayed 4 nights at Calais Motor Inn, $25/night 

SO. MUCH. GREEN!

Vermont has been on my bucket list forever.  It is SO green, in so many shades of green.  There are ferries to cross Lake Champlain, but we drove north and crossed a bridge, then came down the middle through some islands. We stayed at South Hero, VT, a short distance from Burlington and met some lovely people who took us out on their boat. It was the beginning of June, and still too cool for me to wear shorts.

 

We were lucky to explore Burlington during their Jazz Festival. There was live music everywhere, arts and craft vendors around the square, and a great pedestrian mall through the middle of town. We also took a day trip out to Stowe, VT.  This is the quintessential village you think of when you think of fall foliage. It was still lovely in June. We explored Smuggler’s Notch, where legend says traders stowed their goods in caves to  continue trading with Canada during an embargo against France and England during the Napoleonic Wars. We drove up to the Trapp Family Lodge, where the Von Trapps from Sound of Music fame immigrated and settled.  Their family cemetery is on site.  Their views of the Green Mountains looks like Austria, complete with highland cattle. We chose not to stop at Ben and Jerry’s factory since they don’t give tours anymore.  Instead, we had a creamy maple (huge vanilla soft serve cone with a hint of maple.) We even visited a sugar house and learned about the process of tapping trees and making syrup, and bought a pint of liquid gold.

 

 

 

 

 

After Vermont, we got back to the coast in North Hampton, New Hampshire ( a little nod to the village we lived in in England.). It’s a great beach town with a sand sculpture contest, a bandstand for live music, shops, and a old fashioned arcade, called Funarama. We met the best man from our wedding there almost exactly 34 years after our wedding day. He and his spouse introduced me to “fluffy clam chowder” with lumps of lobster in the soup. They also told us we must visit historic Portsmouth, NH.  Strawberry Banke is the oldest neighborhood in New Hampshire settled by Europeans, and the earliest example remaining today (gorgeous colonial homes!).  Their church had notable members and visitors, and their port was lively - a great place to eat and people watch.

 

 

 

 

We made our way up the Maine coast, staying in Freeport, the home of LLBean. We found the oldest tombstone in the oldest cemetery dated 1776, and others marked as soldiers of the American Revolution and War of 1812. We finally rested in Hermon, ME for a week, reconnecting with friends from Idaho.  Penny and I went on a bog boardwalk, a mile-long raised walk through peat and moss, trees and pitcher plants - with LOTS of mosquitoes!  We enjoyed browsing antique shops which, I think, are just as good as museums for telling the local history of an area. For our anniversary, we explored Bar Harbor and the rocky coast of Acadia National park before stopping at a lobster pound for a lobster dinner!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our last US stop was in Calais, ME.  We stayed in the parking lot of a Motor Inn with full hook-ups while we collected our documentation and prepared to cross the border.  We downloaded the app called ArriveCAN, scanned our passports and COVID vaccine cards and waited until within 72 hours of crossing. Since we are hauling our house with us, we had to be sure to follow all the regulations for bringing food into Canada - absolutely no eggs or chicken of any kind, no seeds, most fruits and vegetables, grains, seeds, and dirt. So I boxed up my small treasures from the last three years - driftwood from the Mississippi River, seashells, small pretty stones from the Oregon coast, pine cones, moss, and my few succulents and air plants, and mailed them to Brendan in Michigan. Hopefully they’ll arrive safely and survive. 

Really, we probably overdid it a little. they say getting into Canada is not as hard as coming back to the US, so this was good practice. We cleaned out our fridge and got wonderful new produce when we crossed.  We crossed on a Sunday, so there was very little traffic, and we sailed through in about five minutes. Even so, the guard asked twice about firearms, because we have Texas plates. I even had to give away my pepper spray in Maine. And it could have just been luck of the draw that they didn’t inspect us closer.  There was one other motorhome ahead of us, already parked to the side. The owners were sitting under a tree while two agents were putting on gloves to begin inspection.  ugh!

Where Have We Been? Part I

3/21 to 3/25/2022 -  Biloxi, MS to Bonifay, FL, 218 miles,  stayed at Outback Springs RV Park for four nights, $93.99

3/25 to 4/1/2022 - Bonifay, FL to Brunswick, GA, 197 miles, stayed at Coastal Georgia RV Resort for7 nights, $336/ week

4/1 to 4/8/2022 - Brunswick, GA to John’s Island, SC, stayed at Oak Plantation Campground for 7 nights, $404.22/week

4/8 to 4/13/2022 - John’s Island, SC to Myrtle Beach, SC, stayed at Briarcliffe RV Resort for 5 nights, $241.80

4/13 to 4/15/2022 - Myrtle Beach, SC to High Point, NC, stayed at Oak Hollow Family Campground for 2 nights, $45/night

4/15 to 4/19/2022 - High Point, NC to Max Meadow, VA, stayed 4 nights at Fort Chiswell RV Campground, $45/night

4/19 to 4/21/2022 - Max Meadow, VA to Greenwood, VA, stayed 3 nights at Misty Mountain Campground, for $215.10

4/21 to 4/28/2022 - Greenwood, VA to College Park, MD, stayed 7 nights at Cherry Hill Park for $81.90/ night

4/28 to 4/30/2022 - College Park, MD to Gettysburg, PA, stayed at Drummer Boy Camping Resort for 2 nights, $178.36

4/30 to 5/9/2022 - Gettysburg, PA to Ronks, PA, stayed 9 nights at Beacon Hill Campground for $336

Beaches and Battlefields

It has been a long time and many miles since I blogged last.  Let me say up front, it took me a good eight weeks to recover from my fall, and definitely blunted my interest in exploring on two feet for some time.  But, I’m back to it again, and just in time!  We’re going to spend two months in Canada!

Let me review, and then I’ll share what we’ve learned about getting into a foreign country post-COVID shutdown. 

In the last three and a half months, we revisited many favorite places and saw some new ones. We followed springtime from South Carolina to Vermont. There was A LOT of pollen and dandelion/cottonwood fluff in the air that made our eyes itch and our noses run. But the blooming trees and flowers have been GORGEOUS, and made the sneezing worth it.  And now, we’re enjoying a mild summer in the Northeast, while most of the rest of the country is under a blistering heatwave. Sorry. 

We enjoyed the beaches in Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina.  I will always be happy on a beach, even if I can hardly walk.  But we really started having fun when we reached Washington, DC and Gettysburg.  We’ve been to DC before, so vowed not to kill ourselves trying to do it again, because neither of us could walk the distance required. We stayed at Cherry Hill RV Park in Maryland, which has a city bus that picks you up in the park and takes you to the metro and a 30 minute train ride into DC.  We took a guided tour of all the monuments, which I think is better than the hop on/off bus, because the group is smaller, and the guide gets off, walks with you, and gives you time to explore before moving on.  The bus drops you as close as possible and stays near, so you can get back on when you want.  Unlike 20 years ago when we walked right up to the fence on both sides of the White House, our best vantage point was from Lafayette Square, and we didn’t even try to get into the Capitol. Again, we saw it from a distance. I was awed by the Jefferson and MLK memorials - on the far side of the tidal basin.  We hadn’t seen these before and we did get to walk up and around them. I was impressed at how respectful adults and school children alike were around these areas.  

We stayed two nights near Gettysburg, so we could take our time and drive through the battlefield.  We downloaded a self-guided app that played videos at each major stop along the driving route.   It’s amazing to see firsthand how the fighting ranged all over the countryside and through towns.  In three days, from July 1-3,1863,  51,000 soldiers were killed, wounded or missing. The Soldier’s National Cemetery was designed and built to properly bury the union soldiers and was dedicated on November 19, 1863. Lincoln’s two minute address still hits home today. After the war, 3500 more union soldiers were reinterred there and 3320 confederate soldiers were removed from the battlefield and sent to cemeteries in the South. Every regimen from every state has a memorial at the site. Each one, special and unique. 

Later that day, we found a historic tavern in the basement of The Dobbin House. It was built in 1776 and believed to be the first station on the Underground Railroad north of the Mason-Dixon Line, where we ate lunch. I had cheesy French onion soup with chunks of beef and date nut bread.  YUM!

We spent nine days in Lancaster County, PA, in a town called Intercourse. Amish country has gotten extremely commercialized and overcrowded with tourists. I felt so sorry for the horses pulling the buggies through major traffic, with cars and 18-wheelers zooming around them. But on the off days (Sunday - Thursday), when it was quieter, it was lovely to walk through the countryside and observe the small happenings at the farm across the street, like chicks scratching for bugs in the yard, while the cat prowled nearby.  A Tom turkey puffed up his feathers in full display to impress the ladies, and a new foal rested with his mother.  Laundry day seems to be Monday, and the colorful shirts and dresses fly high with black trousers on long clotheslines in the breeze.  The air smells of manure, which we never got used to, but the sunsets over the planted fields was a sight to see. 

We made our way up the Hudson River Valley from Catskill to Peru, NY. My favorite day trip was to the Norman Rockwell museum in Stockbridge, MA.  I love how he tells a story with careful attention to detail in the costumes and faces and props in his MANY illustrations for the Saturday Evening Posts, or magazines and books. I enjoyed learning about his process.  He used friends, family and townspeople as models to find the most authentic characters. His painting, “Christmas in Stockbridge” is of the main street in winter. The town has not changed at all!  We ate at a cafe that was once the general store. 

 Another great stop was Lake George, NY, where you’ll find the real Fort William Henry, the setting for the novel “The Last of the Mohicans”. Of course we watched the movie, but didn’t visit the fort.  It was the end of the school year and there were MANY field trips going there.

 This is dairy country. Folks in this area of the country LOVE their ice cream and hot dogs. We visited Martha’s several times for soft serve, better than Dairy Queen! (Please don’t disown me, Texas.). A neighboring camper had to have me try a Michigan, cousin of the chili dog but not at all like a chili dog. The bun is a thick slice of bread wrapped around a red hot dog that snaps when you bite it, and the chili is pulverized ground beef in a gravy with not a lot of spice, and a line of mustard, maybe some onions. They love it!  There are Michigan roadside stands all over.  It was okay,  but not a chili dog.  We didn’t get to try the other delicacy called Poutine.  It’s a pile of fries smothered in brown gravy and topped with cheese curds  the servings are so big you could make a meal, but we didn’t.  

I was a little disappointed in the Hudson River Valley.  In know there are some beautiful places there, but I didn’t plan properly to see them, and we didn’t spend near enough time, as is always the case.  Even though we said we were going to slow down, I didn’t get to see any of the places in Virginia that I had wanted because of bad weather.  We are definitely not vacationers, which can be frustrating for me.  We couldn’t keep up such a pace or afford to do all the things we would normally do if we were not on a budget.  Chalk it up to experience.  We’ll have to come back for vacation.