League's Take New York!

Well, it wasn't easy, but we've done it .... attempting to tour New York City when your mode of transportation is a 40 foot motorhome IS a challenge. It won't surprise you that it wasn't easy to find a place to park the motorhome near the city, and, of course, logistics were a challenge as we knew there was no way we could think of driving it anywhere near Manhatten. So we left the beautiful Hudson River Valley last Tuesday, September 29th and headed the last 100 miles into the New York City area. First, the mileage report:

MILEAGE:

BUSTER: Rhinebeck, New York to Andover, New Jersey: 144 miles

Bella: (lots of driving on the tri-state (NY, NJ, CT) interstates: 441 miles

Weekly total: 585 miles

Total for League's Excellent Adventure: 9,537 miles

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 28: We had actually planned to leave the Hudson Valley on Monday, the 28th, after spending most of Sunday doing laundry and "household" chores. Also, now that football season has started, we like to honor the tradition of trying to get a couple hours of gridiron watching in when we can. We don't have satellite TV, but perhaps half of our campgrounds have a cable connection. So it was a typical Sunday afternoon.

Then Monday, we focused on lessons a bit: Gary worked with Liz on math, and then they pursued their joint interest in "science": launching of air rockets.

I had been in contact with Dr. Donna Coletti, a medical school friend of Deb Rhodes, because of a little health problem I had in August. Donna has a medical gynecology practice in Greenwich, CT, and I wanted to check in with her when we went that way. UNBELIEVABLY, she was actually attending an integrative health meeting at The Omega Center where John of God, a healer from Brazil, had been invited to speak. The Omega Center is less than TWO MILES from Interlake Camping Resort were we had camped in Rhinebeck, and Donna drove right by our campsite on her way to The Omega Center that Monday. Talk about coincidences! I considered attending John of God, but couldn't quite allocate the $180 to pursue it out of our travel budget. When I got to talk to Donna later she said it really was very interesting and spiritual and I hope I didn't miss a real opportunity for enlightenment by choosing not to stay and experience John of God.

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 29th, came and we tried to get a reasonable start on our way to New York City. Our destination was New Jersey, out Interstate 80 past Morristown to Stanhope and up 206 to Andover and Panther Lake Camping Resort. This seemed to be the closest and best choice to New York City and also to Greenwich for my planned visit with Dr. Coletti. We wanted to see a little bit more of the Hudson, so we crossed over from the east bank to the west bank at Kingston, NY, and made our way down 9W to West Point. We found ourselves at the somewhat unusual situation for us of wanting to go to something (the West Point Visitor Center) in a small town with our whole rig in tow. We ended up parking Buster with the tour buses and unhooking so Bella could go in the regular parking lot. We timed it right, and were able to join a tour within about 10 minutes of arriving. Private vehicles are not allowed on the West Point campus, and we passed the security check point in a bus. We had an entertaining and informative guide and were able to sit in the bleechers across from Washington Hall and see the cadets in formation entering the hall for lunch. I put a big picture in here so you can see the tiny cadets behind General Washington's statue

Our guide had a number of interesting anecdotes including one about General George Patton. Patton was a West Point classmate of Omar Bradley, and a number of other recognizable military names .... over 40% of their graduating class went on to achieve the rank of General or higher. I think it had something to do with opportunity, i.e. read wartime! But it took Patton five years to graduate from his class .... he opined that he could never find the library. Well, his statue was placed facing the library (ostensibly so he could SEE it!), and now within the last few weeks has been replaced in front of West Point's new library. See the statue of Patton in the lower right corner of the picture below.

There were gorgeous views of the Hudson from the cliffs at West Point which has been a military fortress for years (maybe the oldest in the country) guarding invaders from coming to the interior up the Hudson. The Hudson in this region is called the Highlands and is actually considered a fjord as it is an ocean inlet (salt water in center of river with fresh on the sides!) that is deep and narrow with high bluffs. It is beautiful and, of course, inspired the Hudson River school of painting.

We made our way over to the Cadel Chapel which was inspiringly beautiful.

The stained glass in the Cadet chapel was simply breathtaking, but I didn't get a good focused picture of the front glass pictured at the bottom of this grouping. But you may just be able to make out the writing on yellow background on the panel near the bottom: Duty, Honor, Country. This theme is palpable at West Point. It was moving and made us proud and thankful, once again, to live in this country with freedom as our core value.

Following lunch in town at a little tavern where the cadets "relax", we headed down Interstate 87 to Interstate 80, and west to Stanhope and on to Andover where we would park for 4 days while we used Bella to negotiate in and around NYC.

WEDNESDAY, September 30.

Liz had said that the most important thing she wanted to see in New York City was the Statue of Liberty, so we put that on the top of our list. Alice League had suggested we avoid going into NYC and Battery Park as the departure point to the island, and her suggestion to go through Liberty Park in Jersey City, NJ, was a good one. We parked easily, had no line (also in the off-season), and quickly were able to take the ferry to Ellis Island and Liberty Island. I've been to NYC 5 or 6 times (all very brief visits), and Gary has been 3 or 4, but I had never been to Ellis Island OR the Statue of Liberty. It was a GREAT day. I'm not sure when the visitor center at Ellis Island was redone, but it is now a wonderful experience. The Great Hall with tiled floor, walls and domed ceiling has been redone and it is here over 12 million of our friends and relatives entered this country largely from eastern and western Europe.

First we watched a movie, and got a good idea of the procedure and process most folks went through as they disembarked from steamships. Those in steerage were brought to Ellis Island for processing. They were given a "six second" check-up, looking for obvious skin ailment, trachoma (of the eye), and other physical and mental problems. If something was observed, a mark was placed on their coat/garment. Here is a display of the different marks that could be placed:

(Sorry it's so dark!) We read the story of one girl whose was seen to have a "wart" on the back of her hand. Because of this, she was separated from the rest of her family. Apparently seeing the minimal nature of the problem and the distress at the separation, one of the Ellis Island officials suggested she turn her coat inside out so the mark wouldn't be seen, and she was able to leave Ellis Island with the rest of her family. This brings to mind one of the recurring themes we learned there: the immigrants couldn't believe that there were uniformed officials there to help them. In almost all of the countries they came from a uniformed person was someone to be feared and dreaded. They could almost reliably bring terror or pain. Here, people in uniforms were trying to help them. It was part of the feeling described in the movie that was the most gripping to me: the very rapid transformation of a person moving through Ellis Island, coming from an oppressed, distressed, down-trodden, underdog situation, and on leaving Ellis Island, having the complete sense of FREEDOM .... to go where they wanted, to say what they wanted, to be whom they wanted. Of course, this was what motivated the courageous to endure the unbelievable hardships of making the journey. But what a glorious end of the rainbow! As one man was quoted as saying in the movie: "It was like a human being had been completely reborn ... it was a miracle!" It was really something to imagine a family exiting that building ... having been through the long journey, cramped, hungry, dirty, stinky, and all the unknowns on arriving, going from station to station in that huge building, feeling confused and anxious, not understanding the foreign language spoken to them, and then finally -- for most -- exiting a free person, able to go and do whatever you had enough money to do, knowing that if you worked hard, you could do anything. Unbelieveable .... this experiment in liberty is a miracle for mankind!

The visit to Miss Liberty was equally inspirational. Many of you know the original torch has been removed and replaced with one that is perpetually lighted. The old torch is on display:

So you can no longer go up into the torch, but you can go to the crown. Unfortunately, when we arrived at Liberty Park at 9:15 am, there were no more crown tickets available for the day. So we could only go up to the pedestal. That was enough for me anyway (156 steps up AND DOWN on my new knees. The crown would have been an additional 170+ each way. Liz WAS disappointed, though). The audio tour at the Statue was also very good and we had a nice stroll around the base where the very top picture was taken by a collegial fellow tourist (I don't think I did as good a job on her picture that I took!).

We had about an hour's drive back to the campground, hit some traffic, and then I saw a mall with Neiman Marcus, etc, and we stopped at The Mall at Short Hills (New Jersey). It had a lot of high end stores, and we had a little fun. It has been so long since we've been to anything like that it seemed like a totally new and somewhat foreign experience (this was a little sad for me to realize, but Gary was thrilled with my reaction ... it meant the minor shopoholic is largely on the wagon!) But we did a little damage to the Visa card, and Liz got (it was Gary's selection) a perky hat which has subsequently received compliments all over New York City. (see pic below at FAO Schwartz!)

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 1

We got a real taste of tri-state (New Jersey, New York and Connecticut) driving this day when we went from mid-New Jersey, bypassing New York City, north and around over to Greenwich, CT. Donna Coletti had arranged a couple of tests for me, and we negotiated our way to the imaging center. Then an office visit and some blood work, and I am happy to say .... ALL IS WELL! This is a relief. It was so great that Deb Rhodes had this wonderful friend who specializes in just what I needed. Donna is obviously a very talented and compassionate physician, and I was so grateful for her kind expertise.

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 2

We were happy to get up and advance our adventure to the Big Apple knowing we didn't have any worrisome health concerns. We decided to take the train from New Jersey into the City ... we wanted to do it like real New Yorkers, and also didn't want to consider taking even the car in and parking it. So we did a little online research, got the train schedule for Denville, NJ, (west of Morristown) and also learned we could leave our car there overnight for $3 DOLLARS A DAY (this must be the parking deal of the year!). We made the 9:02 into New York City and arrived at Penn Station at about 10:15. We took a brief taxi to ride to our hotel, a Marriott we had booked with points at a great location at 40th and 5th. We found breakfast at Burger Heaven, and then began a pretty nice stroll down 5th Avenue. Rain was forecast, but it held off (until that night!) and we had a great walk. We stopped at Tiffany's and I was able to find out that a beautiful "gold ball studded with diamonds" earring Gary had given me that I had lost one of was still around (40 pairs in the system) and that I could purchase just the one! Yeah! Then we walked through Saks and on down the avenue to our "ultimate" destination ... F.A.O. Schwartz. I'm not sure Liz would have known about this, but her good friend Shea Hansen from home in Rochester told her this was not be missed on a trip to NYC. It is a treat .... from the piano you can play with your feet, to the gorgeous dolls, to the unbelievable Lego creations it is a toy wonderland. She had a blast, and ended up with a F.A.O. Madame Alexander doll that she designed herself (hair color, eyes, skin), with changeable wigs. She got a red, saucy flip and a light brown classic pony.

(note the HAT!)

We saw The Plaza, and then Liz picked our horse and carriage for our Central Park Ride:

Of course there are interesting vendors all around Central Park, and we were enchanted by a very talented letter artist who created a beautiful Elizabeth:

After a little rest at the hotel, we had a delicious dinner (surprisingly AT our hotel), and were able to walk the few (probably 6) blocks to Times Square and the New Amsterdam Theatre where we saw Mary Poppins. We had a little trouble deciding what to see: I wanted to see Jersey Boys, but felt the language, etc., might not be for a 9 year old. Liz thought Mary Poppins was going to be too babyish for her, but the thrill of the live orchestra and fabulous vocalists and staging was very entertaining. We all enjoyed it a lot. And it was sooo New York to come out of the theatre at 10:30, seeing just as many people on the streets as when we went in at 8 pm, and really felt safe the three of us walking back to our hotel even if it was in the rain and we'd neglected to bring our umbrellas with us to the theatre even though we hauled them with us everywhere else!



SATURDAY, OCTOBER 3

We relished a little sleep in, then showered (really enjoyed that hotel shower ... the force of water in the motorhome is one of Buster's deficits!), and then made our way to Rockefeller Center. We had a deli-type breakfast and really enjoyed seeing 30 Rock and learning about John D. Rockefeller's depression-era contribution of building this sky scraper at the height of hard times. The elevator ride to the Top of the Rock (69 floors) was great ... there is plexiglass on the ceiling of the elevator and a series of blue lights lines the elevator shaft ... it felt like you were moving through something in Mission: Impossible! The view, of course, was stupendous even though we didn't have the clearest of days. We told Liz she would have a better view of the Empire State Building away from it, and indeed she did.

We poked around in the mist and walked through Grand Central Station (seeing a bride and her wedding party there!), and then took our train back to Denville and our parked car. We didn't see everything, but we felt we got a good sampling of New York City.

On SUNDAY, OCTOBER 4, we slept in, did some reading and clean up, and in the afternoon made our way to Pennsylvania staying near Allentown .... one of our designated mail stops. We'll post a short blog about Pennsylvania in a few days, and then devote a chapter to our visit to our nation's capitol. We're on our way to Washington, D.C.

Julie, Gary and Liz

Fall is coming (is here, I guess!)

Greetings,

I couldn't resist putting a fall picture up at the top of this week's post. We passed into fall a couple of days ago, and each day are seeing more and more color here in New England. This glimpse of fall is reflected in the pond at Old Sturbridge Village, Mass. I'm sure we'll be seeing much more color in the next few weeks and will love to share some of it with you. Of course, there will be great color at home in Minnesota, too, I'm sure.

MILEAGE:

Buster: Cape Cod to Mystic, Connecticut, back to Sturbridge, Mass to Rhinebeck, New York:

397 miles

Bella: 120 miles

Total this week: 517 miles

Total mileage so far on League's Excellent Adventure: 8,852 miles

STATE COUNT: 14 (up two); add Rhode Island and Connecticut to last week's count

Greetings from Gary: (he's been wanting to get a few words in!!!)

I really love this motor home, partially because it allows me to fulfill a life dream of being a gypsy and seeing the whole country, and partially because this particular motor home fulfills our needs so well. It's like having a big, self-indulgent, complex, six figure toy that I get to play with and operate each day.

When Julie and I first began to talk with our friends and relatives about our plans to take this trip, some people chimed right in and felt it would be a fabulous experience. Other people, however, had misgivings for unexpressed reasons. It's our impression that some people thought we were going to be camping for a year. Other people's lack of enthusiasm, we think, resulted from their concern that this living in such close proximity would become intolerable after a while.

First of all, we are not camping. Last night was a rainy night. When we got up this morning, we saw a family camping in a tent across from us. They were sitting around outside on pads at a wet picnic table eating breakfast. They had long-sleeved slickers on, were wearing long pants and damp shoes .... and they didn't seem to be having that much fun. At least they didn't seem to be slapping mosquitoes. Adjacent to them was another family who had a pop-up trailer for their camping home. They had a substantial awning and were able to sit under the awning as the rain dripped off the trees ...., but they were dressed the same as their neighbors. Later in the morning when doing laundry, Julie saw the first family drying their sleeping bags in the dryer. Apparently their tent wasn't water proof.

We, in contrast, had a dry night in our motorhome, able to be heated or air-conditioned at our choice. There are no leaks, so we have no water problems, and our floor is about 36 inches off the ground. We feel insulated and protected from nature to a degree nearly equal to that in a home. Our motorhome is not a camper ..... it's most analagous to a small one-bedroom apartment completely outfitted with HVAC, running water, water heater, sewer, cable TV (where available), antennae, satellite (if desired). It's well designed to maximize storage and comfort. And best of all, it completely moveable to wherever we want to go (except narrow alleys and dead-end streets).

We have all the amenities that we are used to. It is true, they aren't all quite as convenient as at home. Each time we move, I have to disconnect and stow the equipment for electrical power, water, sewer and cable TV. I empty the grey water tanks about every 4 days ... we take lots of showers! I empty the sewage once a week, which some people would find odious, but I haven't splashed on myself yet! And then each time we arrive at a new location, I reattach those items; it takes about five minutes.

I would agree that motorhome living is best enjoyed when the outside temperatures are between 50 and 90 degrees. The motorhome is insulated but we would have difficulty and expense at keeping indoor temperatures at 70 degree when outside temperatures are below 50 or above 90 degrees. All in all, I think our opinions are that I love it, and Julie and Elizabeth like it.

Now regarding the close proximity issue: I would say it has not caused me any problem, but I can't speak for Julie. Lizzie, of course, suffers somewhat from lack of friends her age. She forms quick attachments when there is a reasonable child near-by in the motorhome parks we visit, and is sad to leave them. She also misses her friends at home in Rochester. In spite of this hopefully small sacrifice on her part to be on the trip, I believe this experience will provide her with lifelong benefits. First of all, she is getting parenting about 18 out of 24 hours each day. This is much more than she is used to, with all of the hours usually spent at school, with friends and in sports. Any lessons we want to teach her or behavior we want to modify is evident, and we have unlimited opportunities for parenting! I also feel that this is leading to an even closer parent bond relationship which can only be helpful and she passes into pre-teen and teen years.

JULIE'S JOURNAL:

Well, I certainly enjoyed hearing how much Gary is enjoying the trip. He certainly does a marvelous job keeping this rig running smoothly. It is kind of interesting .... on the proximity issue! It has only been the last week or so that I have started to think about it. When you think that we have been gone 9 weeks now, and that it was only after about two months that I started to notice how limited my social contacts are! Understanding that I am probably the more socially needy of the two of us, I think overall it is going amazingly well. I would tell you that our "ace in the hole" is that while we may wish we had longer fuses, we have equally short recovery times .... this is invaluable!

SO .... back to the itinerary:

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22 and WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23

Having visited Plimouth Plantation and Mayflower, we headed across Massachusetts on State Highway 44. It's always fun when our route avoids an interstate. While it takes a bit longer, we see much more local color: small towns, challenging routing through them, opportunities for a Dairy Queen stop, etc. Highway 44 took us to Providence (we added Rhode Island to our state count), but elected not to explore more in Rhode Island though Newport WAS on my initial list.

We found our campground in Old Mystic, CT, and made our plans to visit Mystic Seaport and the Aquarium the next day after my morning newsletter consultations. A staff member at Old Sturbridge Village (OSV) in Massachusetts had said Mystic Seaport was a must see, and as developed as OSV; it wasn't, but it was still very worthwhile. Unfortunately (or fortunately) we are experiencing the benefits and liabilities of off-season travel: many places are very uncrowded, but many exhibitors close down activities and sections of their attraction in the "off-season." Often these deleted activities are targeted for children, so Liz gets disappointed when the advertised "special craft event" isn't happening. But we saw chronometer and compass vendors, boat repairers, iron works, apothecaries where they would create "Medicine Chests" for captains to carry on board sailing vessels. Anchored in the Mystic harbor was Amistad. This is a replica of a slave ship that was commandeered by the slaves it carried, running aground in New England. A legal battle ensued regarding the responsibility of the US government to return the slaves (property) to their American owners or free them. The ship has been reconstructed and sails telling its human rights story, but happened to be anchored in Mystic last week:

Also on display, in the small boat museum was a sampling of different small pleasure boats. Included was FDR's sail boat, that he used to teach his children how to sail at Campobello, in Maine. It was on this boat he sailed the day before he awakened with the symptoms of polio. Coincidentally, when we visited FDR's home yesterday, we were told it is theorized that he had contracted polio while visiting a Boy Scout camp about two weeks previously. He had mingled closely with the children there, and it is thought that is where he was exposed. Here is FDR's sail boat:

We had a delicious lunch there, and then Liz and I spent the rest of the afternoon at the Mystic Aquarium. We were anxious to visit there, as we had heard about it when we heard the story of Andre, the harbor seal, from Rockport, Maine. Many of you may be familiar with this true story of a harbor seal, taken as a pet by the harbormaster some years ago (when it was legal), and raised as a pup. However, the winters were harsh and ultimately it was worked out that Andre would winter either at the New England Aquarium in Boston, or the Mystic Aquarium. He lived 25 YEARS doing this, being returned by the aquarium staff by truck, often to Marblehead, MA, to swim the rest of the way home to summer in Rockport. We enjoyed the book, and, of course, now have a darling stuffed harbor seal as an additional companion with us in Buster.

At Mystic Aquarium we were taught some important differences between harbor seals and sea lions, which are on display and shown at Mystic. Sea lions have very well developed front flippers. They are long, and very complex with a bony structure nearly as complex as a human's hand. These are strong appendages and a sea lion is actually able to support all his/her weight with extended appendages, not having to use his tummy for gliding. Seals slide. Also, the sea lion can catch fish anywhere around him: he can touch the back of his neck with his nose!!! My neck hurts just thinking about that!

We saw a couple of beautiful beluga whales, Liz petted a ray, and I was enchanted by these variant clown fish, i.e. the black and white ones. It seems to very explicitly represent: do your own thing!

We learned something fascinating about clown fish: they live in schools, but there is only one mated pair. If something happens to the female and she dies, the male transforms and becomes a female, and another fish becomes the mating male. Unfortunately, I didn't learn if the converse is true, i.e. that the female could transform into the male. I think I'll restrain myself from editorializing about this!

We rehooked up with Gary after our Aquarium adventure (I also got some very pretty cloisonne jelly fish ear rings there!), and had dinner at Mystic Pizza. Gary and I both liked this Julia Roberts early movie, but we didn't recall it was rated "R!" Liz, of course, wanted to see it (it was on sale in the lobby of the restaurant), but we had to explain it had "mature" content. The pizza was REALLY GOOD, which surprised us. We planned to go just to see it, but were very happy we did! It was a slice of heaven!

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 24

While we were certain we hadn't explored all the wonders of Connecticut, we did want to return to OSV/Sturbridge, as our visit their last week had been so brief. We actually had a nicer day today .... sunnier, warmer. We had hoped to arrive in time for the broom making craft that was offered on the web site, but plans were changed at the last minute, and they didn't offer that. We had to settle for a broom making demonstration later in the day. Instead, Liz and Gary made tin candle holders, pounding and crimping the tin in place.

We were able to spend much more time watching the carding mill and grist mills, and Gary had time to give Liz a lesson on stilts! Gary was pretty good at it himself!

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 25th, was another travel day as we made our way into the Berkshires and the Hudson River Valley. It turned much colder today, too, and again we were thankful for Buster and his amenities. On Saturday, September 26th, we made our way south just a few miles down Route 9 from Rhinebeck, NY, to Hyde Park. We had heard that they were having a small community fair in Hyde Park, as part of the Quadricentennial .... 400 year celebration of Henry Hudson finding this beautiful river valley. Apparently the voyage in 1609 was his 3rd voyage (we learned the 4th voyage was up in Hudson's Bay, and ended in a mutiny and Hudson's loss). They had the most engaging woman explaning his voyage on a painted wood map with a ship that moved along in a little slit. She had Liz "sail" the ship. We learned of his run in with an iceberg as he sailed along Norway (trying to get to China), so he turned his ship around and kept coming west. He was Dutch, and John Smith, in Jamestown, VA, was English, so Henry decided to stay north of there, and ended up first in the Chesapeake, and then at the mouth of the Delaware River, and up the "Hudson" to Albany, where it became to shallow too go further. It was interesting and fun.

Then we spent the rest of the afternoon at the Roosevelt's home at Hyde Park, and visited the FDR presidential library and museum. This library was built while FDR was still in office, and dedicated, by him, in June, 1941. He worked in the museum, and his office is just as it was. The memoribilia is impressive, and, of course, one always comes away with unique impressions. He was the only child of his father's second marriage, and his mother, Sara Delano, was nearby (including living in the bedroom next door to Franklin and Eleanor) as long as she survived. He and Eleanor seemed to have a very productive partnership, and there is a great Eleanor wing in the museum, as well as an opportunity to visit her own retreat ... a home at Val Kill. I want to tell you a humerous thing I saw in the library. Eleanor wrote her assistant that she was enclosing the bill from the doctor to treat Franklin, Jr's, "piles"/hemorrhoids. She alludes to the fact that the fee must be related to the number of visits (12) and not a simple fee for a cure. She suggests that Franklin, her husband, "will have a fit." On the bottom of the memo is written:

"Pay it. Have had the fit. F.D.R."

The museum has a lot of FDR's first 100 days, which, of course, are quite controversial ... his decisions and programs gave people hope, but of course spent more than any government had ever imagined. The footage of him, though, IS infectious ... his "can do" attitude, his "nothing to fear but fear" speech, all had to go a tremendous way in helping the nation crawl back from the Depression. It was suggested that this "can do" attitude was fueled by his attempts to recover from polio. When he returned to Hyde Park after his initial illness, he tried, every day, to walk down this lane with his crutches. He would lock his braces on his knees, and pull his lower extremities down the lane, believing that if he could make it all the way, he might walk again one day. He never made it the entire way ..... but he learned A LOT about perserverance. Here's a picture of that soul-wrenching lane.

Eleanor and Franklin are buried at Hyde Park in the Rose Garden. Some of the roses were in perfect late summer/early fall bloom yesterday.

Liz, of course, was enchanted by the stories of Fala, the Roosevelt's scottie ... another opportunity for a little stuffed friend. Here she is with the topiary Fala at the Visitor Center entrance.

Finally, we have the 4th grader seated with her new friends, Eleanor and Franklin. She thought they sounded pretty special.

Then, while driving home we stopped to ask directions and happened to encounter a very nice woman who appeared to be a fire fighter (she was walking from the fire station), and Liz commented how nice she was. Then she said, "Dad, you should have been a fire fighter: brave, strong, and nice." And there you have .... it doesn't get much more special than that.

Stay tuned .... we're thinking of going to NEW YORK CITY!

Julie, Gary and Liz

.... liberty and justice for all.

Good day!

I believe our favorite thing this week was being reminded/re-educated about the bravery and determination of our founding fathers, and how tremendous it is to live in a free country. As I am finishing up this posting, it is turning out to be really long. But we DID see a lot this week .... we are in the birthplace of the nation, after all!

We did have that delicious lunch at Mabel's Seafood in Kennebunkport, Maine, last Sunday. I had something called Lobster Savannah, which was simply scrumptious with scallops and shrimp baked with parmesan inside a lobster, and the lobster tail and claws boiled in the usual way. I'm told this was Rachel Ray's favorite when she ate there.

We circled back around Orchard Beach, when I saw this sign for a local salon. I thought it was SO funny, I had to share it with you:

MILEAGE:

Buster: Old Orchard Beach to Boston/Foxboro to Cape Cod:

198 miles

Bella: 450 miles

Weekly total: 648 miles

Total mileage for trip so far: 8,335 miles

State count: 12 states, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine. Massachusetts is the latest



Monday, September 14

We had an easy drive, at least at the beginning, from Old Orchard, Maine to the Boston suburbs. We stopped north of Boston in Danvers where we had determined that there was a Costco. We had just about exhausted our frozen chicken and fish from our Costco stop in Michigan, so we were due for a restocking. It is so tempting to buy more .... produce, fruit, etc ... but it is obvious our storage capacity is limited, so we try to keep it to frozen items and maybe a DVD or two.

You won't be surprised to learn that the campground opportunities close in to Boston are not easy to identify. While it may not have been the closest, Normandy Farm campground in Foxboro was certainly one of the nicest we have encountered. Nearly 40 years ago, a long-established farm family turned some of their land into a campground and they have kept improving and expanding. They have a beautiful site, with three pools (one indoor and nicely heated!), great laundry and other facilities, etc. We really enjoyed our stay there. We DID NOT anticipate that driving in on a Monday would present any problems, though we did have a vague knowledge that the Patriot's football stadium was in Foxboro. Well, last Monday night, the Patriots (and Buffalo Bills) were on Monday Night Football. We drove down State Route 1 at 2:30 in the afternoon, but hit bumper to bumper traffic into the stadium. We didn't know the roads (or have a detailed enough map) to plot another route, so we just sat with them for 60-90 minutes. I actually think my iPhone can do this route plotting, but I don't know how to work it (I'm sorry to say). We were able to adjust our antenna to see the game later than night, though we opted for the US Open final with Federer and ? del Portro (from Argentina) and saw the upset. That evening we also plotted our strategy for the Boston area.

Tuesday, September 15

Gary, Liz and I were actually in Boston three years ago for a meeting I had, and Liz remembers being at Frog Pond in Boston Common, and a few other things. This time we wanted to focus on the Freedom Trail.

Even though I am walking and doing steps better all the time, we decided to get a City View Trolley ticket so we could jump (not literally!) on and off the trolley at the spots we wanted to see. We boarded at the Public Garden in Boston Common.

We drove by the Massachusetts State House, saw the Granary Burying Ground, where Benjamin Franklin's parents were buried, and drove by the Old South Meeting House and the Old State House (below).

It was here the jubilant crowds surrounded the balcony to hear the reading of the Declaration of Independece on July 18, 1776, and in front of which the Boston Massacre had occurred six years earlier.

Our trolley tour swung us by the harbor, and we got off to take the included Harbor Cruise, which we really enjoyed. Here we saw John Hancock's Counting House where trading and wharf life centered in the 18th and 19th centuries. The Counting House has been converted to the Chart House restaurant, and it was here we took our dinner this evening.

Boston Harbor remains very busy, more with pleasure and tourism these days, as well as being a Coast Guard station for search and rescue vessels.

It was also really windy on the harbor cruise:

From the harbor, we hopped back on the trolley which momentarily dropped us near North Square and the home of Paul Revere. He lived here during the Revolutionary War years and was a renowned silversmith. We are learning quite a bit about him as Liz is reading the Newbury winner, Johnny Tremain, and filling us in on a lot of details of the time.

It is a short walk from Paul Revere's house (on left below) to the Old North Church (on right below), in whose steeple, you know: "one if by land, two if by sea". We learned much more about this as we visited Lexington and Concord later in the week.

From there, it is another short hop to the USS Constitution. Liz asked us, "What is the second S for in USS?" and unfortunately we didn't know. So she asked a sailor on board: United States SHIP. There you go. The USS Constitution is the oldest battleship in the world; it is considered to be still in active service. It is maintained by the Navy and they deliver a very nice tour. The main deck is currently being refurbished, so it has a roof on it just now, which will be removed when the new deck is done. It has been in nearly 50 battles and never defeated, the most famous of course with the HMS Guerriere off Nova Scotia. She was so sturdy the British captain said, "her sides must be made of iron." Of course, they are wood, but her hull was fortified from Paul Revere's copper foundry, also with 44 cannons on board. It was a great tour.

We finished up our Freedom Trail day with a stop at Faneuil Hall and Quincy Market, and then our dinner at the Chart House. We learned a lot. And I was particularly pleased my knees held up so well. I did get some sitting breaks on the trolley, but all in all, I was on them for about 6 hours. It was today I knew I was better off having the knee surgery before the trip .... here, about 8 weeks into the trip, I am definitely more functional than if I hadn't had it. I'd have been whining and moaning A LOT if I'd tried to do 6 hours on those old knees.

On Wednesday, September, 16, we inserted a low key day. I had my Wednesday morning work on the phone and computer with Women's HealthSource, which actually is always a nice break (read: I get meaningful conversation with other humans outside my family!) On that note, we are getting along quite well for the close quarters that we are in. We get out a lot! Gary took advantage of this time to have an RV mechanic come to the campsite to do some work on our bedroom heating system, the locks on the cargo doors, and the ice maker. Buster IS complex! It did put us behind a bit, as we had planned to go to Concord and Lexington on Wednesday, so we just made a really early day of it on Thursday.

Thursday, September 17, we drove away from the campground just after 7 am because we wanted to try to beat the Boston commuter traffic as we made our way north from Foxboro to Concord. Concord was also a mail stop, and we pulled up in front of the post office at 8:30. It opened at 9. So we had a nice breakfast at Helen's. We had minimal mail at Concord but did get our rent check from the Chung's, so that was welcome!

Then we made our way to the Old North Bridge, at the western edge of Minute Man National Historic Park, which is celebrating it's 50th anniversary. Apparently, in the late 1950's local Concordians noticed that suburban sprawl was starting to occupy Battle Road including motels, ice cream stands, etc. The road still exists where the British regulars had marched out to Lexington, engaged forewarned (by Paul Revere and William Dawes) colonists, and shot and killed 7 colonists. The British moved on to Concord, destroyed some ammunitions supply depots, and saw that about 400 colonists had gathered on the hillside over-looking the North Bridge. Someone shot first (it's not clear which side DID shoot first), but it was here that blood was first shed as troops fired upon each other. These were the shots "heard round the world." After that the British retreated all the way back to Boston where there were multiple skirmishes on Battle Road ... the road of retreat. These sites along Battle Road are now being acquired into a National Historic Monument, and it is really interesting to see just where these encounters took place. See below the little hill across from Old North Bridge (and behind the Minute Man monument) where the colonist patriots gathered.

We learned a documented interesting twist to the Paul Revere story. You may remember that actually two riders were sent out to warn the colonist patriots after the lanterns were hung in the belfry of the Old North Church. Paul Revere had the shorter ride, being rowed across to Charlestown, where he was given a horse to ride out to Lexington and Concord. William Dawes had the longer route and rode via Boston Neck. He reached Lexington after Paul Revere and they rode on together to Concord. As they rode, they encountered fellow patriot Dr. Samuel Prescott who was returning home from a DATE .... visiting a girlfriend or "courting" the reports say. He hooked up with them, and they were all intercepted by a British patrol before they reached Concord. Paul Revere was captured (and released later the same day as the British realized they had bigger fish to fry), Dawes lost his horse, and it was Dr. Prescott who actually got through to Concord to warn the Minute Men there. SO, being out and about, wooing and courting ..... it can be a very patriotic thing to do!

Many of you know that Concord is also the home of a number of 19th century authors including Louisa May Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Henry David Thoreau. Below is a picture of the house where Ms. Alcott lived, and is the model for the home of the Little Women.

We also had to visit Walden Pond, and purchase an anniversary edition of Walden, another Julie favorite. Somehow, Gary had missed this .... he's immersed in it as I write. The man in the Walden Pond gift shop was surprised that Liz wasn't in school. So he thought she needed a little quiz: "Who is the man who lived here at Walden Pond?" She was better with the Henry and David, than the Thoreau, but was ultimately rewarded with a free button with HDT's picture on it, which she now proudly wears!

After a fast lunch, we experienced one of the expected frustrations of this experience: we got lost. Our maps are state maps, and so don't have a lot of detail sometimes. I suppose we could get better at working the NAV in our car (this day's eperience may motivate that!), but we couldn't figure out where to get on the interstate to make our way to Sturbridge. Then I (the navigator this day) missed the off ramp on the Mass Turnpike and we had to go 15 MILES to another off ramp to turn around. With a 30 mile careless detour, moods were a little grumpy when we pulled into Old Sturbridge Village at 3:30 pm (they close at 5). Fortunately, we knew that we could return a second day for our admission price (within 10 days) which we plan to do.

Below find a scattering of pictures from there: milking a cow, making a piece of pottery on the wheel, the Cooper's Shop, the Tin Shop, the beautiful farmstead modeled after an 1830's village, a stagecoach ride and a very handsome rooster.

On Friday, September 18, we headed southeast for our Cape Cod week-end. We decided we weren't going to try to see everything, or much of anything for that matter. We just wanted a little down time. We had some lovely and unusually warm weather, so Liz had fun playing with her parents in the pool.

This series of pictures reminds me of something I forgot to include in a previous blog ..... about my very sound husband! He was sitting waiting for Liz and me in a St. John's, New Brunswick, shopping mall, and a lady walked right up to him and said, "You know ..... you have very nice looking legs for a man your age .... no bulging veins!" He, as he should, took it as a compliment .... and she just backed up what I've been telling him all summer ..... "You look great in shorts!"



On Saturday, we headed to South Cape Beach, near Falmouth. It was breezy but a beautiful sunny afternoon. While we didn't swim, Gary and Liz played in a sand and I took a tremendous beach walk.

(sorry for the shadow in the beach pic!)

Sunday, September 20, was the day we decided to go to Martha's Vineyard. We were camped in Falmouth, near Woods Hole, so took the ferry from there. Any of you who have done this know there is no parking at Woods Hole, so it took us a little extra time to find the correct parking and shuttle lot. We were told some 35+ weddings were taking place on Martha's Vineyard this week-end.

The 45 minute ferry ride was beautiful ... about 10 o'clock on a bright Sunday morning. Everybody was in a good Sunday mood, and enjoying themselves. We had reserved a car at Oak Bluffs, and explored the rest of the day.

Then Liz took a ride on The Flying Horses carousel, the first merry-go-round in the country, and did have some luck grabbing the brass ring!

Above left are the cliffs at Gay Head, and on the right is one of the Gingerbread Camp Meeting houses that were an interesting part of Martha's Vineyard history early in the 20th century.

Finally, we moved on to Plymouth today, Monday, September 21, and saw, of course, THE ROCK, the Mayflower, and a very interesting restoration called Plimouth Plantation. There are neighboring displays: one of a native Wampanpaog extended family who had been asked by the chief, Massasoit, to be a liaison with the newly arrived Europeans; ....and then the 1620 European settlement which was understandably crude, but with folks in costume telling us how life had been that first year. After nearly 100 arriving in December, 1620 (their sailing had been delayed as the original vessel was not determined to be sea-worthy), only one-half survived that first year. We were told they DID have enough food, but had no shelter, and died, really, of exposure. They had been weakened substantially after lying around on the Mayflower for about 67 days during the crossing, and the weather prevented them from establishing shelter, so they spent the winter on the ship. It was a really interesting afternoon.

The Wampanoag encampment had native people descendents staffing it, and we saw young women weaving and another giving herself what she said would be a permanent tattoo: she was using obsidian/charcoal with a sharp edge embedding it into her forearm (see photo).

(look carefully and you can see 1620 engraved on this rock, which is housed on the Plymouth shore, and is apparently 1/3 to 1/2 its original size)

Then, a "colonial" instructed Liz on how to whistle with grass between her fingers.

This evening, Gary and Liz went on a 90 minute walking "Ghost Tour" of Plymouth. They met at Plymouth Rock at 7:30, and with four others followed a guide around town while she told spooky stories and legends and took them by the graveyard. Liz loved it!

It was a busy week, but really perfect for the first week of school. We did do some reading, and spelling, and writing, and math, but just living and seeing things first hand taught us all a lot more. One of our problems may be where to put interesting books we pick up at these very memorable sites. It felt like this week was alot of what this trip is about!

Until next time ....

Julie, Gary and Liz