15 Miles and 3 Manhattans–Fishermen’s Memorial State Park, Narragansett, RI 6/14

It took us about 45 minutes to drive from our campsite to Orient Point at the very tip of the North Fork of Long Island. We caught the 10:00 ferry to New London, CT and thoroughly enjoyed the hour and a half ferry ride. Some of the highlights were seeing the impressive homes along the Connecticut Shore and Trumbull Fort built as a Civil War fortress, which was greeting us from the harbor. We took a short trip along the Connecticut coast with a stopover in Mystic – famous for the movie Mystic Pizza. By this time it was high noon and a great time to try out our own “slice of heaven.” It was great fun to see all the movie memorabilia in the restaurant. In addition, they were playing the movie Mystic Pizza on tv screens through-out the restaurant. (For those of you who don’t know, this movie was Julie Roberts debut. It’s a great, camp coming of age movie and one of my faves.) After leaving the restaurant, we took a stroll through the town enjoying the great views of Mystic River, the drawbridge, shops and great gardens. We continued our drive north on highway 1, eventually entering Rhode Island. We took a couple of side trips down some inlets and finally reached our destination for today at Fishermen’s Memorial State Park in Narragansett. It was still fairly early in the afternoon with a cool breeze so we decided to do some exploring on our bikes. We rode down the point to Judith Point Lighthouse and then rode around several neighborhoods with cute little cottages. This part of the coast reminded both of us of Mendocino. (See today’s pic). We then rode up highway 1 past some amazing, jaw-dropping mansions in the historical district finally ending up at the main beach near the 1885 Romanesque arches. Turns out this was the original Coast Guard station, later turned into a casino and now housing the visitor’s center. We stopped to watch some of the local surfers, but really it was just too sad. The waves they were surfing were just swells and no self-respecting Californian would even attempt to paddle these. We had a nice long bike ride back to the campsite (about 15 miles in all), but within about 1 mile of the campground Ned spotted a tavern and suggested we quench our thirst. Ned opted for a draft beer but I ordered a Manhattan. And, oh baby what a Manhattan it was! Talk about a work of art – served chilled on ice in a small carafe. It filled my glass 3 times – yikes. I had a very tipsy final mile home on my bike. Well, needless to say, after a short nap later we decided to ride our bikes to a roadside restaurant called Aunt Carrie’s. It’s been around since 1920 and still remains a popular spot today. We both had the lobster dinners and for dessert were given coupons to an ice cream parlor across the street. The ice cream was made by a company called “The Ice Cream Machine” out of Cumberland, RI. I think we have a pretty close contender to Farr’s Ice Cream. In all fairness I only tasted Ned’s so I’m thinking we need to do further research. As I’m writing this fire works are going off nearby. Kinda sums up the day perfectly.

A Day in the Hamptons–Wildwood State Park, Long Island NY 6/13

We loaded up the bikes and headed for the Hamptons! Our first sightseeing venture included driving along the Dunes, gawking at all the post-modern oversized mansions. This stretch of the spit featured mainly really ostentatious homes that looked more like hotels than individual dwellings. We continued along Montauk Highway driving through several villages eventually arriving in South Hampton. It looked a lot more like Rodeo Drive than a vacation hang-out spot that’s for sure! We really didn’t feel like riding our bikes through this village so we continued the drive East up the point. By this time it was about 1ish and we were getting hungry. We spotted a seafood shack and decided it was more our speed than the fancier restaurants. The lunch was to die for. We ordered Maryland crab cakes with coleslaw and onion rings. There were a few picnic tables outside and quite a few people already enjoying their lunches of clams, cod and shrimp. We asked if we could join them and we had the best time lunching together and chatting it up. Turns out they were from Ramsey, New Jersey and knew exactly where I used to live on Forest Avenue. How ironic is that! There were 8 of them and they had spent the weekend in the Hamptons at one of their family homes. They were impressed that we had chosen this place to eat since it’s supposed to be a great secret among the locals. We continued towards East Hampton swimming against the Sunday afternoon exodus. We passed miles and miles of BMWs, Mercedes, Land Rovers and Audis as they slowly streamed back to the city. Even though East Hampton village was just as posh, if not more than South Hampton, we decided it was as good a place as any to ride our bikes. We cracked up riding through the village. Every cross-walk has two white-gloved policeman directing traffic. Pretty much overkill if you ask me. We rode out of the village and took several side streets so we could check out all the homes. It was unbelievable seeing the gorgeous gardens and houses. We also enjoyed walking through the local cemetery reading all the headstones, some dating back to 1722. The most unusual being, “Peggy Negro Serving Cap. Somebody (sic) all her life.” We decided it was time to pack up the bikes and drive out to the farthest point of the island and view Montauk Lighthouse. (Today’s pic is Ned in front of the lighthouse). This lighthouse was commissioned by George Washington and was the first one built in the state of New York. Dang - some pretty good history there. Our next stop was Sag Harbor. I enjoyed this section of the South Fork most. Even though it was still pretty ritzy, it seemed more like old money and not trying as hard as the Hamptons. We took a bridge over to North Haven Island and then a short ferry ride to Shelter Island, checking out all the homes along the way. The little town of Dering Harbor really knocked our socks off. There are only a handful of houses, but each and every one of them look like something out of the Great Gatsby. It is very secluded and oriented toward the harbor. We eventually took the North Ferry off the island and headed into the town of Greenport. What do you know, an ice cream parlor serving Hershey’s ice cream, which is the same brand as Doumar’s?! (It’s not on the official tasting list since it would be scoring the same ice cream twice). We had fun walking around the town with our cones and discussing the day. We decided that we are definitely North Fork people. We like the low-key vibe of the North Fork with its wineries, flower and produce stands over the posh and glitz of the South Fork. When we arrived back at the campsite it was a far cry from last night. Almost everyone is gone and instead of campfires, bikes, balls, and the shouts of kids playing, it is incredibly quite and still. Sigh - the tip of Long Island at rest until the next weekend barrage of families and socialites.

Wine Tasting New York Style–Wildwood State Park, Long Island NY 6/12

The drive down the Palisades Parkway early this morning was quite beautiful. Most of our trip through the West and Midwest was comprised of large expanses of wilderness punctuated by small pockets of civilization. Here, it’s just the reverse. Everything is urban or suburban with small pockets of nature. We don’t take those small pockets for granted! In no time at all we were negotiating and navigating our way thru the maze of interstates feeling like we were part of a Grand Theft Auto video game. On our way to Long Island we made an hour or so stop in New Rochelle to visit a cemetery to check out some headstones for our friend James. We really enjoyed seeing some of the houses in this area and I particularly liked the sign welcoming us into New Rochelle. It’s a picture of an Irish looking cartoon character, surrounded by dogs, with the saying “New Rochelle - The Place to Come When A Feller Needs a Friend.” How cute is that?! We finally arrived in Long Island and rather than take the expressway I talked Ned into driving the l-o-n-g way on the surface streets through all the towns. I really wanted to get a feel for what Long Island was all about. For about ¾ of the island it’s basically just one large suburban sprawl. But, the last 1/3 is indeed a treasure! We are staying on the sound part of the island at a rather popular state park. It’s laid out like a small city with turn of the century type street lights at the end of each camper row. There’s rolling grass hills and very mature trees that cover the entire area. It’s nice, but definitely feels like we are camped in the middle of a block party. Kids are everywhere, riding their bikes, playing flashlight tag at night, and hide n seek and other ballgames during the day. I actually really like the family energy, especially after all the nearly vacant campsites or senior citizen only campers we’ve seen. It also has a completely different vibe than the southern campgrounds. Instead of huge bbqs in the back of pick-up trucks or at the campsite, here people are more into just constantly moving. We decided to explore the northern point of the island and were delightfully surprised by the roadside flower and produce stands, as well as the wineries. (Today’s pic is one of the many flower stands that dot the roadway.) I had no idea that Long Island was such a wine tasting mecca. We meandered towards the point stopping quite frequently whenever a particular winery caught our eye. Some of the wineries had live music playing or hayrides, but the biggest difference from our California wineries is that you can buy a slice of freshly made pizza pie as you wine taste! Gotta love New York! We got back to the campground in the early evening and decided to take a bike ride over to the beach. The beach on the sound side is amazing. There are no waves, the water is clear and calm, and the beach is made up of sand and the most beautifully polished marble sized stones. We took a long hour or so walk down the beach, past all the fishermen and their families until we were the only ones at that end of the beach - and there was still a huge stretch of beach in front of us. While it had been stormy looking most of the day, at this point the overcast skies had moved on and we were rewarded with beautifully filtered evening sunlight. Very romantic! Tomorrow we are planning on riding our bikes thru the Southern Coastal tip of Long Island, touring the Hamptons. Should be fun to see how the rich and famous spend their vacation, bet they don’t have any more fun than us!

A Trip Down Memory Lane –Lake Welch, Harriman State Park, NY 6/11

Our first stop of the day was my home in Wilmington, DE. I lived here from 1966 thru 1970- my 4^th thru mid-7^th grade years. When we approached the house a gentleman was standing outside. Turns out he was the owner of the home since 1983. He was able to fill me in on the neighborhood and let me know which families were still the original owners. Turns out one of my closest childhood friends still lives there! We knocked on her door and her mom, Mrs. Leary answered. She’s in her mid-80’s, but still looks remarkably young and the same. She invited us in and we had a little chat about the old times. She was always a hands-on fix it type person and true to form, she was in the process of refinishing a table in her backyard. Cute. From there we went to St. Mary Magdalen’s School. Unfortunately it was locked, but we ran into the parish priest (a rather rude SOB I might add), and he told us we could inquire at the rectory. A very sweet woman opened up the church and let Ned and I wander around. It brought tears to my eyes to see this place again. So many memories. I showed Ned the balcony where I went “fishing” with my hymnal tied to palm leaves that didn’t hold and went crashing down in the middle of mass. The priest stopped mass, pointed to me and my friend, and yelled, “You, out of the house of God.” Yep, that pretty much started off my descent to hell. It was also here where I poured all the holy water out of the containers and filled them with orange soda. You should have seen all the kids, dressed in their Catholic School white shirts with orange dots on them! As we left the church, I must admit I was a bit surprised that it was still standing and didn’t quiver, shake or burn to the ground as I crossed the threshold. Our next stop was The Charcoal Pit, a 1950’s burger joint that still serves the best burgers ever. We had an interesting couple of hours navigating the Jersey and Garden State turnpikes. (Glad Ned was driving!). We finally made it to Northern Jersey and the sweet little hamlet of Ramsey. The town is definitely more upscale then when we lived there. The little house on Forest Avenue, where I lived from 1963 to 1966, is still there and looks adorable! The owner was a little concerned about me taking pictures of his home and came outside to see what we were up to. Turns out his folks bought the house from my parents in 1966 and his mom still lives there! We then paid a visit to St. Paul’s school. It wasn’t yet out for the summer and we were fortunate that a 5^th grade teacher gave us a grand tour of the entire school. Yes, I was able to wander by the statue of the Virgin Mary that we would crown on May 1 and my 1^st – 3^rd grade classrooms. Interestingly enough, there are no longer nuns associated with any of these schools. Apparently both the convents have now been converted to the rectory. I guess now that woman have more options a life, the nunnery no longer has quite the appeal it used to – ha! As I wandered around the churches and schools it was hard not to imagine the nuns still wandering the halls, fully clothed from head to toe in their dark habits. Some, like Sister Mary Catherine, will always be remembered for her kindness and gentle guidance, while others, like Sister Flavian still haunt me – the mean ol’ battle-ax. No one, at either of the parishes or schools knew what has happened to any of the sisters. Sad. It was an emotional day for me reliving so much of the past -thinking of the years my Big Papa lived with us in these homes, the childhood friends I played with and lost touch, my little brother being born and brought home on Christmas Day, and all those catholic school memories!

We decided to camp at a place closer by than originally planned so headed into nearby New York. It’s a gorgeous area, feels very much like the Adirondacks. However, the campground itself is kinda odd, despite the beautiful lake and WPA era style buildings. We are in a wide open wooded meadow surrounded by too many New Yorkers. The thousands of ¼ inch tiny frogs continuously hopping all around definitely adds to the uniqueness of this campground.

Hanging with Tom –Patapsco Valley State Park, Catonsville, MD 6/10

Ned here again. Our focus today was all about Thomas Jefferson at Monticello. We drove through some beautiful Virginia countryside on our way to Jefferson’s home. On arriving there, we were impressed to see a beautiful visitor center which had opened about a year ago. We were a little anxious about whether we would get tickets to tour the house interior, since the place, on a Thursday morning, seemed to be crawling with large groups of school children. However, we were pleased to get a tour time about 1 hour later than our arrival time. This gave us a chance to take the plantation tour which covered the work and life of the slaves on Jefferson’s property. Our tour guide was a very enthusiastic former geologist, Ed, who was very knowledgeable about lots of interesting details of individual slaves lives, who he knew by name. Our house tour was given by another very well-informed fellow, who dressed in a tie and sports coat, despite the warm weather. One of my favorite highlights of the tour was the wound clock in the large entry room over the front door. The cannon ball-sized weights which power the clock are supposed to indicate the day of the week as they descend the wall. The problem, however, as our guide put it, was that “the 7-day clock was mounted on a 5 ½ day wall”. A whole had to be cut into the floor so that the weights could drop into the basement of the building on Friday and Saturday, before they were rewound back to the ceiling on Sunday morning. We also liked the design of the interior shutters on the windows, which folded back in a very elegant manner. Some other highlights: excellent use of skylights for good natural light, clever dumbwaiter and revolving shelf designs in the dining room to reduce the waiting staff to one person, and the famous double-pen invention which allowed Jefferson to make a copy of every letter he wrote. The grounds of the building are very nicely maintained and landscaped. (Today’s pic is a nice exterior shot of the house.) We enjoyed a walk from the house back down to the visitor center where we watched a very good short film on Jefferson. After Monticello, we made a slight detour to Fredericksburg to sample the ice cream made at Carl’s. We had seen this store featured on a TV show about great ice cream stores. While we thought the ice cream was very creamy, both the chocolate and strawberry (which I bought in the name of science) were served too warm and sloppy. Debi’s vanilla was a good consistency, but we didn’t think either the chocolate or vanilla were particularly well flavored. So, despite the wonderful original-looking 1950’s exterior or the place, and the very impressive vintage freezers from which the product was served, we had to rate Carl’s as number four, so far, behind Blue Bell, Doumar’s and Farr’s. From there we maneuvered through the rush hour traffic surrounding both Washington D.C. and Baltimore, in order to find our current campground in a beautiful state park, which is strangely located in the middle of a very urban area. Tomorrow we’ll try to hit two of Debi’s childhood homes in both Wilmington, Delaware, and Ramsey, New Jersey. She can hardly wait!

A Walk thru the 18th Century –Bear Creek State Park, Cumberland, VA 6/9

Today’s big adventure was Colonial Williamsburg. The historic park was a short drive from our campsite so we were able to really spend the majority of the day taking a walk back through time. We were fortunate in that the weather was just about perfect, a little on the cool side for starters with very little humidity. We enjoyed walking through the historic village, viewing the demonstrations of different trades, and listening to the vignettes of life around the time of the American Revolution. I really enjoyed watching how books were bound and seeing how leather was stretched over the spines. Ned enjoyed talking with the cooper as she explained the ins and outs of barrel making. It was also quite fun to see how silver coins were literally cut into pieces to make change. Clarifies so much the expression, “Pieces of Eight.” We also thoroughly enjoyed a visit to the still active Episcopal Church. It was so amazing to see the pews marked with the names of our founding fathers, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe and others and imagining them sitting there taking part if the service. The gentlemen that gave us a tour of the capitol building got top marks for good storytelling and bringing history to life. I was particularly fascinated with all the maps showing the colonies as they were at this time. There are so many good pics to choose from, including Mr. Ned with a 3 corner hat, but I decided to just show a snapshot of a typical street scene. There was a constant stream of horse drawn carriages, coaches and wagons rumbling by that really added of the authenticity of the village. We left Williamsburg at a little past 4, did a quick drive through Richmond and finally arrived at the sweetest little camping spot. Believe it or not we are the only people in the campground! It’s situated around a beautifully wooded lake and seems too perfect to be real. We popped the lid on Winnie and were planning on taking a ride through the park and perhaps taking a dip. Mr. Ranger, John, a very friendly fellow came on over to say hi. (Apparently, there’s not a lot going on today). He claims it’s a weekend campground that usually hosts about 400 people. Kinda hard to believe as I sit in the woods this evening, with the only sounds being the birds, insects, and Ned grilling chicken! He let us know that the beach was closed and we were no longer allowed to go swimming in the lake. Bummer. Ned and I hopped on our bikes anyway and spent some time poking around the place, visiting the lake, playing on the pier and taking great photos. We’ve been secretly planning our strategy for a late night swim, but I think Ranger John is hip to us. He keeps driving by occasionally to see what we are up to. At one point, as I was riding my bike he drove by and said, “Hello there Debi” and gave me a nice friendly wave. Kinda makes me feel a little tiny bit bad to be plotting against him. Tomorrow we continue the tour of our country’s forefathers and visit Monticello. I’d like to get an early start, but this place is so beautiful it’s going to be hard to leave.

Feast of Firsts –First Landing State Park, Virginia Beach, VA 6/8

Knowing that there were a couple of little tykes eager to pounce on our bed and wake us up, this ol’ lady managed to outfox them and get up first. It was wonderful to spend the morning with all that boy energy and Ned and I each enjoyed taking turns reading to them. I must admit, I was a little sad to have an early start, but we had a lot of territory to cover today. Originally we were just going to head straight for Virginia Beach, but Ned really wanted to visit Kitty Hawk and see where the Wright Bros. had their first flight. I thought that was an excellent idea since that would give us a chance to travel longer up the coast. As we meandered toward the coast, the North Carolina countryside put on quite a show for us. We traveled alongside miles of abundant orange daylilies, magnolia and mimosa trees in full bloom, and the ubiquitous fields of corn. We also admired a field of red tulips. It was quite a thrill to finally reach The Outer Banks of North Carolina and see the sandy shores of the Atlantic Ocean. Hard to believe we’re here, especially after traveling thru the canyons of the west, peaks of the Rockies, plains of Oklahoma and gaps of the Appalachia Mts. It’s so interesting to see the home styles change from single story with large porches to three story homes built on stilts. Nag’s Head and the surrounding towns didn’t seem to have much of a “there” there. Even though there were the obligatory beach shops touting swim wear and hammocks, it seemed more like it was just strip mall after strip mall. We finally arrived at Kitty Hawk National Site and were really amazed at how many people were there. We’ve visited a lot of National and Historic Sites the last 3 weeks and haven’t seen crowds like this. The visitor’s center and pavilion detailing the history of the Wright Bros. and their first flight was interesting, but nothing compared to going out to the dunes/field and walking the actual first 4 powered flights. So fun to imagine what it might have felt like to be in mid-air for 12 seconds, then finally 59 seconds! As we walked the final 852 feet you could almost feel the magic of the moment. We continued our drive up the coast leaving North Carolina and entering Virginia. After what seemed like a really long car ride traveling up the coast we finally reached First Landing State Park. We are camped at the spot where the Virginia Company first landed before going on to settle Jamestown. We picked out a spot nestled under the trees, but facing the dunes and the Chesapeake Bay. The first thing we did was take a walk out onto the dunes and put our feet in the water. It was much warmer than I expected! Well, Ned knew I was feeling antsy after being in the van so long, so he thought it prudent to “run the dogs” – i.e.. take the ol’ girl out for a bike ride. We headed for the boardwalk and had a marvelous 10 mile ride in the heart of Virginia Beach. (Today’s pic is Ned on the boardwalk). It was fun to ride up and down the boardwalk, but I enjoyed cruising through all the neighborhoods and looking at the affluent beach houses even more. It was a little after 7 by this time and we thought it too late to head back to the campsite to cook dinner so decided to head to Doumar’s for dinner and ice cream. (We first heard about this place on the TV show Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives). Doumar’s claim to fame is they invented the ice cream cone. They still make homemade cones on the very same machine that Abe Doumar made in 1905 on Coney Island. Doumar’s is located in the heart of Norfolk, in a very inner-city part of town. We couldn’t believe that after 8 pm on a Tuesday night the place was packed! We each had their famous bbq pulled pork sandwiches at the bargain price of 3.25 ea. Meh – I wasn’t so impressed with the bbq. It’s North Carolina style, so it was a vinegar based sauce. Ned summed it up perfectly when he said they tasted like tuna fish sandwiches. Our main reason for coming was to taste the ice cream! I had a vanilla cone and Ned had a chocolate. We thought it was pretty darn good and rated it just behind Farr’s. So for those of you following our ice cream adventure and keeping score the list now goes like this: 1^st place – Farr’s, 2nd Doumar’s, 3^rd Blue Bell and Andy’s Frozen Custard still is in last place. (This is only the official ice cream tasting, I’m not even counting the Baskin Robbins or franchise soft serve we’ve eaten!) Yes, there will be more of me to love upon my return home.