New England #10

Well we shagged our way on the Interstate from Conn. to Chambersburg PA yesterday. Our plan was to attend our Sister in Law’s birthday party Saturday night in Blacksburg. Oops we were a week early. That will be the last time Vickie believes that I know anything about dates. Thank goodness we have Outlook on our computer at home to keep up with life. Hope I’m not a week early for my funeral. Since we were in the neighborhood we decided we’d just head on home. Yesterday was your normal Interstate day of dodging trucks and avoiding folks that can’t seem to keep a constant speed. I like to play a game of setting my cruise control, then seeing how many times a particularly bad speed varrier will pass me and vice versa. We had a crazy encounter with a physco truck driver that twice tried to kill himself and run over a couple cars. When he made an attempt to run over me, I boxed him in and made him drive 55 for a while, then went to light speed and all he could ever see after that were my taillights. He tried, but every time he started closing the distance, I politely danced out of his way. After a while he must have gotten tired or turned off. We ended up at a nice Country Inn and Suites in Chambersburg PA with a cool discount coupon. (for the record, this place passed the curved shower rod test, but lost style points for the old magnets in the shower curtain on the fiberglass tub trick) This is a relatively new motel chain, and I recommend them. All we have stayed in or seen so far are new and include an indoor pool. Had supper at a Fuddruckers nearby, they really do great burgers. Up early this morning and hit the pool. Usual Continental Breakfast fare. (I made my own waffeel with no assistance, Thank you very much) We will be on the road soon. I-81 is one of my least favorite, but does go down through the mountains, and is pretty scenic this time of year. Thanks for sharing this trip with us. Next we are off to Lake Powell in Arizona with 2 other couples for what we are calling our House Ship Trip in mid-late October. (actually it’s a houseboat, but Vickie calls it a ship cause it’s pretty big) Take care.

Cheers,

Wes

New England #9

We ended up today in Torrington CT at a Quality Inn. Stopped a little early cause we reached empty on the laundry tank. Going to do a load today to get us home. This is without a doubt the weirdest room we have ever stayed in. It is also sort of rough, and won’t get a good review from me. (I think carpet was at the Battle of Gettysburg) The room is your normal something by something motel room with AC unit and bathroom. But then where the back wall of the room should be there is like another little room ½ again as big and the regular room with a ceiling light directly in the middle of it. Looks like a dining room. Very strange. We called the desk to ask and the girl said she didn’t know perhaps it was converted from something else. Oh and while I think about it---does anyone know why Massachusetts has this little hangy down part where Rt. 202 crosses the border into Connecticut? The entire Southern border is straight except for one little rectangle hanging down. I told Vickie pr obably back in 1789 or thereabouts, someone wanted to live in Mass. rather than Conn. Since they couldn’t move their land, they paid someone off to change the border. Or perhaps they were an influential politician. Other than the above mentioned hangy down part, and some jumbled street signs, wasn’t much to see today, and pretty slow going on Rt. 202. We have decided we’ll jump on the Interstate tomorrow and make some miles Southwest toward home. I uploaded some more pictures of Acadia and various other stuff. Continental breakfast at the Quality Inn was the usual fare with a new twist. There was a sign on the waffle batter dispenser that said "Do not touch the waffel machine, someone will assist you". Well the person who couldn’t spell waffel (pronounced wafeel) was nowhere to be found, so after waiting a while I just toasted a bagel and ate some yogurt. While I was eating, the breakfast attendant returned and started fixing her own waffel. There was a tip jar on the table, and I was conspicuous by my non-contributory nature. Well we’re off to utilize Ike’s legacy, ought to be an interesting day exploring uncharted territory for us. More later.

Wes

New England #8

Left Bar Harbor yesterday and headed south along Rt. 1. The coast of Maine is quite beautiful and the water vistas just keep on coming. Yesterday in Maine, however, it was 92° in some places and above 90 almost all day. (don’t anyone tell Al Gore).

Made myself a note of a couple of soapbox items yesterday. Has anyone noticed the "Project Planet" placards hanging in motel rooms nowadays? It is the motel owners looking to save money masquerading as saving the planet. The placards encourage you to reuse your towels and only have your sheets changed when they need it. (boy that’s novel—seems like exactly what we do at home) I went on the web site of Project Planet, and guess what business they are in? You got it, selling stuff to hang in motel rooms. On their sight they tout some motel chain that was going to save $1.3 million with their program, while saving 4 million gallons of water Seems to me the $1.3 million is way more important than the water when everything else at the motel is disposable. (especially the new little coffee pots with the extra plastic disposable thingie) And oh yea, how about the water saving shower head you have to run around under to get wet, directly across from an old style 3 gal per flush toilet? Also, it allows the illegal alien room people to handle way more rooms per person if they don’t have to change the sheets. I don’t mind that they are saving water, but don’t tell me you are doing it to save the planet. (I’m dumb, but not that dumb)

The second box I want to get on is, who are these guys that design motel rooms? How come the air conditioner always blows up into the drapes causing you to have to engineer some kind of holding device for the drapes to keep the spotlights aimed directly at your window out? You know my ongoing position on curved shower rods. This place got the installation right, but added an interesting new wrinkle. They have magnets in the bottom of the shower curtain—with a fiberglass tub. Must have missed high school physics class. And what is it with desks and no place to plug in anything?

The third soapbox item is tourism. Dawned on me day before yesterday at Acadia—this horde of tourists doesn’t really even include the Boomers yet. Vickie and I are "Early Early Boomers" in that we are early boomers and retired early. The make up of the crowd at Acadia was all mostly older folks like 65-75 and beyond. In addition most of the folks we see on the road are this same advanced age. I can’t imagine what it’s going to be like in 10 years when the Boomers really start retiring. You better get your National Park reservations 3 years in advance.

Along the way down the coast, we passed through Bucksport Maine that calls itself "The Center Of The Known Universe" It is the site of the British Battle "Disaster On The Penobscot in 1779" and also site of the new Pneobscot Narrows bridge and observatory. The bridge was very interesting. It has nitrogen pressurized chambers the suspension cables run through to prevent corrosion. It also has an observatory in one of the 420’ towers. As we proceeded further down the coast of Maine yesterday, we decided we had seen enough water vistas, and headed inland. My great navigator found some Maine back roads (read barely roads) and we cut across to Rt. 202 which we intend to follow for a while. Oh and something I wanted to mention, when the State of Maine posts a sign that says bump, they really mean it. (like 1 mph bumps) Also I was introduced to a new sign yesterday called "Frost Heave" The frost heave sign is usually followed by a road that looks like the aftermath of an earthquake, bu t with more rounded edges. We set our sights on Rochester NH for the night. Well turns out when we got to Rochester there were 3 motels. One that really fooled us was named Residence Inn. I don’t believe it will be entering the Marriott system anytime soon. The other two were its brothers bad and worse. So we headed on to Concord NH which was the next bold (on the map) city. Our GPS showed motels there, and we had coupons for several. By this time it was getting late and we were tired. Our first stop was a Fairfield by Marriott. They were full but the Day’s Inn down the road was supposed to have rooms. To make a long story short, we got one of the last two rooms at the Day’s Inn, cause it seems like there were a bunch of Democrats in NH having a debate. The Day’s Inn refused to honor our coupon siting a special event. What was that special event? Not the Democratic debate but Fall Foliage! Guy said oh they’re coming in from all over for it. However the coupon is valid for September and October which is when the fall foliage is, so we are a little miffed. We’re going to write the Room Saver folks and the National Day’s Inn folks just for the venting of it. (we weren’t dumb enough to not take the room, regardless of coupon or not) Since it was late, we called for Chinese delivery, and had a great room picnic in front of the TV. Then right after dinner, the water died in the whole motel. It was back before we went to bed, but made for a harrowing night. We’re heading East tomorrow. Good Continental at the Day’s Inn this morning and quite a bit of rain. Made instant mud on the car. Looks like it might continue for a day or so. More later.

Wes

New England #7

Made it to Bar Harbor ME yesterday. Rt. 1 in Maine is a rough old girl in many places and quite a bit of construction. Vickie and I were wondering how they would ever get it all finished before the "permafrost" sets in. You can tell there might be something to the winters here by the way their firewood stacks are often almost as big as the house. Most of our day yesterday was spent at Acadia National Park. This is one of the few National Parks on the East Coast. Basically it is a lot of islands and peninsulas that stick out into the Atlantic from the coast of Maine. Bar Harbor is pretty much completely surrounded by the National Park. Last I was here, many many years ago, Bar Harbor was a sleepy little town where you caught the ferry to Nova Scotia. Well you still catch the ferry here, but boy has it built up. Looking at some kind of local paper we picked up, 9 cruise ships are scheduled to dock here this week. One of the "cruisers" said the Queen Mary 2 was due here next Saturd ay. I was curious where cruise ships would come from to get to Bar Harbor. I asked one lady, and she said her ship sailed out of NYC with stops in Boston, Bar Harbor, Halifax, and some other places. This is really off-season for Acadia Park, but because of the cruise ships, it was slammed yesterday. Nothing like meeting a 48-passenger giant bus coming down the mountain road around a curve at you. However despite the droves of people, Acadia is a most beautiful place. The view from Cadillac Mt. at 1500+ feet above sea level is worth the trip. There is a park loop road that takes in most of the more popular sites. We spent our time on the loop with the roof down enjoying the park. Also there is a bus service that you can utilize to see the whole park. Since it was late in the day, we decided to stay in Bar Harbor. After the cruise ships pulled out around 5:00 (so they could get out past the 12 mile limit and open their casinos) the place was pretty empty. We enjoyed sitting on the ba lcony of our room at the Quality Inn with beautiful weather, and surprisingly few bugs. (oh and on the scorecard—this place didn’t get the memo, the curved shower rods were installed so that the shower area is now smaller than before) We later went across the road to something called The Saltwater Grill, and enjoyed the early bird specials. (makes me feel like a very old tourist to say early bird special) However in this case 1 of the early bird specials was a lobster, fries and slaw for $15.95. Great deal and it was good. I added an appetizer of steamed mussels and was in heaven. Miss Vickie ate the early bird sirloin tips in that she doesn’t do well with shellfish. I rounded it all off with a crisp Maine apple back at the room, and collapsed into a protein coma. Tomorrow, we plan to continue down the Maine coast on Rt.1 and eventually turn back inland before we get into the millions of folks called Boston. Oh and last night, Old Blue didn’t have to sleep alone for a change. He go t to snuggle up to a nice new maroon C6 with the same color top. I was hoping I might find a little Corvette pedal car when I went down this morning but nothing happened. (probably both boys) Ran down this morning to see the departure of the ship called "The Fast Cat" to Nova Scotia. It is this huge all aluminum catamaran car ferry with 38,000 hp (4 engines/9500) that runs from Bar Harbor to Yarmouth Nova Scotia at around 45 knots. Came back and went to breakfast at the same restaurant as last night. Usually isn’t possible to screw up breakfast but they did. Food was bad service was worse. More later.

Wes

New England #6

’m sitting here in a jacket after spraying myself with 98% Deet. I’m overlooking one of the most beautiful scenes on the trip so far. We lucked up and ended up in this cool old strip motel on the bank of some tidal river. We have sat here all evening watching the sun go down and the moon come up. We watched little shore birds fly in formation, we watched something that looked like the lock ness monster (neighbors later told us it was probably seals). We watched the old guy go out to the moored boat and adjust the moorings meanwhile messing up the whole mirror pool effect of the wide spot in the river. Vickie just took a picture of me writing this. It is impossible to put into words. The coast of Maine is unlike anything we are accustomed to. There are no beaches, just rocky coastline. We lucked up and found this place in some little town called Machias. Earlier this afternoon we were at Quoddy Head State Park in Lubec, ME which is the furthermost East point in the continental U S. There is a nice old lighthouse there and the water view was beautiful. The tides in this area run 28 feet. Everywhere today we saw the low tide cause it was at 3:50 p.m. The high tide is supposed to be at 9:30 tonight, and low is at 3 am (I’ll be sure to see that one) and high is again at 9:30 am tomorrow. Vickie just reminded me we have a full moon overhead. I didn’t realize it. It might not be full but it is 17/18^ths full. I mean, you couldn’t pay money (which we did) for a setting like this. The motel is populated by a mixture of tourists and construction workers. It is interesting. I have overheard big old burly construction workers on the cell phone telling their families how incredible the view is here. I believe I’m going to have to keep this place a secret to only my closest friends. Put this place on your list of places to visit on the coast of Maine. Oh it’s a ring around the moon---what does that mean? I’m going to have to look that up. I just can’t st op looking at how beautiful this setting is. I’ll post some pictures later.

Yesterday I made myself a note to mention the cute little coffee makers they have started using in most motel rooms. They have little disposable baskets with coffee already in them, and they brew only one cup at a time. Also don’t have warmers so you don’t have to worry about leaving them on. You brew directly into the Styrofoam cup you drink out of. So now instead of biodegradable paper filter packs and coffee grounds, we have an additional plastic tray per cup of coffee. Much simpler for motel though and people don’t take the coffee packs with them to use later. (unless they have one of these curious little machines at home.)

Helen’s restaurant is in the same parking lot as our motel and is supposed to have good food. We are going to wander across the parking lot and partake of their fine food some time this evening. We stopped today at Calais at the Maine tourist bureau. We picked up a lot of literature for our trip down Rt. 1 and two very pretty free Maine apples. We asked the nice lady if there was a good diner in town for lunch. She directed us to Karen’s diner, which she said was the most popular. We found it quickly. They had posted that their off season hours were only till 2 p.m. on Mon and Tues. We got there about 1:15 and they took us in. The menu had all sorts of cool things. I ended up with a cup of split pea and ham soup (excellent) and a "Haddock Sandwich" Boy was it good. Vickie ordered Macaroni and cheese with a diner roll. It was quite interesting made with a vegamel sauce laced with cheese. Well it's later and we are off for the restaurant across the parking lot for dinner . (back) Food was pretty good, I had stroganoff and Vickie had a hot pork sandwich with gravy. I brought back a piece of Maine apple pie for later. Rose early this a.m. in time to see the sun rise over the water (a Kodak moment) then proceeded to Helen’s Restaurant once again for breakfast. We got back to our room and the water had risen to within feet of the deck. Going to upload some pictures to share and get ready to go. Headed for Bar Harbor today.

Wes

New England #5

Monday morning finds us in Bangor Maine at a Holiday Inn. We used a great coupon out of one of those paper travel books you pick up at the State Welcome Centers. (we have saved like 30 or 40 dollars off the normal walk in room rate by using them) Vickie has a great method. She doesn’t show the coupon until after she asks if they have a room. That way they can’t say they don’t have any rooms, and then point to the fine print that says subject to availability. I let Miss Vickie handle all the hotel room negotiations. She is a tough negotiator. I think I mentioned that we stayed at a VERY pricey Comfort Inn in St. Johnsbury VT Saturday night. Well the place just wasn’t up to the standards of the price they charged. I was outside cleaning the car windows and packing up, and the lady at the desk made the mistake of asking Vickie "how was everything?" Vickie, being honest, told her we were quite disappointed and that we had paid half as much for better quality accommodations at severa l other places. Turns out Comfort Inn has a satisfaction guarantee and we ended up getting the room free. This was not our intention but we did feel they really hosed us on the price of the room at the self proclaimed "Taj Mahal!" of Vermont.

We left St. Johnsbury heading East following Rt. 2 and eventually came to the New Hampshire border and Mt. Washington. For those who don’t know, Mt. Washington is like the highest peak in New England and has an auto road to the top built in the late 1800’s. I had been up it years ago on a motorcycle with a friend. I suggested to Vickie we ought to try it. (little did she know I was really talking about driving up a mountain) It was a beautiful sunny clear day, and we got to the entrance pretty early ahead of the crowd. The sign at the entrance said there was a high wind warning at the top, but I decided to go for it anyhow. We headed up the narrow winding road, which is a 12% or better grade for over 8 miles. The road is just barely wide enough for 2 vehicles to pass and there are no guardrails with thousands of foot drop offs. It was really a fun time but Vickie was terrified. We got to the top and lucked up cause 9 out of ten times the top is cloud covered. Because of the high wind, we had several times when the clouds rolled off and we could see the whole vista. It was really amazing watching the clouds go by directly in front of the windshield moving VERY fast. Mt. Washington is the place where the highest wind on the surface of the planet has ever been recorded of 232 miles an hour at –47 ° . Glad it wasn’t yesterday. We got safely down and continued across New Hampshire and Maine to Bangor. The fall foliage just keeps getting better and better. We camped at the above mentioned Holiday Inn and found out the Cole Land Transportation Museum is right next door. So this morning we are off to see that. It is supposed to have the largest collection of snowplowing equipment anywhere and several 50’s tractor-trailers. More later.

Wes

New England #4

Saturday morning we left Rutland VT in good time, and headed up the road to St. Johnsbury VT. After the "bus people" left the Inn in Rutland, we were able to partake of their fine continental breakfast and carb load for the day. We stopped on the way out of Rutland and topped up the gas. Other than one time I got snookered at a Sunoco station we have not paid more than $2.99 for high-test the whole trip. At the mentioned Sunoco station, they had 4 grades of gas, and they advertised their 91-octane stuff as top grade on the sign. It was advertised for $2.99 but when I pulled up the 93 octane was $3.03. I should have pulled off but we were in the middle of no where and I didn’t know where the next gas would be. Back to today. We had a beautiful trip, about 125 miles through the mountains. We stopped for coffee at a little roadside market and Vickie found a beautiful "Vermont" embroidered hooded fleece sweatshirt for a great price. I got a giant homemade thing like a devils food ca ke except it was maple with that killer white cream stuff in the middle. I ate about a third, and saved it for later to avoid a sugar blowout. Along the way we went through a little town named Williamstown and the high school kids were having a car wash. This was the class of 2010, which made me feel 100 years old. (I graduated in 1967 which is 43 years before them) The car was real dirty after 1000 miles, so I turned back and let them wash it. Made their day, and we made a donation to their cause. After we had ridden a while and everything dried out, we put the roof down and enjoyed the incredible scenery. This country is really remote. There are very few Wally Marts, K-Marts or any Marts. Today I needed some McGuires Quick Detailer, so we stopped at a True Value hardware store, which was the only place that remotely seemed to be a possibility. They had a small automotive section and 1 bottle of what I wanted. It was too early to check into the motel so we stopped and had lunch at Anthony’s Diner that had been mentioned in our Road Trip USA book. Food was great and atmosphere was perfect. Had some New England clam chowder (first time to have it actually in New England) and Egg Salad sandwich on toasted white homemade bread. Sandwich came with homemade potato chips, and everything tasted great. After lunch, we checked into the St. Johnsbury Comfort Inn and Suites, which calls itself "Vermont’s Taj Mahal!" (complete with exclamation point) After we checked in, we used our Quick Detailer to get the car back to pretty. Then we took some cool pictures in front of the fountain with the hundreds of mums in front of the place. If I get time tonight, I’m going to post some pictures from the trip so far. Well by now you have probably gotten an invitation to view our pictures. Don’t know what is involved on your end, but I do know it’s free. We went swimming for a while earlier after finishing the car. Then I came back to the room and worked on editing the pictures. I t was getting late, and Vickie said hey there’s a button on this phone that says pizza delivery. I said go for it, and we ended up with a delivered Hawaiian pizza that was great. Vickie has been busy saving marigold seeds from some interesting white marigolds she found out front. She even taught the young pregnant desk clerk how to save and grow marigold seeds. We are working on our route for tomorrow. We plan to get an early start and perhaps get to the coast of Maine. We have gotten some good travel suggestions from our friends Mary X. and Charlie Russell. The pool opens at 05:00, and we plan to get in some aerobic swimming prior to carb loading at breakfast starting at 06:00. Hopefully we can be on the road as soon as it is light. Oh and just a few comments about the current Taj Mahal. The sign over the front door says #1 Comfort Inn and Suites 2003. Well, it’s been all down hill since then. A bunch of stuff in our room didn’t work and they took care of things, but we had to ask a lot. Latest not so good: dutifully got Vickie up at 05:00 so we could swim before breakfast at 06:00. Went to the Inn front desk for towels and the lady said, "oh the pool doesn’t open till 5:00." I said it’s 5:30, she said no it’s 4:30, I said but the clock in my room said 5:30, she said but it’s 4:30. Note to self—check the clock in the room against the cell phone. Oh well at least we went to bed an hour earlier. Someone had a good joke on us. Did our swimming, and sat in sauna and hot tub. Got to the breakfast that was supposed to start at 06:00, and the lady said she was running behind. We hung around and got some stuff to eat as she toted it out. She reported that for the second day in a row, the waffle makers were not working. All in all this very pricey Comfort Inn was not worth the money. I’ll have to write to Comfort Inn’s and post something on Trip Advisor.com. In any event, we will be on the road as the sun is coming up, hopefully to make it to the Maine coast tonight . More later.

Wes

New England #3

Hello, it’s Saturday morning, and we’re in Rutland VT. Had a good day yesterday, rode with the roof down most of the day. We stayed late at the Red River Inn utilizing the good Internet connection and cell service to secure reservations for Friday and Saturday night. We don’t normally worry about reservations, but we’ve found Friday and Saturday nights in popular areas can be difficult with out a reservation. We found this to be true as many of the few motels available in New England were down to their last rooms. Last night, Friday, we ended up in Rutland Vt., which worked out perfectly. We didn’t set too aggressive a distance target for yesterday cause we got a late start, and we were driving the Rt. 7 trip we came up here to see. The trip up Rt. 7 lived up to its expectations. The scenery was beautiful and the drive was entertaining. The further North we get, the more the leaves are beginning to show color. I can’t imagine what it must be like at the height of the season. Alm ost every road here is like driving on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Also, often you are driving through long valleys with mountains on both sides of you. Many of the small New England towns resembled tourist traps, but I guess that’s what they do here. Along the way, we stopped at Kent Falls, a couple of covered bridges, and various other points of interest. The navigator had an easy day, as the route followed 7 the whole way. Last night we easily found the Comfort Inn in Rutland, and landed with no problems. It was interesting though because the whole place was full of older folks on bus trips. They were all wearing tags around their neck, and loaded up on the busses about 6:00 PM headed for somewhere. (dinner probably) We hung around for a while, and I wrote a review of the Red River Inn from last night for Trip Advisor. If you’ve never used it, Trip Advisor.com is a very useful web site. My friend Jerry hooked me up with it, and I now use it a lot and am starting to contribute review s. It is a community of over 17 million travelers that write independent reviews of various places they visit. It can be very useful when considering a visit to a resort, hotel or other establishment. Reading reviews yesterday morning saved us from booking an over priced room at a 3^rd rate rundown motel. After hanging for a while, we went to dinner at the Sirloin Saloon just down the road. It was an interesting place with a creative menu. They had something called "Bison Bread" that if you could eat 2 slices of I’d buy you dinner. It was baked in huge loaves about 2 feet in diameter, and weighed about a pound per slice. It was very tasty, but way filling—texture like eating crushed grain. They had a nice salad bar with the dinners, and on it we found an interesting new treat. They are called Wasabi Peas. They look like little yogurt covered mints, but don’t taste that way. They are sort of like way hot little crunchy poppers you can sprinkle on top of salads. They really go good with salad or just by themselves. We looked them up on the Internet, and they are available for purchase from various on-line places. After the cool salad discovery, I had a nice piece of broiled Cod probably my first of many seafood dishes in the next week.

Today we are also going to stay in Vermont. We were headed into Maine, but in order to make it to anywhere we could find a place to stay, we would have had to drive way farther than was comfortable with the speed we can manage on these New England back roads. I commented to Vickie yesterday, the speed limits here are like musical chairs. 30-40-45-30-25-45-50-55-40-55-40-25-etc.etc. and that is all in about 5 miles. Then you never know when there is a local law waiting to get you for 35 in a 25. (have seen many speed traps in little towns) Needless to say our average speed is nothing to write home about. (pardon the pun). So tonight we’ll land in St. Johnsbury VT at another Comfort Inn. Oh and by the way one of the attractions at St. Johnsbury is a 1916 portrait of Abe Lincoln made out of 6,399 dried insects--we'll be looking for that one. Got to get going, we better get to the "Deluxe Continental Breakfast" ahead of the bus crowd or it will probably be like following a heard of locusts. Oops went to get Vickie some coffee and the breakfast room was overflowing with "bus people". The lady who took care of the breakfast was harried beyond belief. She was pouring OJ concentrate into the machine on a stool while the lady in front of me whined at her because there was no decaf coffee. She said, somewhat sharply, "I didn’t know 2 bus loads would all be coming at the same time". I grabbed Vickie a coffee, me a yogurt and we’ll hang in the room a while till the locusts are done. More Later

Wes

New England #2

Well it’s Friday morning, and I didn’t get to write last night. We ended up driving late again and by the time we got back from dinner it was time to watch a little tube and crash. First thing I wanted to relate was a great story Vickie told me yesterday. It was about when we were checking into the Country Inn and Suites day before. It took quite a while to check in, but I never asked cause I was sitting on the porch in a rocking chair, contented. Seems as though when Vickie went in to check in, there was an alarm going off, and the girl was on the phone trying to handle it. She told Vickie she was the only one there so she would have to wait. During the lengthy process, a woman happened to walk down the stairs from the second floor (of three). The girl turned to the lady and nonchalantly said, "There’s not a fire up there is there?" The woman replied she hadn’t seen one, and the girl turned to Vickie and said, "Good that saves me from having to check." Safety first of course but then what about the 3^rd floor? If I’m the one trapped in my room on the 3^rd floor while this girl asks any old passer buy the status of the fire, I hope the passer buy has at least been on the top floor. (Unlikely since the stairs came from the middle of the 2^nd floor and most folks from the 3^rd use the elevator or the stairs on the end of the building.) Oh well you get the picture, I was feeling very safe knowing this girl was on the job. Vickie said later when she went to get some change, she could hardly tear the slug away from the TV long enough to accommodate. Back to the trip.

Yesterday morning we utilized the great pool and hot tub at the Inn, and partook of their advertised "Hot Breakfast". Turned out to be quite a spread. We went from Best Western the day before with nothing, to $25 less with indoor pool and breakfast at the Inn. The breakfast was the standard "Continental" fare, but added the ubiquitous make it your self waffles plus some scrambled eggs and sausage patties in a steam pan. The eggs were a little rubbery and the sausage had a curious texture. However, both tasted pretty good, and if you are a big breakfast eater sort of rounded out the all carb fare that the normal "Continental" presents. We departed uneventfully, and traveled across Rt. 209 toward Stroudsburg PA and the Delaware Water Gap. Along the way we stopped in Jim Thorpe PA. This is an interesting little town that changed it’s name from Maul Chunk to Jim Thorpe after collecting nickels weekly from the residents to build a shrine to entomb the remains of the great athlete. Turns out Old Jim never even visited Maul Chunk alive. Very enterprising of the civic leaders to buy a dead athlete and rename the city after him. Leaving Jim Thorpe, we drove over the mountain (literally) and came down into Packerton PA. I saw a sign that said Flagstaff view which looked interesting, so I turned UP. We went straight up for about 3 miles and ended up back on top of the mountain overlooking Jim Thorpe we had just left. As we explored, a very nice lady said "Do you want to see the ballroom and deck?" She led us inside, and began explaining this mountain top, all wood ballroom was built in 1914 and that Jimmie Dorsey and His Orchestra were the house band for many years. She said Frank Sinatra and Teresa Brewer had performed there. The Flagstaff Ballroom was a beautiful old relic with an incredible view of the Lehigh Valley. What a find, glad I turned at the Flagstaff view sign. Later we stopped at a palatial PA visitor’s center near where I-80 and Rt. 209 cross in Strou dsburg. We got the lowdown on all that was to do in the area and headed out. We drove down to see the famous bridge that connects PA to NJ across the Deleware river. We then strolled across the pedestrian bridge to view the river. It was beautiful and the fish were frolicking everywhere. We rode a lot with the roof down, and headed up through the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area. We stopped for a short hike to see Dunwoddie Falls which turned out to be worth the walk. After the park, we looked at our time and decided we could push on a little further, so we set our sights on New Paltz NY. The GPS listed several motels there and it seemed like a reasonable distance. Vickie said something about four colleges being there, but I didn’t think much about that. (1^st mistake) Turned out when we got to New Paltz, it was bumper to bumper traffic, and a lot of congestion. I decided the place was too congested for our liking so we pushed on to Poughkeepsie, which listed n umerous motels. Unbeknownst to us (but probably knownst to many), when coming into Poughkeepsie across the FDR Hudson Bridge, you have to take the first right as soon as you cross the bridge cause that’s where every motel in the city is. I’m sure you can see what’s coming---it was the middle of rush hour—a million cars---we didn’t turn---found ourselves on the far side of Poughkeepsie with no motel. Rather than go back through the city, we broke out the laptop, and searched for the next possibility. It looked pretty bleak, but New Milford CT. listed some motels and was on route 7 the route we came to drive. So even though it would put us late, we headed out to there. The drive was very interesting and as we came into town we passed a couple of old motels. We rode on looking for the motel district—well it never came. New Milford has all the normal stuff, Wally Mart, Home Depot, McDonalds, Auto Zone, etc. etc. but surprisingly no motels. I finally stopped and asked a nice Pakistani s hopkeeper if there were any motels anywhere. We sort of did charades and I ascertained there were some back 3 miles past the powerhouse and big flag. Turns out these were the old ones we passed coming into town. We stopped at the first one the Red River Inn and Vickie inquired for a room. She said they had 2 for 2 different prices and she was going to look at them. One was in the "old building" and one was in the "new building". She ended up taking the one in the new building and we proceeded to unload. We are not motel snobs, and have stayed in many a little old strip motels, especially out West. Turns out the reason she took the new building was cause it was the most amazing motel room you’ve ever seen. It made up for all the travails we had been through during the day. It was brand new, and a sort of mini suite with a huge bathroom, main room, and little office with desk for yours truly. It was decorated in sort of "Pakistani Modern" which has to bee seen to be believed. We took a lot of pictures. But what was amazing was the amenities. On the wall was a 45" plasma TV, and there was a stainless ice bucket and a stainless tray with real glass glasses and coasters. We had a refrigerator, microwave, and huge closet. In the bathroom were a selection of herbal soaps and ointments and the bed king size and comfortable beyond belief. We relaxed a while in our suite at the Pakistani Ritz, then headed out for dinner. We ended up at The Cook House that was recommended to me by the owners son. The menu offered up all manner of stuff, but the specialty appeared to be barbecue. In fact according to them it was voted the best barbecue in Connecticut by the NY Times. Somehow when I think barbecue, Connecticut and the NY Times don’t jump readily to mind. Vickie decided to try though, and ordered up ½ a rack of baby backs. I went for the meatloaf which looked interesting. While we were waiting on dinner I had a PERFECT Bloody Mary. I say this because I have sampled house Bloody Marys all over the US and many other places, often to be very disappointed. (especially Applebee’s which I consider to be the all time worst) Also while waiting on dinner we sampled their "Sauces" They had Mild, Hot, Scary, and North Carolina Style. They all tasted pretty good, but I’ve had hotter than their "Scary", labeled Mild in our part of the country. Dinner came, and the food was good—not great, but good. The ribs were nothing to write home about---Pigs Are Us in Martinsville could run them out of business in a month. The meatloaf was interesting---they brought me a piece about the size of a Volkswagen topped with a large wad of horseradish mashed potatoes, with some brown gravy drooled around. The vegetable of the day was a corn-red pepper-onion sauté that was excellent. The service was poor and I left the dolt a $2 tip. (big enough so he would know I didn’t forget, but also small enough to let him know I wasn’t impressed) We went back to the room and plasma screened ourselves to sleep. More Later.

Wes

New England #1

Well here we are on the road again. How this happened is sort of crazy. Monday morning I was reading my new Auto Week and read an article about an interesting "drive" that followed Route 7 up through Connecticut and Vermont. I walked in the dining room and asked Vickie if she wanted to go to Connecticut. She said, when, and I said tomorrow. Well, we were scheduled to go to my doctor that afternoon, (in Winston-Salem an hour away) to get the stitches out of my knee after my surgery last week. (Arthroscopic, to fix problems that developed after my last hip replacement) I said my knee felt good and if the doctor agreed, I was ready for a road trip cause I was tired of sitting on the couch reading Clive Cussler under the influence of strong drugs. She said ok with trepidation, and we set off for the doctor’s office. Got to the doctor (oh and by the way he’s a car guy) and he agreed that a road trip would be just the medicine I needed. So on the way home we started planning. It seeme d like a million things to do, but we took them one at a time and to make a long story short—ended up on the road late Tuesday afternoon. We drove to South Boston and took Rt. 360 North to Rt. 15 to Farmville, VA. Our GPS told us there was a Comfort Inn on the other side of Farmville exactly the way we were going. We rode past several motels when passing through Farmville and on to the other side where the GPS said we should stop but there was no sign of a motel. I’m not one to back track unless it’s necessary---so we pressed forward. I said "I’m sure there will be something down the road", but there was nothing. Looking at the map Rt. 522 (which we were on at this point) crossed I-64 down the road and I was sure there would be some motels there. Wrong again! Bottom line we ended up driving late (after dark, which is way unusual for us). Finally found probably the last room in Culpepper, VA at a Best Western for way too much money and no continental breakfast. (Us being the experts of the "Continental Breakfast") But I was tired, and several motels in the same area were already full. (What gives with this on a Tuesday in September in Culpepper, VA?) We landed, did our usual unloading routine, and checked out the bar, which also served food. Turned out the bar had really great food. We ordered "She Crab Soup" and 2 spoons along with a steak salad for me and a Caesar salad for Vickie. We also partook of some fine Yungling beverages and some great cheese spread with assorted breadsticks and crackers. The "She Crab Soup" arrived, and it was to die for. Creamy with tender crabmeat, a tomatoey cream sauce, with a hint of sherry. We shared that and soon the salads arrived. Mine was huge with beautiful strip steak slices medium rare, tomatoes, onions, hardboiled eggs, and great dressing. Vickie’s Caesar was exactly to her liking as well. Turned out to be a wonderful surprise at the end of a pretty hectic day. We went back to the room and crashed. In the morning we d id our normal up-coffee-shower-pack-load and vamoose routine. (Oh and by the way for those of you keeping track, this Best Western got the curved shower rod right) We were wondering tonight if the guy who invented the curved shower rod patented it. I hope he did cause every motel chain is copying the idea that started at Holiday Inn Express. We elected to pass up the over priced breakfast at the Best Western and headed down the road a little and found the Culpepper Diner. Had a great breakfast with all the attending local color, gassed up the Vette, and were on our way. We followed Rt. 522 up through the dairy country across West VA, MD, and into PA. At the PA Welcome Center we stopped and picked up an assortment of the ubiquitous motel coupon books and a detailed PA map. Along the way we decided to go topless. Temp was 76° and the day was beautiful. Since we were on the back roads rolling along about 55 ish it was like convertible heaven. Turned out to be a beautiful trip with many picturesque small towns and about a million miles of cows and corn. We ended up landing in Frackville, PA (or so we thought). We did our usual cruise around to find a motel with WiFi so we could get on the Internet in their parking lot and check out places to stay. Couldn’t find an accessible network, so we ended up in the McDonalds parking lot and paid a couple of bucks to get on their network for a 2-hr. hunk. (We decided we needed to join the McDonalds network later, cause they are everywhere, and we can get on from their parking lot). We did some research and finally headed to the Country Inn and Suites one exit down I-81 toward Harrisburg. We had a coupon from "the books" that gave us a good rate and they advertised a heated indoor pool, hot tub, and hot breakfast. We got off on exit 119 from I-81 and could see the inn up on the hill. Turned out to be quite a circuitous route to get to the place, but we are quite happy with the accommodations. While waiting in the parking lot for Vickie to register us I noted a great front plate on a Mercedes in the lot. It said "Latitude and Longitude-----To Boldly Relax Where No Man Has Relaxed Before" (a cross between Jimmy Buffet and Star Trek) We moved in, mixed one up, changed into swimsuits, and headed for the pool. We had a nice session soaking my knee in the hot tub and then doing some water aerobics in the pool that we had all to ourselves. After swimming, we found that there was an Italian restaurant (Di Maggio’s) that delivered to this motel, which is basically in the middle of nowhere. We ordered up some Tortellini Alfredo, Veal Parmigiana with angel hair pasta, bread, 2 salads, and 2 stuffed Cannoli for dessert (a first for Vickie). I waded into my writing, and the food arrived fairly soon—piping hot and delicious. We enjoyed our "room service" and now are planning our route for tomorrow. We plan to head from here through the Delaware Water Gap to Port Jervis, NY and on to somewh ere in Connecticut where we will land for the evening. Now full of great Italian food, and a couple of adult beverages, it’s looking like time to read a little and drift off to road trip dreamland. More later.

Wes

Kitty Hawk #3

Wednesday we got up, and hung around a while. I took advantage of the time to put a good hurting on a Tom Clancy novel I was reading. After everyone had breakfast, we paid a visit to the Wright Bros. Memorial. We had a nice visit there, and then decided to take a ride south to see the Cape Hatteras lighthouse. Turned out to be a little farther than we had planned (about 120 miles round trip), but it was a beautiful day, and the scenery was great. We were amazed at how everything here had developed. There were huge cottages everywhere you looked. What used to be barren sand dunes is now cottage development. We visited the lighthouse but decided to forego the climb to the top, which costs $7.00 and involves stairs numbering in the hundreds. After returning to the condo, we spent a little time at the pool, and grilled some hot dogs. My dad and I had already decided we would go fishing again on Thursday.

Thursday morning, we got up early and hit the pier again. The "blues" were running, and the pier looked like a fish factory. However, we sort of brought a knife to a gunfight. Everyone was fishing on the windward side of the pier, and they were pulling in "blues" as fast as they could throw the lines. We were excited, and baited our hooks for the blues catching. Well we couldn’t buy a bite. Turned out everyone else was using something called a "Gotch Ya" lure. This particular lure must have been like cocaine to fish, cause they were pulling them in like there would never be fish again. We spent several hours trying to catch a fish. Oh and during this time the game warden came by looking in coolers making sure no one exceeded the 10 bluefish per person rule. He looked in our cooler and all we had was some very smelly squid. (I think he laughed, but he disguised it as a cough.) I finally caught one fish, but it was a retarded fish and looked like it had been caught several times b efore. I caught it on a Bass rig that looked like a minnow. I figured he didn’t know his minnows from his "Got Ya(s)". As lunchtime approached, I made the decision that we had to find some "Gotch Ya(s)". We loaded everything in the Tahoe and headed down the road for the bait store. We found the very same "Gotch Yas" at the bait store for $1.99. Two of them joined our fishing armada. After lunch we returned to the fishing pier to try our luck with the newly purchased "Gotch Ya(s)". As it turned out the blue fish had decided to vacate the premises while we were gone. I did manage to catch three using my new found lure technology but Dad caught none. While trying to catch the blue fish, Dad managed to throw half his pole overboard due to the pole joint not being fastened tight enough. However, we were able to retrieve the errant hunk of fiberglass and get him back to full fishing strength. We spent the remainder of the afternoon till about 3pm casting our "Gotch Ya(s)" into a 35-mph w ind. (the fish of course were never on the leeward side—how they know that under water I’ll never know) Finally the wind got too annoying to bear. Having nailed our limit of three fish (which we gave away) I decided that we would call it a day. We returned home, packed everything away, and headed out for a seafood dinner because of our inability to catch anything edible. Once again it was the old Master Card commercial. Who could have known the impact on Americana some advertising weenie could have. Fishing lures $1.99 each etc. etc. etc., fishing with your 86 year old father (and 50 year old tackle box) priceless.

Happy day,

Wes

Kitty Hawk #2

Today is Thursday, and it has been and interesting couple days. Tuesday morning, I picked up my dad to go fishing on the Avalon Pier. We loaded the stuff in the Tahoe, and off we went. We checked in at the pier, and paid our fee ($10.00 for 24 hrs) to an old Jewish guy that looked like he came with the pier. The pier itself was a trip back in time. The entrance building was crammed with a mixture of old fortune telling and strength testing machines, right beside the latest video console stuff. On the entrance was a sign "If you didn’t buy it here you can’t drink it here" but to my observation, it wasn’t exactly enforced. Murray (that’s what I decided to call him) stamped our hands with a red Tuesday, we bought a nice box of frozen calamari (or squid as fishermen call it), and headed out onto the pier. We decided to "rig up" our poles at the table shortly down the pier, to stay out of everyone else’s way. My dad opened a tackle box, that probably rode in our 56 Chevy, and we put on the customary pier bottom fishing rigs. It was at this time the fun started. Somewhere between his car and the pier, the tip grommet had fallen off dad’s pole. Well this wasn’t a tragedy, it still seemed like it would work. So we found a spot, baited up our hooks and "started fishing". It was at this point, I discovered the brand new pole and reel I had brought were totally unsuited to the task at hand. I couldn’t cast it six inches without the line turning into this horrible bird’s nest on the reel. Meanwhile, folks all around us are pulling in little Croakers two at a time. Oh yea, and dad’s pole with the missing grommet, wouldn’t reel up correctly. This is when the old Master Card commercial came into my head. "Pier fishing $10.00, squid $4.50, fishing with dad on the pier, priceless. For everything else there’s MasterCard". (or in my case American Express) I said the heck with this, and we made a 30-minute round trip to Kitty Hawk’s finest Wally Mart for some new poles. Trus t old Sam to think of the fishermen at the Beach. There was a fine assortment of complete fishing outfits for under $20.00. We picked out matching Shakespeare Tiger poles (one red and one black), and headed back to the pier. Things went smoothly from there, with the exception of the fish quit biting and now all we could catch were Skates (small stingrays). I caught eight and dad caught two. They are very heavy and difficult to get off the hook. Interspersed with those, we caught a couple little Croakers. However, something about sitting on the pier and watching the beach world go by grabbed me and didn’t let go. We had fun, and then left to come back later. In the evening, we came back and tried our luck. Again it was wonderful sitting on the pier fishing and watching the sun go down. We caught numerous little croakers, and finally called it a night about 11:30. Turns out, you can show up any time after 11:00 and get on the pier for free till 05:00 when Murray shows up and starts c ollecting the money again. More later.

Wes

Kitty Hawk

Tropical Storm Barry.....

Well here we are at Kitty Hawk NC at the beach. We had an uneventful trip down on Saturday, and it didn’t start raining till Saturday night. I drove my father’s car and Vickie drove the Tahoe with her mother. The place we are staying is quite nice, and other than heart attack stairs getting to the top floor (where the kitchen and living room are) we really like it. I thought my ticker was going to explode before we got all the stuff from the car up to the kitchen. (I brought quite a bit of food from home, to save going to the grocery store all the time. And anyone who knows me knows when I catch something un-perishable on a good sale, I stock up. So I raided my pantry to the tune of a couple big plastic tubs and my freezer for a cooler full.) As usual, something interesting happened on the trip down: I overheard a guy talking on a cell phone about "a storm coming up the coast" I didn’t think any more about it, until it started raining like a cow peeing on a flat rock Saturday ni ght. This place does not have gutters, and the rain was running off the roof like someone was hosing it down with a fire hose. I was busy hoping it was raining at home. I never turned on the news and then Sunday, it was still raining hard, and the surf was pretty severe. I thought to myself, what a storm. Then today, Lorayne, Vickie’s mother told me the whole thing had been a named tropical storm. Shows you what I know. I just thought it was raining quite a bit. Today she showed me where The Weather Channel was on the TV, and we watched the talking heads yammer about the "major storm". I must admit yesterday morning when it was raining so hard we couldn’t see out the windows, I started looking for Jim Cantorini out in the yard doing a live report. But leave it to Wes to be on a barrier island in a tropical storm and not even know it.

Today (Monday) weather is beautiful. It stopped raining about 5:15 am. This afternoon it is hot and all the puddles are gone. Yesterday during a lull in the storm, (sun actually came out) we walked down to the beach and stuck our ankles in the water. It was really cold (like 67 ° ). This morning, we went down to the cottage where my Mom and Dad are staying with some of my kin on my mother’s side. I got to see and meet some of my various cousins (1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd and 4^th) their spouses etc. It was quite interesting, and I found we had quite a few things in common. Miss Vickie, as usual, acted like she had known them all her life. This afternoon, we spent some time putting new line on an ocean type-fishing pole I’ve never used. Tomorrow I’m going fishing on the Avalon Pier with my Dad, ought to be a new adventure. Last time I can remember doing it (fishing on a pier with Dad) would be about 1958 here in Kitty H awk. First time I can remember them bringing us to Kitty Hawk was when we lived in Pittsburgh, and we came down in Dad’s 54 Chevy and it took two days. Rest of the afternoon I think will be spent by the pool with some adult beverages. More later.

Wes

California Day 4 and 5

It’s been a couple of whirlwind days. Yesterday, we went to visit the Queen Mary Exhibits in Long Beach. The Queen Mary was launched in 1936 and was in transatlantic passenger service till WWII started. It was then impounded in New York on the Hudson River for many months, until it was drafted into wartime service as a troop carrying ship. In the beginning it carried 9,500 troops per crossing. (its original compliment was aprox. 3,500 including crew and passengers) To do this they stripped out everything and put in bunks, as many as six high. Then they painted the whole thing battleship grey and blacked out all the windows. The Queen (nicknamed The Grey Ghost) ran across the Atlantic unescorted zigzagging at high speed. It was un-catachable by enemy submarines due to its high speed of 31 plus knots. At one point in time the ship carried a record number of 16,350 troops on one voyage. They described the conditions on the troop crossings, and it was unbelievable. After the war the ship was restored to it’s pre-war grandeur, and returned to passenger service. But soon the advent of jet air travel across the Atlantic spelled the end of opulent steamer service. In the late 60’s, the Queen made her last crossings. Cunnard put her up for sale and the Port of Long Beach successfully bid for her at 3.5 million. The last voyage of the Queen was around the tip of South America up the coast to Long Beach. This is where she sits today as a tourist attraction and hotel. Yesterday we headed down there thinking we would take the water taxi from this side of The Port. Unfortunately California has an off season just like the East coast, and the water taxis only run Sat and Sun until sometime in May. As soon as we figured this out, we got back in the car and drove around to the exhibit area. This turned out to be a good thing, cause it gave us the chance to see the Port of Long Beach (what a busy place) and the remnants of the Long Beach Grand Prix from last weekend. At the ship, we opted for the 1^st class tour, which included two guided tours, the total ship walking tour, and the Ghosts and Legends tour. We very much enjoyed out two guided tours, the guides were very knowledgeable and entertaining. The ship was unbelievably opulent for it’s time, and was like a current day cruise ship, but much more structured. It had 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd class passengers. Each class had their respective areas on the ship, and woe be unto the passenger that traveled outside his/her "class". Also interesting was the original teak planking that composed most of the decks. After the two tours, we hiked down to the engine rooms and propeller shaft area (Wes’s must see). It was interesting that this ship had reciprocating steam engines and used the reciprocating exhaust to run low-pressure steam turbines. This was an unusual setup for WWII era (normal is high-pressure turbines only), but was good for the highest speed crossing the North Atlantic of the period. In addition even though Adolph Hitler issued a $250,000 prize to the captain that could find and sink the Queen Mary, she never suffered so much as a scratch from the enemy throughout her whole war career. The last tour we took was called the ghosts and legends tour. It took you deep into the bowels of the ship below the water line. It was akin to a scary theme park ride, but at one point, really brought some things home. We were in the dark in what was the bottom of one of the old boiler rooms, and between sound and special effects, they made it seem like boilers were exploding and steam was flying everywhere. It really made me think about what it must have been like way down below the water line in a WWII ship that had been hit by a torpedo and was sinking. It was really scary. After the Queen, we headed back to Newport Beach and stopped at Joe’s Crab Shack, a restaurant that had been extolled by some folks that Jerry and Brenda had met traveling. F ood was OK but nothing to write home about (no pun intended).

Yesterday (Wednesday) morning, we got up early and as soon as the traffic cleared we headed for Hollywood. We planned to take the Hollywood tour(s) and had booked a VIP tour of Warner Brothers studios. We successfully navigated the bezerko freeway traffic, and arrived in the center of Hollywood. We booked our tour, and then spent some time hanging out in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theater, examining the foot/hand prints and Walk of Fame. Soon we boarded a small bus for a tour of the Hollywood Hills and the Stars’ homes. We lucked up and due to the windy conditions had a very clear day in LA. According to the guide, it was one of the clearest in quite a while. We greatly enjoyed the tour, and saw all manner of famous/infamous sites. (the Guess Jeans guy had 6 Ferrari’s sitting covered up in his driveway) (Also saw James Woods eating along Restaurant Row) The views from Mulholand Drive, overlooking LA, the Hollywood Bowl, and the Hollywood Sign were incredible. After the Hollywood stuff (as we call it "stupid tourist stuff"), we headed cross-town to Burbank for the Warner Brothers VIP tour. This turned out to be super interesting, as we saw all the behind the scenes stuff of many popular TV shows and Movies. Out tour group was very small, so we got to go and see all kinds of cool stuff. On a personal note, at the end of the tour, was talking to a pretty girl who had been on the tour. Turns out she worked for the company that makes the cool hole buttons for Crocks. She gave me one that looks like a Jimmy Buffet parrot head that’s in my shoe as we speak. We finished up our tour and at the suggestion of one of the Warner Brothers tour folks, headed down the street to Bob’s Big Boy, an old style drive-in that had been built in 1947. We ended up having dinner at the Bob’s Big Boy in Hollywood. It was quite a nostalgic trip, and the food was great. After that we freewayed back to our Villa, and crashed. Thursday is planned as an R & R day before a day of flyi ng on Friday.

Yours,

Hollywood Wes

California Day 3

This morning (Monday) they had an "Owners Breakfast" (donuts, fruit, juice and coffee). It was supposed to start at 8:30 and go till 9:30. By the time we got there (around 8:55) it was down to 5 pieces of honeydew, an empty OJ thingie, coffee with no condiments, and a few donut stragglers. (also no plates or napkins) We jockeyed for position around the few remaining donuts with the ravenous pack of children present, and succeeded in scoring a few good doses of fat and flour. Brenda registered us all for the prize drawing at the last moment and Vickie succeeded in winning the grand prize of a $100.00 Spa treatment. We returned to our Villa, and continued to work on something we had been trying, (Jerry’s idea) to get tickets to a Jay Leno show taping. Jerry had written in for tickets a couple of months ago but was not able to get any. He did find out that we could call for tickets the day of the show and if there were any available we could get them. (the tickets are free) However , we had to call exactly between 10:45 and 11:15 a.m. Brenda manned the phone and we scored tickets. We were able to print the tickets in the resort lobby and were all set. We had to be there in line by 3 p.m. in order to get seats. Burbank is about 59 miles from Newport, and involves quite a bit of freeway movin and groovin. We programmed the "Hertz Lady", as we have taken to calling her, to take us where we wanted to go. Jerry drove using his most excellent Detroit driving skills, I navigated, and we flowed with the traffic (at about 80-85 mph.) arriving safely at our destination. California freeway traffic is quite interesting. Interspersed with all the trucks and semi normal drivers, you have the crazies flying in and out of traffic passing us like we were stopped. (and we were doing 80) You also have the other crazies that are driving 80 reading the paper and talking on the cell phone. Meanwhile the speed limit is 65 or 55 depending on where you are. We commented we probably s aw more cars in our 1 hr trip today than pass through Martinsville in a year. We all agreed this helps us remember why we don’t want to live in a big city. It also really emphasizes the mind set difference between the sprawling West Coast folks and us backward small town Easterners. These folks literally live in their cars. (Oh and regular gas is currently $3.45/gal here.) We arrived at the NBC studio in plenty of time and took our place in line to wait for entrance. We had the interesting experience of standing in line behind a fellow who knew everything there was to know about everything. He seems to have invented the moon rocket, personally knows all the past and present astronauts, is currently producing documentaries for Discovery, when young used to fly to Atlanta for breakfast and Idaho for a grilled cheese sandwich, circled in a plane over the Spruce Goose when it was towed to Long Beach, consulted with Werner Van Braun on rocket propulsion, knows where Dick Clarks office b uilding is, and showed Jerry the fire truck Jay Leno drove to work this morning. His partner is the Executive Vice President of Baldwin Productions who supposedly produced Sahara, Crash, and Ray. He talked to several of the astronauts Friday, and shared his 25 anniversary with Wally Schirra who was celebrating his 60^th, whose wife is not doing too well, and gave us all the up to date info on the Long Beach Grand Prix and the Queen Mary which was built by the same company as the Titanic, so you can see exactly how things were on the Titanic. We were certainly impressed. In fact Vickie looked like the RCA Dog and His Master’s Voice. After our lecture on everything there was to know about everything, we proceeded through the airport-like security, and ended up with great seats for the show. The set was very cold and we were all literally shivering. (Note to self, wear a coat and hat when you go to a TV show taping, Jerry said he was clapping to stay warm) However, it soon g ot really cool (not temperature). Jay Leno came out in jeans and talked to us about what would happen during the show. Unbeknownst to us, the show is truly done live, and they don’t stop and correct any mistakes or screw-ups. He told us all to laugh if we thought he was funny, and have a good time. They had a funny guy come out and continue the warm up of the audience while Jay got dressed. Soon the band started playing, everyone was clapping and cheering, and the show started. They really do have signs that light up and say "APPLAUSE" to let you know when to really cheer. We got into the spirit of the whole thing and had a big time. When it was time for commercials, the band played and entertained the audience. One of the numbers during the commercial time featured the sax player. It was a Reggae sort of song and the band was not really in the pocket. Then the sax player started his solo and it was like he was playing a different song or some music written by aliens. We decided th ey might be looking for a new sax player soon. When it was time to go on air again, it was just like you imagine, the director counts down 10, 9, 8, etc. and Jay’s on. All in all it was a unique experience, and if we lived in California, would be something we would do whenever we could. A really fun time. After the show, we went across the street to an Acapulco Mexican Restaurant and had a nice dinner while waiting for the traffic to clear. We then followed the Hertz Lady home to our villa and plan to watch the Leno show tonight.

In the meantime we are trying to absorb the horror of what happened today at VA Tech. The endlessly yammering talking heads on the news channels seem to be trying to make it into some sort of terrorist deal or at least some type of conspiracy. It is awful for all the kids at Tech and their families. Who can really understand what goes on in some people’s minds? I sincerely believe, though, all the police type shows that portray bloodless shootings and gunfights where no one dies using pistols that never run out of ammo have a lot to do with these type of actions.

Your closet writer,

Wes

California Day 2

Sunday morning it was a little rough getting going but we finally got moving and headed south down California Rt.1, the Pacific Coast Highway. We drove south through Corona Del Mar, Crystal Cove, and Laguna Beach, to Dana Point. Along the way we stopped at a Ruby’s Diner for a late lunch. The food and ambience were wonderful. It is a chain but is modeled after a 50’s type diner. They had great shakes and a cool American Kobe Beef mini burger plate. All along the CA 1 the scenery was pure California coast, mountains, and cliffs with houses hanging off every possible inch. The surf was up and people were out enjoying the 68-degree weather. I spent a lot of the time car spotting. This is truly the place where all the exotic cars go, and folks actually drive them. We saw more Ferrari’s, Lamborghini’s, Porsches, Rolls Royce’s, Bentley’s, and high end Mercedes and BMW’s than I have ever seen. Dana Point was fabulous and we found a beautiful overlook high above the marina/harbor. We th en headed off to see San Juan Capistrano (looking for Swallows). Had a funny event along the way: I had been working on learning how to program the "Hertz Never Lost" navigation computer. To find the San Juan Mission, I programmed San Juan Capistrano into the computer. We dutifully followed the directions, and ended up in the parking lot of the San Juan Capistrano Post Office. We asked directions from a nice man, and soon found the Mission a few blocks over. We looked around in this area and then headed back up the coast to Newport Beach to land. Along the way, we stopped in Laguna Beach at a Park, and spent some time walking around. The flowers were too beautiful to describe. There are all types of blooming cactus and a multitude of other blooming plants we did and didn’t recognize. (the birds of paradise were especially beautiful) When we got back no one was too energetic so we watched a special on Yellowstone Park and crashed.

Your correspondent,

Wes

Newport Beach #1

For those I have'nt written to yet---we are currently in Newport Beach CA. Here are some adventures from Southern California.

Well here we are at the Marriott Newport Coast Villas resort. The trip yesterday was pretty much uneventful, which is great for a cross-country flight. The flight from Greensboro to Atlanta was somewhat funky in that it was on a Bombardier 65. I think that Bombardier should stick to making snowmobiles instead of trying to make planes. This was the smallest 2 and 2 seating plane I’ve ever been on. The overhead bins were too small for our carryon bags so we ended up in the sardine-like seats with carryon bags sitting on our feet. I felt like I was in a straight jacket. In any event, I was very glad to get to Atlanta. Amazingly, flying on Friday leaving at 9:50 found the GSO airport virtually deserted. Atlanta also was not too crowded for noonish on a Friday. We arrived at LAX (Los Angeles) and everything went fine...Until.... we went to the Hertz rental car place via a 15 minute bus ride. Jerry went inside to get the car and he never came back. I went inside to check on him and he was in one of those zigzag lines with about 4000 people in front of him. There were 30 or so counter positions but only four or five had bodies in them. An hour later he emerged and we took possession of our Ford Taurus (Grey of course). A while later, after an hour or so on the 405 south, we arrived at the resort. In the meantime I spent a while trying to figure out the "Hertz Never Lost" that had come with the car. Mostly all I succeeded in doing was having this reasonably pleasant woman tell me about turns that didn’t agree with the directions we had. We arrived at the resort and were checked in at the curbside by a very pleasant, helpful, good-looking young woman. We located our unit, made a foray to find supper, and then a trip to the grocery store. After locating several restaurants that appeared to have long waiting lines and/or valet parking, we opted to head directly to the grocery store and just buy dinner to eat leisurely at the condo. The grocery store was called Pavil ion, and was very nice, like a big Harris Teeter. (Except in California, the grocery store sells beer, wine, and liquor) We rounded up everything we needed for survival and landed for the night. Traveling all day and a 3-hour time change had whipped our butts.

Saturday, I was up early (04:30) due to the fact that it was really 07:30 my time. I read a book for a while then got started on cooking breakfast for all. After breakfast we adjourned to the pool and spent the day meeting all sorts of cool folks. But somehow starting @ 04:30 with Bloody Mary’s and then a 12 pack each of Tecate and Dos Equis in the pool and in the hot tub and in the pool and in the hot tub, etc. etc. and it turned into quite a day. I played a lot of solo tetherball, forgot to put on sun block, and oops got quite a set of red neck and shoulders. Cooked Italian meatballs on the very nice gas grill provided outside then simmered them with Marinara and diced tomatoes for a great pasta dish. We had a fine dinner and eventually wound down for and long night’s sleep.

Wes

California

Hi all, just a quick note--we've been real busy since arriving in California. I'll write you some news when I we get back later. We got tickets to the taping of the Jay Leno show tonight and we've got to get rolling. The Pacific coast is so incredible. Houses on cliffs, Lamborgini's beside you in traffic, and the rest of the Porsches that aren't in Florida, beautiful flowers, Rolls Royces, enhanced body parts, blond hair.......Be sure to watch for us on Leno Monday night.

Wes

Day 16 and 17 Estero and driving through h_ll

We had a wonderful time visiting with Herb and Linda Spencer. Linda is my cousin—daughter of my Father’s deceased sister. She and Herb have been married since I was about 10, and lived in Lexington, Kentucky. Herb had a very successful commercial AC and heating business there. He sold the business a few years back and finally retired a couple of years ago. They bought their place in Estero Florida 6 or 7 years ago, and now spend the winters there. We were welcomed, fed, and used the facilities to thoroughly wash the car. Also while we were there Grant Spencer, their son, whom we hadn’t seen in a while, came in from a business trip. He is a Regional Manager with Trane air conditioning. The whole visit was wonderful, and we hope to get back to see them again some time. We realized last night, we needed to get back on the road today and make some miles. Rt. 41 left Estero and headed North, so we took it. We wanted to see Longboat Key and points North on that island. Rt. 41 was non- stop traffic lights all the way. We made the cut off to go to Longboat Key, and the place was beautiful. We followed Rt. 789 all the way up to Anna Maria Island (thanks for the tip, Jerry) through Longboat Key, Bradenton Beach, and Holmes Beach. We doubled back a little and took the bridge back to Bradenton (the city). It was late so we found a cool little hut called The Shake Pit on Rt. 64 in Bradenton. We had a great lunch and then went on up Rt. 19 (also I-275) across the Sunshine Skyway to St. Petersburg. What an amazing bridge this was. After that though, the trip degenerated. Rt. 19 turned into a parking lot with stop lights every 12 inches. We finally couldn’t take it any more, and set sail for the Sunshine Turnpike North, Rt. 589. After abominable traffic we finally made it to the entrance to the toll road. We got up to the booth, and oops, we needed a quarter and didn’t have one. Traffic was backing up behind us, and we didn’t know what to do, so we pulled through the boot h and over to the side. At that point, we became public enemy number 1 and 2 in Florida. The photo enforcement will be sending us a $100 ticket. However, a nice guy behind us donated a quarter, and we sat there till 30 cars finally got through, and we backed up and dutifully deposited our quarter. We called the enforcement folks tonight and the nice guy told us to call between 8:30 and 5:00 tomorrow to straighten it out. We are going to try. After the quarter fiasco, we headed on up the Turnpike, and stopped about every 8 miles or so to give them another dollar tribute to drive on their pretty road. Folks who live in Florida can have something called a Sunpass that lets them go through a special lane at 70 MPH and pay electronically. We went as far as we could go on the Turnpike, and ended up back on Rt. 19 at Crystal River. We camped for the night, and are through with the West Coast of FL. We have decided it is way to congested for us, and we are heading inland for a more stress free route North. We slipped up the road a mile to the Denny’s for dinner. While there I discovered something all of America should know: Do Not Eat Meatloaf at Denny’s. I have never had an issue with food at Denny’s, but mostly I have eaten breakfast type foods there. Last night I ordered their "Great New Dinner Selection" meatloaf and mashed potatoes with mixed grilled vegetables. The mashed potatoes were ok, probably real. However, they were covered with a dark brown substance that had its origins in motor oil. The "meatloaf" (there was a bunch of it) was some kind of mystery meat that had been fried on a flattop like a hamburger. That in itself wouldn’t have been too bad, but the texture resembled that weird meat they put inside "chuck wagon patties" and the flavor was like a sort of spiced sausage. Sum total of all the parts was even worse than the individual components. All the flavors and textures melded to present something that resembled fried Alpo. There wasn’t enough ket chup or Worchester in the universe to make it edible. The grilled mixed vegetables were well past their prime, but wonderful compared to the meatloaf and motor oil gravy. But enough Denny’s bashing. We enjoyed a great deluxe continental breakfast this morning at our Comfort Inn. Today we are heading for inland Georgia and are going to try a route Vickie picked out using Rt. 301 and Rt. 1.

Homeward Bound,

Wes and Vickie

Day 14 and 15 The Everglades

Got back too late from our day and then eating last night to write anything down. We left the Econo Cheap yesterday morning, and headed into the Everglades National Park. Where we were staying was only a few miles from the park entrance. The trip to the park entrance was through lush vegetable fields. We passed tomatoes, zucchini, and yellow squash. Squash harvest was in full swing and the fields were swarming with migrant pickers. I never saw a squash field with rows as far as the eye could see. It made my back hurt just thinking of those folks bending over putting squash in a bucket for hours at a time. We arrived at the park, paid our $10.00 (which was good fo r 7 days), and headed in to see what we could see. The main road lead to something called the Flamingo Visitors center, about 38 miles Southwest of the entrance. We rode through 38 miles of desolate marsh and arrived at Flamingo. It must have been pretty cool at one time, but now it is a bunch of derelict buildings. According to the ranger Wilma and Katrina really put the whammy on the place. It used to have a bar/restaurant, and nice cabins and motel like rooms you could stay in. All that’s left functional are some campgrounds and the marina/store. However, they still offer guided boat tours of the Mangrove Tangle Estuary nearby. We were about ½ hour away from the next boat trip so we bought some tickets and grabbed a little snack. They had nukeable pre-cooked food, beer, sodas, snacks, etc. I found a cool “Cup O Noodles” that all you do is add hot water to. That and a beer, and I was a happy camper. (cost all of $0.60) We powered down a few carbs, and joined the other folks for t he boat tour. The tour was 2 hours and narrated by a park naturalist. It was worth the price cause the group was small and you could ask any questions you wanted. We saw all manner of birds, alligators and crocodiles, along with numerous types of Mangrove and other swamp trees. After the boat tour, the naturalist suggested we head for the Anhinga Trail back near the entrance of the park. We rode back through the swamp to the suggested destination. Here we found a mile or so nature trail that was literally covered with wading birds, swimming birds, giant fish, turtles, alligators, you name it. All of the animals were seemingly unaffected by our presence, and Vickie nearly wore the camera out taking pictures. We stayed there till nearly dark. After that we had to get back to the Econo Cheap and the Rt. 1 Sunday night traffic was abominable. (Rt. 1 ran directly in front of our place) We finally got back (only to discover the cheap b_stards had turned off our AC while we were gone) and camped for a while to let the traffic clear. Then we headed next door for another shot at Sonny’s Barbecue, to try something different. Vickie had baby backs and I had pulled brisket, both were excellent. This morning we once again breakfasted from the not too deluxe continental breakfast, supplemented with 2 nice hunks of sweet cornbread doggy boxed from Sonny’s. We left Florida City and headed for Everglades City where we are now—I got us a reservation at something called the Captain’s Table Motel and Apartments. Along the way, we traveled up Rt. 936 out of Homestead. This passed through one after the other huge nurseries. We could not believe the nurseries on both sides of the highway as far as the eye could see. Now I know where all those plants and trees at The Lowes come from. We followed this road up until it intersected Rt. 41, the Tamiami Trail. This road heads due West toward the coast. The road is in abominable condition, the truck traffic has ruined it. We followed it across and stopped at another Everglades Park entrance called Sharks
Bay. We hiked another short nature trail (yes Wes and Vickie actually hiked a little) and saw some more interesting wildlife. Then we headed further West. Along the way there was this road that cut off 41 called the Loop Road in the Big Cypress National Preserve. I decided to take it. It was really a backcountry little lane and a half barely paved road through the boondocks, until—it turned to dirt. I told Vickie, this finally made it a real road trip when we ended up on a dirt road. Based on what the GPS told us, we still had a good piece to go on this road, but the sights were so good we forged ahead. The road literally had water on both sides, and every so often it would have these green stakes with an opening in the side brush and a vista on both sides of the native marsh. We saw so many birds, alligators, fish, and even a deer. It was worth the trip. Often we h ad to pull over to the side of the road so we could let another car pass in the opposite direction. By the time we were done, the Vette looked like a powdered sugar donut. We finally got to Everglades City, and had lunch at Susie’s Restaurant. What a quaint little place, and what good food. A killer fish sandwich for me and hand ground burger for Vickie. We went down to the Everglades Park entrance, and found out they had a boat tour titled “10,000 Island Tour” that went out after dolphins and manatees. We signed up for the 5:00 tour which included the sunset. We then left the park and checked into our place, which was great. The desk clerk told us we could use the boat wash to hose off the car so we did. We hung out for a little while at the motel (I wrote, and Vickie discovered a group of trained pelicans that she got to pose for numerous pictures) and then set out for the boat tour. It turned out to be great, with a beautiful view of the sunset over the Gulf. While returning to the dock a dolphin swam and frolicked alongside the tour boat. I got some great video footage of his performance along with the sunset. We had a nice dinner at the seafood restaurant next door, and crashed for the night. Tuesday A.M. we set off for my cousin’s place in Estero, near Ft. Meyers. We enjoyed driving up the coast through Naples etc. and arrived at Herb and Linda’s house in the early afternoon. They live in a fairly new gated community fairly typical of the retirement communities in this area. Very nice, and with minimal maintenance required. It never dawned on me till reading the local paper last night, how seasonal the population in Florida is. Linda was telling me this particular development (one of thousands in South Florida) has 1200 or so “doors” as they put it. In the non-winter months, the occupancy rate is less than 30%. This means the population here swings 70% winter to summer. Another big issue down here is water. They go so far as to pipe the waste water tre atment plant discharge into special piping used to water lawns etc. It really is a different world. We’ll be here for a couple days—plan to give the car a serious wash job, and then head on up the coast.

More later.
Wes and Vickie