Massachusetts, Massachusetts and more Massachusetts

Massachusetts May 31 - ?, 2013

We left New York anxious to get to Massachusetts and see lots of friends and family.  We picked a route safe for our big rig and headed out.  Our first stop was to be MacDonalds RV in Plainville, MA to get the repairs done from the blow out and the crazy African incident.  As soon as we crossed the Mass state line I heard a loud BOOM and wouldn't you know it we blew another tire!  This is the tire on the same side as the previous blow out which underwent all of the strain when the tire fell off.  It blew a huge hole in the side wall and took out all the wiring for the frig and bedroom slide-out in the process. Seriously!  Good Sam sent out a tow truck and he changed the tire and tucked the loose wires up so we could get to the RV place.  Three slide-outs opened, but the refrigerator wouldn't come on.  So we packed up a few things (in the blazing heat) and left Suni to be repaired.  By a few things I mean.... cats, dogs, everything in the fridge etc.  AAAAHHHHH

We had previously arranged to go to Peg's brother's house for dinner so we headed over with our menagerie in hopes that there would be room at the inn :).  When we pulled into the driveway... Scott says "What happened to you?"  We were dripping sweat and Peg was at her wits end.  Cathy (Peg's sister in law) quickly made room in their fridge for our freshly purchased groceries, introduced Calcite and Zoe to Bailey and Bridgette (their two yellow labs), unloaded the cats into the guest room and tried to relax.  Luckily the dogs were instant friends.  Scott and Cathy were very gracious and opened their home to us for as long as we needed.  We spent the evening catching up on the two years since our last visit and Cath whipped up some delicious turkey burgers for us to feast upon.  We fell into bed pondering whether or not our adventures are worth it!

Happy Labradors!

Our Saturday plans were to drive out to South Hamilton (Beverly, Mass) to see Peg's friend from Girl Scout Camp - Marianne and her partner Janet.  We left the cats at Scott's and took the dogs for an overnight adventure.  We had a wonderful time catching up on the years since we had last seen them.  We took a drive through the area and visited a historic home filled with antiques.  We ended the evening with a delicious dinner. On Sunday Suellen another camp buddy came with her husband Chris for brunch.  We spent hours looking at old pictures and reminiscing about canoe trips and old friends.  Peg loves hearing about all of the crazy things she did as a teenager as she remembers none of them!  It was a great weekend ended with promises for our next reunion in Panama.

 

Old Friends, Janet, Suellen and Marianne

We headed back to Scott and Cathy's house for a little family reunion.  Mom drove in from Martha's Vineyard and both kids took time out of their busy lives.  We took advantage of the moment to celebrate mom's birthday.  We had several great family dinners and lots of good times.  Scott even took a little time off to spend with his mom and sister!  It was great to spend time with Henry who is home from college for the summer and before heading out to his Marine Reserves duty.  He and I have a running Spite and Malice (card game) competition going and he kicked my butt!  I am anxiously awaiting a rematch.  Elise is a very busy young lady taking pre-nursing classes and working two jobs!  We so enjoyed watching the Bruins work their way to the Stanley Cup as a family.  We can't remember the last time we were all together.  I hope it happens again soon.

Happy Birthday Mom!

Elise and her favorite aunt

Brother and Sister - can you see the resemblance?

Henry the Handsome!

On Friday we packed up the menagerie and drove up to Gloucester, MA to see our friends Marc and Christina!  We met Marc and Christina on our Backroad's Bike trip through Tuscany and we became fast friends.  They have had quite a year in that they got a dog (Annie the border collie), moved from a New York City apartment to a gorgeous home in Gloucester, and had the beautiful baby Lillian Ruth.  The first order of business was to introduce Calcite and Zoe to Annie always the most stressful part of any visit.  There was lots of sniffing and tail-wagging and all was well.  Their new home was built in 1904 complete with a guest house, carriage house, and on the most beautiful 11 acres overlooking the ocean.  Peg loved working in the garden with Marc's mom Marle and helping Marc take down a hedge that was limiting the view. When Peg wasn't in the garden she was playing with the only baby that has ever liked her.  She is the most beautiful, happy baby I have ever had the pleasure of meeting - besides my own of course.  We shared her first cereal and pears!  They treated us to an amazing lobster feast with homemade onion rings.  Did I mention that Christina recently graduated from culinary school?  We spent a wonderful four days being wined and dined.  Christina took us into Rockport on our last day and we enjoyed walking around the cute little town and feasting on a waterside lunch!  We had a hard time leaving this paradise.... the only thing that could pull us away was the Vineyard! 

Ginsburg Big Top.  There is an ocean view from the other side of the house. 

 

The main room of the big house

 

One of the many beautiful gardens

Back garden stairs

 

BFF's in Rockport

Our young friends Christina, Marc and Annie

 

View from the guest commode! See the ocean?

 

Zoe thinks she is the baby

Calcite is not happy at all.  She has only once laid her head on my stomach!

Since the trailer was still awaiting parts we decided to take advantage of the time to visit Mom and JT on the Vineyard.  Peg was very excited to see her island, her mom and stepdad.  We took the ferry over and have been in heaven ever since.  The menagerie is enjoying the freedom of the open woods around the house and we are really enjoying our time with mom and JT.  Hopefully we will get to go to Maine sometime, but this is not a bad place to be stuck.

There's no place like home

White Plains, NY   May 28 - 31, 2013

We left New Jersey with our route all planned out (thanks Patti) and headed to Croton on the Hudson a state RV park inside Westchester County right on the Hudson River.  We were assured that the site was big enough for us, but when we arrived in the rain we weren’t so sure.  I was able to back in with no problem at an angle.  It was a beautiful park with large grass areas and tons of greenery.  The rig that pulled in behind us was also from Texas and I thought he was waiting for us to unhook so he could get by us so we hurriedly set up in the rain and got out of his way.  It turns out that his wheel fell off when they pulled into the campground!  He said his bearings were smoking and when he made the turn, his wheel fell off.  And we thought we were the only ones cursed.  Fortunately he had the skills to fix his rig, but his axle was beyond repairing so he had to order a new one.

Hudson River view from our campsite

 

Peg was so excited to get to her old neighborhood and see how things had changed.  No trip into White Plains would be complete without a stop at the Little Spot hot dog stand.  This is the place that has the hot dog chili that Peg has been trying to emulate for her entire life.  I have to admit it was really good, but I think Peg’s is just as good.  We found out that the recipe is a secret handed down through the generations for 65 years.  We then drove to the house where Peg grew up.  She said it looked completely different, but it sits right on a lake with a beautiful beach area and clubhouse.  She even ran into a couple of her old neighbors.  We then headed over to Peg’s Uncle Ted and Aunt Di’s for the evening.  It was great to see them and catch up on the few years that have passed since the last time we saw them.  Di made us a fantastic dinner with the most delicious pie I have ever eaten.

Home Sweet Home sort of.  This is not the house of my childhood.  It has been totally remodeled.

 

Mongie's house four doors down.  This is my Grandmothers, looks very much the same.

 

My Great Grandmothers house.  Grammy.  Looks the same.

 

Lake I grew up on.  Learned to swim here.

 

Teddy,  Di and me.  Teddy is my Moms brother

 

We have had two hitch-hikers with us on our travels after we left Florida.  We picked up some Spanish Moss in Georgia that got wrapped around our antennae on the truck.  It is still with us and has now become like “Wilson” from Tom Hank’s movie “Cast Away”.  We thought we saw it fly off the truck the other day and we both almost started crying.  Alas, it was not “Molly” that we saw flying.  She is still hanging in there 3 months later.  The second hitch-hiker is a spider believe it or not.  We picked him/her up in North Carolina around April 1^st.  He builds his web in front of the passenger side mirror.  Every day we go somewhere in the truck and destroy his web with the wind of travel.  What is so amazing about this persistent little guy is he rebuilds each night.  I went out to check on him before I got in the truck the other a.m. and I didn’t see the web.  I was sad but thought “about time you wised up my friend”.  As I walked around the truck I saw he simply had moved his web to the back window of the truck and his web was still intact after having traveled one hour on an Interstate.  Our spider is showing signs of natural selection and has obviously evolved into a spider with a problem solving brain.  He thought it through and determined “I must get out of the wind if I don’t want to have to rebuild my pantry every friggin night.  More updates on “Molly” the moss and “Sylvester” the spider as our saga continues.

Molly hanging by a thread

Sylvester before he got smart

 

We were telling Peg’s college friends about Molly and Sylvester and Dawn picked up some beach pebbles from the driveway, threw them into the back of the truck and said “OK, now you have to keep these”.  Perhaps our collection will grow as we continue our travels.

Coming soon… Sudbury, Massachusetts to see Broth, Marianne and the Ursul’s!              

                                                       

Family, Friends and Lots of Laughter

Galloway, NJ   May 18 - 28, 2013

We left the great state of Pennsylvania and headed to the little state of New Jersey with much anticipation and anxiety.  After all of the traffic and road rage we faced in Maryland we were very leery of our drive into NJ.  Every time we told someone where we were headed they would say “Why NJ?” and “Oh the drivers in NJ are worse than DC”.  I was trying to get information for everyone whom had ever ventured into the northeast to determine the best and safest route.  Our neighbor in PA had this great atlas designed for truckers which includes all of the truck routes as well as road restrictions for all 50 states.  He let me borrow it and I mapped out a way to Galloway.  We made it just fine and let out a sigh of relief. 

We used the first couple of days to do some chores and to satisfy Peg’s craving for a veal parmesan wedge sandwich.  I had a delicious Stromboli!  Who knew we were in Italian country?  Galloway was a great location; close to Atlantic City, Margate, Ocean City and Long Beach Island all planned stops in NJ.

Monday we drove down to Ocean City to see Peg’s Aunt Patti and her family:  sons David and Michael his wife Elika and daughter Lila and Patti’s sister-in-law Eileen.  We were really looking forward to seeing everyone and were not let down.  We had a wonderful time getting to know everyone especially little Lila the most brilliant two year old on the planet.  She can identify local birds by sound!  It was a little chilly on the beach, but Michael braved the waters without us.  Peg was feeling very old!  Patti made us a delicious dinner and we had a grand time.

Did we get everyone?

 

Brilliant Lila!

The next day we decided to go to the Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge known for the diversity of birds.  For once we were actually in the right place at the right time!  They have an 8 mile drive through the wetlands which took us 3 hours!  We were using our bino’s and bird book (thanks Alex and Jacob) to identify all of the birds.  It was great fun.  We then took Calcite and Zoe on a great hike through the tick invested wild.  I must admit to having a tick phobia so I did not enjoy picking the 30 plus ticks off of them at the end of day.  They are ugly little buggers.

I love the babies!

Can you see the ticks!

This guy was crossing the road

 

Wednesday was set aside to visit our friends Bob and Elaine in Margate.  They are actually relatives of our good friends the Crouches.  We visited Bob and Elaine whom at their winter rental on St Simon’s Island.  We were excited to see their NJ house.  They invited us and dogs over for a visit and dinner and a good time was had by all.  They are great people and Bob kept us in stitches with his many colorful stories.  Bob is a fabulous cook and made the best breaded veal ever!  They graciously offered to keep the dogs for us the next day so we could take the train into Philadelphia even though their house is on the market and they had prospective buyers calling!  They even dropped us at the train station so we wouldn’t have to park the BAT.  It was a great day visiting Independence Hall, Liberty Bell, Betsy Ross’ house and Ben Franklin’s grave.  We did get caught in the pouring rain unawares and were soaked to the skin, so Peg seized the opportunity to get another souvenir sweatshirt!  I love taking the train and subway anywhere such a great way to travel.  I guess that what happens when you pull your house around the country.  Elaine took us on a driving tour of Margate after picking us up at the bus station so we could see Lucy the Elephant and the “end of the island”.  We were greeted at the door by two very happy dogs and Bob with a pre-dinner cocktail!  Did I mention these are great people?  We are so excited to say that they may be moving into our old neighborhood in Austin so we will get to see more of them woo hoo!

Elaine with her grand dogs!

 

End of the Island for MK

Margate's Famous Lucy

Liberty Bell much smaller than we thought

Ben Franklin's many accomplishments

Independence Hall

 

Friday was set aside for another trip to Ocean City to see Patti’s sister Anne and her husband Eric whom were coming up from Maryland for a visit.  Unfortunately Eric was under the weather and couldn’t make it – we missed you guys!  We still went to visit some more with Patti and David and even taught them to play Mexican Train.  It was a great afternoon and it was fun getting to know David a little better.  They also helped me plan the route to NY…. I do not like the cities!

We finished up our New Jersey stay with the Fanelli Finale!  We drove to Long Beach Island (or LBI for those in the know) to visit Peg’s friends from college: Nancy Fanelli (Traits), Cathy Peterson (Fenton) and Dawn Kranzo (Quasar).  Let me just say this…. Until this weekend I thought my Peg was the funniest person on the planet, well now I know where she was schooled!  We had such a great time catching up on the 35 years that have passed and I haven’t laughed that much in a really long time.  It was a great cure for the home-sickness I had been feeling.  Here are some random quotes from the banter… “I wasn’t at your wedding… Peg! You were in my wedding”  “zucchini 2.99; tomato 1.49; garlic .09”  “the bagel shop will have it”  “where’s Zoe?”.  I heard stories about Peg’s personal ad (she still swears that didn’t happen); Peg dragging Fenton from the shower to the elevator naked; and a wild trip to Fort Lauderdale.  Zoe managed to get through a two patio chair blockade and wonder out onto the highway.  She was saved by Trish and Kas who called and texted until we answered (Peg was on the phone).  We think she was trying to get back to the beach.  She is the luckiest dog on the planet.  It was such a great two days and I can’t wait to do it again.

Friends Forever!

Cathy, Nancy, Peg, Dawn

Great end to a great stay.

 

p.s. I wish this blog was funnier J

Coming soon… White Plains, NY and Littleton, Massachusetts