Augurst 22- 26, 2014 PA to MN

Friday, Aug 22:
Rich was able to take the day off.  So after a lazy morning and great breakfast, we drove around the area.  His home is near the area where Washington crossed the Delaware.  There is so much history of the birth of our country in the eastern states.

We had a great dinner at an English Publick House.  Dave had a hamburger with scrapple on it.  It looked like Spam to me.  

 Saturday, August 23:
We went to a Phillies baseball game against the St Louis Cardinals, in Philadelphia.  It went into 12 Innings and wasn’t over until 12:30 am (Cardinals won).  We had  Philly cheese steak sandwiches and Yuengling Beer.  Rich had actually brought some Yuengling beer to MN for us in the early 1980’s.  He said it was the oldest still operating brewery in the US. 



 Sunday Aug 24:  This morning we received a phone call at 6:00 am.  It was Dave’s mother telling us that Dave’s Stepfather had passed away during the night.  She and Hap have been married over 40 years.  He was in his early 90’s and was a WWII veteran.  He had been in and out of  hospitals since last Thanksgiving with lung problems.  And within the last month, he was moved to a nursing home and put on hospice care.  In the end, he was just worn out.  So he went peacefully.  But Dave’s mom will be very lonely. 

So, we decided to get up, pack our bags, and head to Minnesota.  We were about 10 hours away from our boat in North Carolina and returning our rental car.  Last minute flights would have been expensive.  So we decided to drive for 2 days to MN.  We made it as far as Indianapolis today. 

Monday Aug 25:  We drove the rest of the way today to LeSueur, MN.  We have gone through 19 states and 2 countries since we left NC Aug 6.  Pete arrived tonight also.  He will be able to stay until Thursday.  It’s so great to see him.

Tuesday Aug 26: Alice, Pete, Dave and I drove to Eden Prairie, MN today to watch our great nephew play football.  Mateo is in 10th grade and into multiple sports.  We met our niece, Dena and her other 2 kids, Julianna and Malachi, and a family friend, Bill, at the game.  They won 28-0.  After the game, Dave’s brother Dean joined us and we all went to Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner.  We had a fun evening with family. 

Dave, Mateo, Pete and Malachi

Alice, Dave and Dean

August 21, 2014 Hudson River, NY to PA

This morning we walked over the Hudson River on an old railroad bridge.  It was a beautiful morning and great to be able to go for such a nice walk.  Then we drove to Newtown, PA.  Dave hates traffic.  I need to get him back to the boat.  One comment while driving was “This really f***’s with the rhythm of life.”  But I must admit, the countryside in these northeastern states had been beautiful.

We arrived at Rich and Cindy Valent’s home in New Town, PA in time for a nice dinner at their home.  This was the third couple we have visited on this trip with ties to our days in Germany while Dave was in the Air Force back in the late 1970's.  Rich was room mates in the barracks with Lee Glenister (Dave’s room mate) after Dave and I were married.  So Rich and Lee spent a lot of time with us.  We had never met Rich’s wife.  They have twin sons close to the age of our son who both now live in New Orleans.  Dave was his usual self, teasing and joking.  Rich commented a few times that it was nice to have Dave visit, because it made him look better in the eyes of his wife.  Funny

Hudson River

August 20, Conn to NY

I did return to Mystic Seaport on Wednesday morning to see a few demonstrations that we missed the morning before.  Dave wanted to do some things on the computer while we had a good wifi connection.

We drove to Waterford, Conn after I picked up Dave. There is a boat supply mail order company there called Defender.  Dave has ordered half of the things on our boat from them.  So it was nice to actually go there and look though their warehouse display/ship store/Chandlery.  We have been planning on buying more anchor chain.  To have it shipped, it would have to go by truck.  And we usually don’t plan on being in one place long enough to have it shipped.  So we did some figuring and decided we would be able to take it with us in our rental car.  And that would save the cost of the shipping.  The chain comes in a barrel.  So we had to measure the hatchback area to see if there was room for the barrel to stand up AND the forklift to be able to lift it into the car.  We bought 200 feet of chain which weighs roughly 350 lbs.  So you can see that we saved a lot in shipping, but it may change our gas milage.

We had a late lunch at a Greek restaurant in Waterford. We looked at the map to go directly to our next destination, Newtown, PA.  We would have had to drive on the outskirts of New York City with after work traffic.  Plus our friends there weren’t expecting us until tomorrow. So we detoured and went straight west to the Hudson River.  We ended up in Poughkeepsie, NY. 

August 18, 2014 Maine to Connecticut

We walked to a restaurant overlooking the ocean for breakfast.  We shared a lobster and scallop omelette and Dave had one blueberry pancake and I had one slice of blueberry french toast.  Dave giggled like a child when he found out he could have whole milk. 

After breakfast, we walked to Pemaquid Point lighthouse and toured the buildings and the grounds.  Very picturesque.  Nice rocky coast and great view from the lighthouse.   

We decided we had seen and done the basics in Maine-ate lobster, toured a lighthouse and saw the rocky coast.  We decided we DO want to return by boat to see the coast from the water.  So instead of driving further up the coast, we decided to drive to Connecticut.  We drove through Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut today within about 6 hours.  We found a hotel in Mystic so we can tour the Mystic Seaport tomorrow. 

August 17, 2014 Coast of Maine

Today we headed to Maine.  We drove to Newburyport, MA and had lunch at Michael’s Harborside restaurant.  We shared a lobster roll and a dish with lobster and mascarpone cream.  Both were delicious but expensive for small portions.
Our next stop was  in Portsmouth, NH for ice cream and we walked around the town and the port.  We then stopped at Bath, ME at a tourist info center.  We had to take a picture of the train station that was the tourist info place because my sister, Janice, lives in Bath, SD. 

We decided to drive down one of the peninsulas to the coast and spend the night at Pemaquid Point in the Hotel Pemaquid.  We had a room on the second floor of a small building that looked like a lobster house.  We drove to New Harbor and had dinner at Shaw’s lobster house.  We had lobsters and clams.  Dave’s was 2 lbs, mine was between 1 and 1 1/4 lb at $14/lb.  They were delicious, the best we have ever had.  We returned to the hotel and sat in lobby of the main building with a fireplace and antiques.  Very cozy.

dinner of lobster and clams

bay in front of restaurant. Nicholas Sparks movie "Message in a Bottle" was filmed here

Picking out your lobster

August 16, 2014 Swampscott, Mass

This morning we joined Tom and Lesa Franken and their grandson, 9 month old Henry Pettit at Lincoln’s Landing in Swampscott, MA.   Their daughter, Heidi, is married to Tom and has lived in Boston for several years.  They moved to Swampscott (north of Boston) about a year ago.

We met Tom and Lesa Franken in Germany in the late 1970’s while Tom and Dave were stationed there in the Air Force.  Since they were from SD and MN, we were instant friends.  Then we both moved to SD and attended SDSU after leaving the Air Force.  After college, the Frankens moved to Watertown, SD and we eventually  moved to Rapid City, SD.  So we have seen each other several times over the years.  It has probably been about 4 years since we last saw each other.

Swampscott is a beautiful little community on the bay north of Boston.  After breakfast at a little diner, we went to Heidi and Tom’s home that was built in 1900.  We sat in the backyard and visited all afternoon.  Heidi’s husband Tom is from England.  He just returned from Argentina for work this morning.  So while he and Henry napped, we had our own Boston Tea Party in their backyard.  Heidi was a gracious hostess.  Lesa’s mother, Margaret Olson, from MN came with Tom and Lesa.  They were here for a week to babysit while Tom was in Argentina and their normal daycare was on vacation.  So it was a coincidence that we would be in Boston at the same time.  

We decided to stay another night at the same hotel so we could go to dinner with them at the Tides restaurant on Nahant Island.  The island is connected to the mainland by a causeway.  We had to have Boston baked beans as a side. It was a beautiful day/evening.  We are loving this weather in the low 70’s.   

This was another fun day of reconnecting with friends.  We have been blessed to be able to coordinate with so many friends this week.  And they are all long term friends that you feel like you just saw yesterday even though it’s been years. 

Leas and her mother Margaret by Heidi's home built in 1900

Our Boston Tea Party with 3 generations, Heidi, Margaret and Lesa

Dave, Mary, Lesa, Tom

Tom and Henry Pettit, Dave and Mary, Heidi, Lesa, Margaret

.

August 14-15 Bernardston and Boston, Mass

We had wonderful blueberry pancakes for breakfast at Glenister’s.  Then we drove to Massachusetts to spend  the night with Bill and Brenda Hill.  The Hills were friends of ours from Rapid City.  They moved back to the area where Bill grew up about 4 years ago.  Bill had a meeting after work and Brenda and I went to church (catholic holy day).  So Dave cooked dinner at their house after Bill stopped home and offered some ideas.  We all came back to the house with a great chicken dinner ready for us.

They just celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary.  Brenda has recently lost a lot of weight and said she was about the same weight as when they got married. Bill thought Brenda should try on her wedding dress, so we convinced her to do it.  

Friday:  We are getting into having breakfast made for us.  Today we had waffles and coffee before leaving.  We drove to a northern suburb of Boston, Peabody (pronounced PEA bu dee) for a room at a Holiday Inn.  From there we drove to a subway station and took the subway into downtown Boston.  We found the Sail Loft restaurant/bar and had a cup of their clam chowder on recommendation of friends.  It was outstanding.  And this place was just a little bar off of a marina, not a tourist trap.  Good find.  We then went on a Duck tour of the city, it is on the road and in the water (the one in Seattle was fun, but I wouldn’t recommend this one).   After the tour, we walked to the Black Rose Irish Pub.  When we think of Boston, we think of Irish.  We had dinner and listened to a man singing Irish music.  We are getting old because we love it when we can enjoy the music over dinner and not have to wait for it to start at 9:00.  After dinner we walked around a few blocks listening to music on the street, then took the subway back to our hotel.

Brenda in her wedding dress sweeping Bill off his feet

reunited with good friends

Brenda and Bill

cup of awesome clam chowder

The Irish Rose in Boston