Weeks 9-11: The East Coast

October 26

Day 57:

Day two for our four-day weekend.  What to do today.  Well, tomorrow, we are mobilizing our rig from Cape Cod to Boston, but we will only be in Boston until Friday, when we move again to New York.  I will be working most of the time, so I won’t have another chance to get into the city.  On Monday, I took off work to go to Salem.  So, we figured that we would take the day and make the journey into the city. 

Since we have the big truck and we don’t want to wrangle that beast in the city, we decided to find a park-and-ride somewhere outside the city and take the subway around for the day.  Kids under 11 don’t need a transit pass, so we only needed to buy Subway passes for Jen and me.

We parked at the Quincy Adams stop on the Red Line and took it to Downtown Crossing where we were going to hop on the Orange Line to eat to the Haymarket Station, but unfortunately the Orange Line was closed for repairs.  So, we popped out of the subway tunnels at the Downtown Crossings station to find out we were right in the middle of a Dog Parade for Halloween.  Owners and dogs dressed in costumes parading up and down Washington Street.  We spent some time wandering around there before we headed north to Faneuil Hall Visitor Center, which is a National Park.  It really is a bunch of historic sites around Boston.  

On our way there, we started following the Freedom Trail and went past the Old South Meeting House, which was the historic site of the Boston Tea Party.  We went past the Old State House and the site of the Boston Massacre.  We made it to Faneuil Hall, where the girls got their Junior Rangers books, and we went upstairs to get them.  In the upstairs area, they were restoring the large mural that hangs on the wall; they had taken it down and placed it on the floor face down and were waiting for a person to come and help restore the painting, which they said was a very specialized profession.  

Our next stop was the park.  We wanted to see the duck statue in the Public Garden.  The “Make Way for Ducklings” bronze statue commemorates the book of the same name by Robert McCloskey.  I talked to the girls later about this trip into Boston and that was their most memorable part.  Surprisingly, the city was packed today.  We figured that it was because it was the Saturday before Halloween, and everyone was out celebrating.  The duck statues were no exception.  People everywhere.

Just across the street from the duck statues was the famous Cheers bar.  We had to go there.  I was there during a trip in architecture school, but it had been 30 years ago.  It hasn’t changed.  Jen hadn’t been there, so we made the trek in and around the very crowded bar.  When traveling the city with little legs, everything takes so much longer to do.  We looked at the clock and it was already time to start heading back to the subway so we could get back to our truck and get home.  We didn’t get home until after 8:00, Which was a full day.  Everyone was tired from walking so much.

Tomorrow, we will move closer to Boston.  Looking at the map, we are near the second ring of highways southwest of downtown.

October 27

Day 58:

We drove to Boston today. We are just off Interstate 95, which connects Boston to Providence, RI. It is part of Boston, but we are actually closer to Providence. We are just down the road from Gillette Stadium, where the New England Patriots play their home games. The park we are staying in is called Normandy Farms Campground. They claim to be rated in the top five in the nation. It’s a nice park. It has a lot of amenities. Frisbee Golf course, four pools, one of them is indoors. Softball fields, horse rides, and craft activities for the kids. 

October 28

Day 59:

A trip to Salem. Since we are only in Boston until Friday, I took the day off to go to Salem. They even had a National Park. The Salem Maritime National Park. We met Jen’s friend Lauren, who graciously let us park in her driveway for the day. Then, we walked around the city doing the Junior Ranger program. 

October 29

Day 60:

Work day. Not much happened. Girls had school. 

October 30

Day 61:

We are only here until Friday, and tomorrow is Halloween, so we decided to go to Providence for dinner. It was after I got off work, and it was already dark, but at least we got to see it. We ate at Circe and walked along the canal for a little bit. The food was amazing, but more adult-focused and not so kid-friendly. Oops. So, on the way home, we ended up stopping at McDonald’s for the girl's dinner. 

October 31

Day 62:

Halloween!  What a beautiful day. 79 degrees and sunny. By the time the girls went trick-or-treating in the evening, I think the temperature was only 70 degrees. Perfect. We have been talking to people back home, and they got 4” of snow in some areas. 

The girls carved pumpkins last night, so we set them out to adorn our campsite. Eva was dressed up like the Oogy Boogy Man from the Nightmare Before Christmas, and Aela was a witch. Both costumes were amazing. 

We went to Jen’s friend’s house to trick-or-treat (Tara). The girls were very apprehensive at first, worried about whether people had dogs in their house. But towards the end, they didn’t hesitate to get to the next house. They both had a lot of fun and got their bags filled with candy. Lots of full-size candy bars. 

Tomorrow, we are off for New York. 

November 1

Day 63:

Moving day.  today, we are moving from Boston to New York.  The drive took us through Hartford and the traffic was a lot.  It was mostly highway, but 45 minutes out from our destination, we got off the highway, and it was like mountain driving all over again, with tight, windy roads.  The place we are staying is at a county park in Croton-on-Hudson.  It is nice because we are right next to a rail line that we can use to go into New York City. The spaces here are pretty far apart. We don't feel like we are on top of each other.

November 2

Day 64:

Today is a quiet day.  We have been going, going, going every day that we all needed a break.  Since I am taking off Monday, we have time to see things and get a day of rest.  We just cleaned and caught up on tasks around the RV.

November 3

Day 65:

We are off exploring today.  Since we are going to NYC tomorrow, we thought we would explore around our campsite today.  The first part of our adventure, we went down to Sleepy Hollow to have lunch and see the bridge and the cemetery from the story.  After that, we headed over to Stamford, CT, for a quick look at the city.  We didn't know what to do while we were there, but we found a great little Arboretum to hang out at for the rest of the day.  The girls loved it.  We walked through the gardens and found a rock garden with words scribed on it. The girls made sentences for about an hour. Fascinating. They wanted to go back.

November 4

Day 66: 

NYC today!  Wow, where do I start?  Well, first, we stayed at a park right next to the rail line, so we hopped on the Amtrak and rode down to Penn Station.  From there, we transferred to a subway line that took us to the southern tip of Manhattan at Battery Park, where we got on the ferry to Liberty Island, where we toured the Statue of Liberty.  The Statue of Liberty is a National Park, so the girls did their junior ranger program and got their badges. Jen and I were really surprised by the way Aela took to the Statue of Liberty.  She was lit up and excited to be there.  She took lots of pictures with her camera and was smiling the entire time we were there.  We also went up into the pedestal of the statue.  That was high enough for them.  Surprisingly that took a big part of our day.  We had plans to do so many things in NYC, but time was slipping away.  We returned back to Manhattan and got on another subway back up to Central Park.

The girls had recently seen the movie Eloise at the Plaza (2003) about a six-year old that lives in The Plaza hotel.  We had to see it.  We walked the south side of Central Park from the subway stop to The Plaza Hotel located on 5th Ave. and W 59th St. They let us go into the lobby, where we took a bunch of pictures of the familiar scene.  After leaving the hotel, we walked the south part of Central Park back to 7th Avenue, down to Times Square.  

Times Square is about 14 blocks south of the park which equates to about 3/4 of a mile.  That is when I realized how much walking we had done for the day.  We hadn't seen much, but we already put on 16,000 steps.  How many more steps was that for our girls?  I asked Eva to count her steps.  I counted off 10 steps.  "Eva, how many for you?"  She said 14.  Wow... so after a little math...she had walked about 6000 more steps than me.  What a trooper.  Both girls had mentioned how their feet were starting to hurt.  I can understand why.  

Times Square was a lot. We got to the center of Times Square, and the girls started to shut down.  Both in their own way.  Eva just buried her head in Mom's torso.  Aela was excited and soaking it all in but struggling because it was the end of a very tiring day.  We stopped at a street vendor and picked up some NYC stocking hats as souvenirs, and worked our way back to Penn Station, where we took the train back home.  What a great day! 

November 5

Day 67:

Election Day.  Try to work all day.  Not much else.  No sleep.

The Podcast about us released today. National Parks Conservation Association's podcast, The Secret Lives of Parks, featured our family on this month's podcast.

November 6

Day 68:

The day after election day.  We all knew what happened.  Trying to get through the day with work.

Jen took the girls back to the arboretum in Stamford, CT for the day.

I have a Jackery Explorer 2000 Pro.  It is a 2000-watt battery generator that we can use as temporary power when we need it for off-grid situations.  That sounds great, but this one has been giving us trouble for a while, and the unit did not work for us during the last boondocking night.  So, I have been in contact with the company and trying to get it replaced.  I tell you, it's like the damaged bike carrier we had to deal with back in up-state New York and Vermont.  Having stuff sent to you while you are constantly moving can be stressful.  

November 7

Day 69:

Working today.  I dropped the girls off at the train station.  They are going into NYC so have a tea party on a tour bus!  Yes, they are having a tea party while they are driving around New York City.  How awesome is that!  I was worried that the city was so big and we only saw a little bit of it. Now, they get to be driven around to a bunch of the sites without having to walk with their little legs.  I am so excited for them.  They are also checking out the NYC Public Library collections and meeting up with Jen's friend from high school, Megan.

November 8

Day 70:

Moving day. Today we are going to New Jersey. We will be close to Philadelphia and Delaware. Since we are staying on the east side of the Hudson River, at some point we have to cross over. There is a bridge just south of Sleepy Hollow that we saw when we went there and ate at the Bridge View restaurant. But since there are a ton of low bridges in this area, we had to do some driving around. We just followed the RV Life app that we have been using to make sure we don’t hit any low bridges. 

Well, following our GPS, we ended up driving our rig into Manhattan and going over the George Washington Bridge. That was an experience. In about a two-mile stretch, it took us 45 min. And we were constantly fighting the traffic, people always trying to cut in front of us. What a nightmare. But. We just settled in and got through it. 

November 9

Day 71:

 Today we went to Delaware.  What is there to see in Delaware?  Well, from where we were coming from, we found this cute town of New Castle.  It has a National Park, the First State National Historical Park.  I will say that for our travels, there have been two big surprises for me, areas where I didn't know what to expect and I was pleasantly surprised by how much I would enjoy it.  Those two places are Cape Cod and New Castle.

 The historic town of New Castle was amazing.  We first got there and at the information center they told us that there was a tour of the courthouse in five minutes...so we ran over there to catch it. We were just in time.  We walked in the door and the lady just started giving her tour.  That was nice.  It also lasted for an hour and a half.  Well worth it.  There was a lot of information about the town of New Castle, The state of Delaware, and the history of the court system.

  After our tour of the courthouse, we walked around town to find a nice place to eat. We ended up eating at Jessop’s Tavern and Colonial Restaurant, a quaint little nook with great food.  From there we walked down to Battery Park on the waterfront and took pictures of the sun setting on the water.  With some light left in the sky we decided to explore a little bit more of the town.  

 Jen had a map with a couple key landmarks she wanted to see before heading back home.  One of them was the The Amstel House Museum.  We got over there to find out that is was closed.  Not a surprise, it was getting late and things were closing around town.  We are still not adjusted to the time switch for daylight savings.  It’s now getting dark at 5:00.  In the middle of the summer we would still have four hours of daylight left.

We were standing across from the Amstel House when we were talking about how George Washington attended a wedding in that building.  Can you imagine?  George Washington was in the building we were looking at!  Wow!  As we were walking the two blocks back to our car we passed a lady coming out of her house (on the corner across from the Courthouse where we had the tour).  I turned to the lady and asked, “Do you live here?” She said, “Yes.” To which I replied, “Because my wife and I were just talking about all the great history that has happened right here in this area and there are people like you just going about your life every day.  We find that amazing.”

She asked if we would be interested in touring her house.  What?  Yes, of course!  If it isn’t any trouble.  But she was going to run some errands, so she called her husband and he came to the door and gave us a tour of their house.  It turned out that they loved showing people their home. It had so much history.  They said they bought it back in the 80’s.  As he was giving the tour, he said that the people who were getting married at the Amstel House that George Washington attended lived in this house and across the street.  In fact, George Washington came into this house and sat at the dining room table for dinner in this house.  Wow!  The history here… it was amazing.

We felt so fortunate to get this opportunity to get this private little tour.  What a day.  To top off such a great day, we took the girls for ice cream on our way home.   

November 10

Day 72:

Today, we went to Philadelphia.  We drove to Lindenwold outside the city and took the PATCO Speedline into the city.  It was easy to find, free parking, and the ride was only about 24 minutes into the city.  The only item worth noting was the homeless population both in Lindenwold and downtown Philly.  

Our focus for the day was on the Independence National Historic Park.  It has evolved a lot over the years.  But we got to see the remains of George Washingtons house, The Liberty Bell, the outside of Independence Hall, and Ben Franklin's residence.  Since we finished all that by around 4:00, we decided to get over to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and show the girls the "Rocky" steps.  Even though we had to explain to them what it was.  They ran up the steps like real champions while at the same time thinking in their head, why are we doing this?  They had fun.  In fact, they had so much fun that they ran back to the bottom and ran up the stairs again.  Ha!  Rocky only ran up them once!

It started getting dark, which is so early now that we had daylight savings switch over.  It gets dark at 5:00.  So, we went to a nearby place to eat so we could get a Philly Cheesesteak,  a must while here.  We ate at Pete's Famous Pizza on Fairmount Ave.  

November 11

Day 73:

Working today. The girls had a very busy weekend.   They learned a lot, so they have the day off school.  They spent most of the day chilin'.

November 12

Day 74:

Working today.

November 13

Day 75:

It's Wednesday, middle of the week.  It has been a little chilly, so we haven't been doing much outside.  The temps have been dipping below freezing at night, so  we have to disconnect our water lines and put on our tank heater overnight so the lines don't freeze.  It's not really cold, about 30 degrees or so.  But just enough that we should be taking some precautions.

November 14

Day 76:

Working today.  It's the last day of work for the week.  We gotta get things ready this evening for our move tomorrow. Jen took the girls to the Atlantic County Park. The Pinelands (Pine Barrens) and The Great Egg Harbor River are National Park sites so they went to get their stamps and explore the park.

November 15

Day 77:

Captain's Log - Stardate 1115…We found ourselves off on another adventure. Moving day. We are leaving the Pine Barrens of New Jersey in search of our location near Washington, DC. It’s about a 3-hour journey. We stopped about an hour out from our destination at a wayside rest.  We used our rig to go to the bathroom and make sandwiches. Much cheaper than if we stopped at a truck stop or something.  

We crossed over the waters for the Chesapeake Bay. That had to be the biggest bridge we have been on so far.  Way bigger than the Mighty Mack.  Getting closer to our destination, we could see the large houses and big estates.  Wow, this is a nice area…and then it turned.  The big houses we were passing weren’t so big…then they were in shambles…what were we getting into?

Our last turn…looking ahead all the traffic had stopped.  School was out, and the kids were getting off the bus…a lot of kids getting off the bus.  I bet that almost half that bus was getting off at this stop, a trailer park, and it was right across the street from our campgrounds. Uff da.  I don’t have anything against trailer parks.  In fact, when I was about three years old, I lived in a trailer park too…at least until my parents bought their first house.  Ok…no problems.  Let’s just turn into the park and see what we have.  Our first impression…not good.  All the spots were piled on top ofeach other…the roads were tight just getting into the park…and then, the first building we saw…smashed in…????? What was this place?  

Well, this is the place we reserved for the week.  Let’s make the most of it.  Following the map they gave us we drove back to our site.  I will say that I almost damaged our rig three times just getting to the site.  The roads were too narrow, there were big trees planted on every turn…why would that be a thing…our big rigs need those angles to make those turns.  Not here.  Anyway, we found the road where our site was and immediately Jen says, “We are not fitting in there.”  Me being the optimist I thought that we just need to drive down to our site and take a closer look.  The road was barely 8 feet wide and the residents (that’s what I’ll call them because I think a lot of these people were permanent) had built structures on their sites; sheds, deck, etc. and they were built right up to the road.  There was no way to turn our 42-foot rig into this tiny spot. Across from us was a shirtless guy tearing apart his truck…nice.  We are getting out of here.  On the way out, we almost damaged our rig two more times. The universe was telling us to get the hell out of here!

We finally made our way back to the main office where we told the lady that we were not staying there.  She asked why?  We said…”where do we start…”  To give her the simple answer…”We don’t fit” that is enough.  She asked if we wanted another site, and we quickly said, “No thanks”. We couldn’t even get a cell signal for us to find another place to stay…add that to the list. 

We finally found a Harvest Host nearby. 15 minutes away. Let’s go. We were able to sleep at a horse farm. They sold meat, so we got some sirloin and some lamb stew meat. While there, we found our place to stay. It is rated 9.3/10, so it should be nice. 

November 16

Day 78:

Off to our new place, Cherry Hill Park. Wow, what a difference. Wide open, lots of room to maneuver, and our spot was a pull-through…that was straight in. No fuss. We got set up, and we walked around in awe of how nice this was compared to our last event. Settle in. Tomorrow is The National Mall in Washington, DC.