Traveling Beverage!

I am ready to return north and thanks to the inspiration of a high school classmate, Sue, I decided the perfect traveling beverage would be a Rt. 44 diet cranberry limeade from Sonic. Traveling beverages are what Alicia called the drinks that fortified you for road trips. I used to go to Sonic back in seminary in Kentucky where all the people from the Midwest like Nancy and John helped me figure out that my favorite was a diet cherry limeade. New Jersey only just got a few recently and I haven't had a Rt. 44 drink since maybe last year when I was in Texas when Tina (from Ohio) and I decided to stall for time before surprising Alicia for her birthday. I came to this sonic north of Richmond with a classmate, Elizabeth last year some time. So, when Sue mentioned last week that she tried the cranberry limeade, I decided that it was worth a try being December and all. This is the very first solo Sonic run I've made though I felt a little loss for the company of friends riding with me I was glad to be able to chat to a few on the phone on my ride back to Jersey. Having a traveling beverage like a Rt. 44 is helpful on the return stretch of a boomerang ride like this one.

Boomerang Road Trip

I have a meeting in Richmond, VA tomorrow morning so I saw the sunset in Delaware late this afternoon. I got some really fun video of Cindy Lee's cat playing fetch, but Blogger is not being cooperative in uploading it. Trust me, it was highly entertaining!

Field Trip to Woolrich!

Today, Mom, Dad and I went for a field trip. We drove out to Woolrich, PA and visited the original company store. It was a wonderful store - not a huge box store at all. Kinda like LL Bean used to be in Freeport, ME. Not that that store isn't a great place to go visit - but it has lost the quaint charm it had until it remodeled and expanded sometime in the 1980s. This store has obviously done remodeling since it was founded 180 years ago. They don't have the factory store they used have on the premises when my grandparents used to stop here, but its stuck with what made it famous - wool products and buffalo plaids for home and outdoor use. We did some Christmas shopping, some personal shopping and found some deals we were very impressed with. During lunch at the little cafe adjoining the store, we discussed our bargains and decided to return and make another purchase or two for dad. Though we filled up the trunk with bags of treasures and bargains, I did leave the little sheep that symbolizes the store on the shelf when we were ready to leave and explore the little town.
The whole town is centered around the store and I think there are some historical markers describing the significance of the cabin - but we were tired from shopping and ready to head for home that I didn't take the extra time as we left to go read the markers.

We were interested enough to drive around the town and see how much John Rich influenced the area with his little mule cart that he used to peddle his woolen goods he manufactured at a mill in Plum Run before relocating to this spot where he had a steadier supply of water. If you know your 19th C American History and anything about the spread of evangelical denominations across the country, it will come as little surprise to you that a circuit rider made his way to the settlement that resided around the mill to bring religion to its inhabitants.

And today it is known as the Woolrich Community Methodist Church!

I just loved the little pine trees in the porch fence.

The road into town is lined with 2 miles of pine trees just on the road's edge. Don't know who took the initiative to plant all those trees years ago - but it made an impressive procession on the way in and out of town.


Mom managed to get this video from the front seat on our way out of town. Coming or going, it offers the same stately effect.

Quick Campus Visit

On my way to NC for a Methodist event on Thursday, I stopped on campus for some appointments, meetings and a visit to the library. Since it is Tuesday, 5PM means there is an Ultimate Frisbee game on the Quad of Union Presbyterian Seminary.

Ultimate Frisbee is taken very seriously here at UPSem. It has a competitive edge that culminates in a spring tournament that involves several other seminaries from as far away as Pittsburgh. The last two years, UPSem has been victorious and defeated the competition in the day long event. Community members are regularly practicing Tuesdays and Thursdays in all sorts of weather - just not the pouring rain which began a few hours after this photo was taken.

My overnight accommodations were at the M&M B&B where Mevin was downright insistent to be the center of attention. My reservations were in the bag as the Hokies are on the road and Cindy Lee elected not to travel for the game this weekend.

Road Trip with Dad Pt. II

Well, it is not 5:00 yet - but I figured these shots of Wayne, Maine
are a little more picturesque than what I'd see at 5PM on the NY State Thruway.

We arrived last evening to the Folks' place after what Uncle Butch figures was approx. 850 miles of driving and riding between the two of us for the first day. Despite the fact we were all up with the sun before 5AM, (obviously, I didn't think to take pictures at the am hour) we enjoyed a lazy morning and a great breakfast cooked by Aunt Jan. We not only took a walk through the woods up at their place, we also went strawberry picking before we even thought about repacking the truck to transport the perishables home.

On the way to the fields, I was regaled with the stories of Tubby's: Wayne's ice cream parlor that is an attraction for miles and miles around. It's a relatively new establishment (my last visit was 8 years ago) that is doing great business year round. If you've known me for any length of time, you know my penchant for good, homemade, or fresh ice cream. So I managed to delay our departure just long enough for the eatery to open at 11:00 and convince Dad we needed to get ours "to-go".

So while he waited for our order, I wandered around and got a few shots of metropolitan Wayne before we said our farewells, loaded ourselves into the cab of the truck, and pointed it homewards to get the last leg of 500 miles done and over with. We managed not to eat the lobster roll or the ice cream till we hit I-95 once we were off the roller coaster hills and curves of the state highways.

Even if it was an all too-quick trip (1,350 miles in 38 hours) it was nice to get away and see people and places I haven't seen in years. Isn't that what road trips are all about, anyway?

Road Trip with Dad Pt. I

Lincoln, Maine is the home of 13 lakes. It is also the town where Dad's truck was repaired. I managed to line this shot up and take it just a little after 5 PM. It might have a lovely foreground, but the rainbow arch that had been there moments before managed to disappear.

Here's proof that the rainbow existed - not a great shot, but it was there!

By this point of the day, we'd been driving since 5AM and still had another 2 hours in front of us to get to our overnight accommodations at Uncle Butch and Aunt Jan's. We were road warriors though, eating our fast food meal on the road after we dropped the rental car off an hour south of this place. Happily, our lunch had been spent at a fabulous spot called Stonyfield Cafe in Falmouth, ME. (They make a great yogurt I regularly get when I can find it. I really loved my salad - too bad the only one they have is there in Maine!) My friend Ruth, from swimteam days, recommended the spot just off the interstate when I called her mid-morning and met us with her three kids. Ruth and I had been in carpools together for so many years, she totally understood the delicate balance of wanting to visit longer but the need to get back on the road and accomplish the mission at hand. It was so great to see her that I didn't realize until I started uploading my pix that I managed to take none of the principal players of whom I mention in these two road-trip posts!

Back in Lincoln, the weather vein is more proof
of being in Maine: loons - not roosters.

The moose are on the loose in Maine

(We actually did see a young bull moose scamper across I-95
the next day but it was so fast he was gone before we could get the picture.)

The chariot awaits

Tomorrow at some unseemly hour of the morning before dawn I will be in this rented car headed north to Maine to retrieve my dad's truck. It's a long, painful, and pitiful story that still makes no sense, and the end result is that we are banking on the mechanic's words that there is an 80% chance the truck will be ready when we arrive. If not, we have another 24 hours in Maine to visit with some friends that are like family. Here's hoping we are back and off the road before the weekend holiday traffic gets going!

my bags aren't quite packed....

but I'll be ready to go in the morning. I'm not leaving on a jet plane, there's no worries about taxis blowing their horns. Unfortunately, I have an incredible headache from the heat, so there's a lack of ability on my part to get these verses right.