100 blogs, wow! I guess I really do have a lot to say. I don't expect to keep up this pace of blogging all the time. There will be times when we are not doing much. I've said it before & I'll say it again. We aren't on vacation, this is our lifestyle. Yes we get to stay in some awesome places & see some amazing things but we still have the hum drum chores of everyday life. Also, who could keep up the pace of a vacation 365 days a year? We are planning some workcamping which may be boring & not blog suitable or we may just stop & stay someplace to relax & do nothing. Again not fodder for a scintillating blog.
Right now we are in Niagara Falls NY. We left Vermont with plans to see some friends on our way out to N Dakota. Our plans are, as always, written in jello so we weren't able to stop & see friends in the upper central part of NY. We do have friends that are in Canada just over the border from Niagara Falls that we needed to see due to personal reasons, & may need to do so several times this week. First things first, needs before wants, we do what we have to do. While we are in Niagara Falls we will try to see some of the things the area has to offer. We heard they have a water fall somewhere around here. Seriously, we have been here before, in 1993, in a pop-up tent camper with 2 kids. It will be interesting do see how things have changed.
The weather is forecast to be nice so the bikes will be our mode of transportation. This is nice because we like to ride & it makes parking much easier than with our big truck.It is already later than I had planned to go to bed so I don't expect an early start tomorrow. So this is my 100th goodnight, but this time our home is Niagara Falls because....
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Thursday, July 29, 2010
# 99 Wasted Day & Wasted Night
The drugs didn't help. Mary still wasn't feeling great & I was feeling like crap. Wednesday, day & night, was a total waste & we will leave it at that. I guess we will have days like that from time to time. It doesn't make for good blogging material.
Thursday morning found us both feeling better. Not great but better, so we decided to take the truck instead of the bikes. Our destination today was Waterbury-Stowe Rd. Why that road? It seems to be the central location for the factory tours & outlet stores of Vermont. Our first stop was Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Factory. Between the dozens of flavors, tens of thousands of pints, & temps going from 130 degrees to pasteurize to -40 degrees it was very interesting. The free samples were a perfect end to the tour. Ben & Jerry's charges for their tour which at first put me off, but once I found out all the money gets donated to local children's charities I felt good about it.
Next stop was the Cold Hollow Cider Mill. Not much of a tour but you could see the equipment they use & taste many of their products. The cider was awesome & several of the homemade jams, dips, & spreads found their way into our shopping bag. We also found a couple of spiced apple cider donuts in the bag. Farther on down the road was the Cabot Cheese annex & store. Unlimited samples of some of the best cheeses we have ever tasted. Again the shopping bag started to fill but we only have a small RV refrigerator so we had to restrain ourselves. Full of cheese we headed over to the Champlain Chocolate Co. Fortunately being full of cheese made it easy to exert self control. We left with a very small bag of what we wanted but did not need.
Tomorrow we leave for NY so when we got home we loaded the bikes & got a lot of things ready for our morning departure. Hopefully it will be an early night & an early morning. It is always better to get to our destination early enough to set up & get a good nights rest so that we can get an early start on enjoying our new neighborhood. So this is our last goodnight from our home in Vermont because....
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary
Thursday morning found us both feeling better. Not great but better, so we decided to take the truck instead of the bikes. Our destination today was Waterbury-Stowe Rd. Why that road? It seems to be the central location for the factory tours & outlet stores of Vermont. Our first stop was Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Factory. Between the dozens of flavors, tens of thousands of pints, & temps going from 130 degrees to pasteurize to -40 degrees it was very interesting. The free samples were a perfect end to the tour. Ben & Jerry's charges for their tour which at first put me off, but once I found out all the money gets donated to local children's charities I felt good about it.
Next stop was the Cold Hollow Cider Mill. Not much of a tour but you could see the equipment they use & taste many of their products. The cider was awesome & several of the homemade jams, dips, & spreads found their way into our shopping bag. We also found a couple of spiced apple cider donuts in the bag. Farther on down the road was the Cabot Cheese annex & store. Unlimited samples of some of the best cheeses we have ever tasted. Again the shopping bag started to fill but we only have a small RV refrigerator so we had to restrain ourselves. Full of cheese we headed over to the Champlain Chocolate Co. Fortunately being full of cheese made it easy to exert self control. We left with a very small bag of what we wanted but did not need.
Tomorrow we leave for NY so when we got home we loaded the bikes & got a lot of things ready for our morning departure. Hopefully it will be an early night & an early morning. It is always better to get to our destination early enough to set up & get a good nights rest so that we can get an early start on enjoying our new neighborhood. So this is our last goodnight from our home in Vermont because....
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
#98 Still Crossing State Lines
With NH in our rear view mirror it was Vermont in the windshield. If you have been following us you know how much we enjoy the creations of Mother Nature but here in VT it is going to be different. On the agenda for the next few days is Cabot Cheese, Ben & Jerry's, the VT Teddy Bear Factory. Not exactly the finest of Mother nature but there will be fun & calories to be had.
Mary had not been feeling well for a couple of days but is doing much better. The problem is now I am having issues. Either Mary gave me what she had or I am allergic to the "Great State of Vermont". Mary stopped at a drug store & bought a veritable cornucopia of cold & allergy medicines. With any luck I will feel better & the factory tours can begin.
The weather looks promising for the next few days so miles will be put on the bikes. We will also try to get down to Lake Champlain. Until then I will drug myself & hope to feel better tomorrow in our home in Vermont because .....
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary
Mary had not been feeling well for a couple of days but is doing much better. The problem is now I am having issues. Either Mary gave me what she had or I am allergic to the "Great State of Vermont". Mary stopped at a drug store & bought a veritable cornucopia of cold & allergy medicines. With any luck I will feel better & the factory tours can begin.
The weather looks promising for the next few days so miles will be put on the bikes. We will also try to get down to Lake Champlain. Until then I will drug myself & hope to feel better tomorrow in our home in Vermont because .....
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary
Sunday, July 25, 2010
#97 And Away We Go!!!!!!
Sundays weather looks kind of iffy so we figure Saturday would be our last day on the bikes. It's no fun loading them in the rain. After breakfast we headed out in search of covered bridges. The weather was beautiful and the roads were a motorcyclists dream. The curves, the hills, & driving through all the small towns it just seemed like we were driving down Main Street America. It is real & so much better than Main Street Disney.
The first bridge we drove over was a 4 trestle wooden bridge in Bath. At about 250' it is the longest wooden bridge in NH. Farther on down the road we drove over the Swiftwater Bridge. The bridge was smaller but no less photogenic. We then stopped for lunch. As I've said before, touristing is tough & we had worked up an appetite. After lunch we found the Haverhill Bridge but were not able to drive on it. It had been restored & was closed to vehicular traffic so we walked across it & took some more pictures. Mary will be posting them on FB.
It had been a wonderful day but we wanted to get home before the evening rains came. Also since it was going to rain most of Sunday we hoped to get the bikes loaded when we got home. Mary was exhausted & not feeling so great so she went to take a nap. I was feeling pretty good after a great day on the bikes so I loaded them in the trailer. No sooner did I have them loaded & the door locked up it started to rain. Talk about perfect timing.
Sunday we slept in. After a late breakfast Mary got started on some laundry & I began dumping our holding tanks. We try to get as much done the day before we leave to make our departure as painless as possible. It doesn't always work but we try. I went out to get some bread & milk & came home $124 poorer. Oh yeah there was almost 40 gallons of diesel fuel in there somewhere. It is so much easier to fill up without the trailer attached. Some of the local gas stations just don't have the room needed to pull in to the pumps with a 40' long & 13'6" high trailer.
Tomorrows ride is only about 120 miles so we don't have to be on the road too early. It will be an easy trip into Vermont, the land of Cabot cheese & Ben & Jerry's ice cream. We look forward to both. So this is our last goodnight from our home in NH because....
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary
Friday, July 23, 2010
#96 MOOOOOOOOSE!!!!
As expected it was a late night & as promised we saw moose. The night wasn't perfect though. The tour bus had broken down so the driver showed up with a borrowed 14 passenger van. The van was borrowed from a kayak tour company so it was a bit soggy with trash bag seat covers. Oh well they promised moose so let's see what happens. Basically they drove us up & down the local roads where moose are regularly spotted. With flood & spot lights we searched the roadside woods. Once the sun was completely down the moose started to appear. First there was a female with a calf. A little farther down the road we spotted the whole family, a bull, cow, & calf. It was dark & the moose stay in the woods so photography was very iffy. Mary got a few pictures & will post them on FB.
Roaming the roads in & around the mountains we saw more moose, some deer, & found a bear rummaging through a restaurant dumpster. By the time the "Moose Safari" was over it was after 11 pm & we had about a 45 minute ride home. It was already late so we figured we would look for more moose. Well there were no more moose but we did see another bear & a family of raccoon. Mary was starting to feel like Marlin Perkins in her own version of Wild Kingdom. I think we will be shopping for safari gear soon. She will be ready for the next safari.
Today we took the bikes out & just rode with no destination in mind. We took pictures of waterfalls, stopped at a covered bridge, & checked out a cider mill & bakery. Tomorrow we will do more nothing on the bikes & see what we shall see. I enjoy reading your comments & look forward to more in the future. Until the next blog, Ta Ta from our home in NH because.....
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary & Bullwinkle
Roaming the roads in & around the mountains we saw more moose, some deer, & found a bear rummaging through a restaurant dumpster. By the time the "Moose Safari" was over it was after 11 pm & we had about a 45 minute ride home. It was already late so we figured we would look for more moose. Well there were no more moose but we did see another bear & a family of raccoon. Mary was starting to feel like Marlin Perkins in her own version of Wild Kingdom. I think we will be shopping for safari gear soon. She will be ready for the next safari.
Today we took the bikes out & just rode with no destination in mind. We took pictures of waterfalls, stopped at a covered bridge, & checked out a cider mill & bakery. Tomorrow we will do more nothing on the bikes & see what we shall see. I enjoy reading your comments & look forward to more in the future. Until the next blog, Ta Ta from our home in NH because.....
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary & Bullwinkle
Thursday, July 22, 2010
#95 In Search Of Moose
The first thing I would like to do is thank everyone who has started to comment on the blog. Mary lets me know when people talk about the blog but it is nice to get the comments directly & encourages me to write more. So, again thank you & keep the comments coming.
Wednesday turned out to be a pretty miserable day weather wise. We slept in until the rain let up & decided to tour the area in the truck. It was a short drive over to Franconia Notch & the visitor center to see what there was to do for us tourists. I think that is what I will start to put down as my occupation, "Professional Tourist". Armed with a stack of pamphlets that would choke a moose we headed down the road. We stopped at "The Basin" which is a naturally carved pot hole fed by streams & water falls. We weren't the only ones who saw a photo-op so the woods were filled with tri-pods, cameras, lenses, & the click-click-click of dozens of cameras. Mary will be posting on FB shortly. There were also a few brave(or foolish) souls who thought it would be nice to take a dip in the 45-50 degree mountain spring water. BRRRRRRR!!!!!
Continuing on down the pike we stopped at the viewing sites of "The Old Man of The Mountain". The Old Man is a natural rock formation featured on NH licence plates & state quarter but has since collapsed. Since its collapse in 2003 large numbers of people feel that it should be rebuilt. I personally don't think that man should rebuild what Mother Nature built & caused to collapse. Nature is a process that includes creation & destruction. We can't stop Mother Nature. If man was around should he have stopped the erosion that is the Grand Canyon, the volcanoes that are Hawaii, the glacier that made the New England shore line, & more? No, what man should do is minimize his own impact on that that was created by Mother Nature so that generations can see the process that is Mother Nature. Well I'm off my soap box because it is starting to rain.
Mary has found us a "Moose Safari" & hopefully we will see moose this evening. We will be getting in late so the blog & photos will probably not get posted 'til Friday. It is time to get dinner put together so we can head out on the "Moose Safari". If we "bag" ourselves some moose, with a camera of course, we will share with everyone as soon as possible. Until then from our "Moose Safari" base camp (aka home) in Twin Mt NH because....
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary
Wednesday turned out to be a pretty miserable day weather wise. We slept in until the rain let up & decided to tour the area in the truck. It was a short drive over to Franconia Notch & the visitor center to see what there was to do for us tourists. I think that is what I will start to put down as my occupation, "Professional Tourist". Armed with a stack of pamphlets that would choke a moose we headed down the road. We stopped at "The Basin" which is a naturally carved pot hole fed by streams & water falls. We weren't the only ones who saw a photo-op so the woods were filled with tri-pods, cameras, lenses, & the click-click-click of dozens of cameras. Mary will be posting on FB shortly. There were also a few brave(or foolish) souls who thought it would be nice to take a dip in the 45-50 degree mountain spring water. BRRRRRRR!!!!!
Continuing on down the pike we stopped at the viewing sites of "The Old Man of The Mountain". The Old Man is a natural rock formation featured on NH licence plates & state quarter but has since collapsed. Since its collapse in 2003 large numbers of people feel that it should be rebuilt. I personally don't think that man should rebuild what Mother Nature built & caused to collapse. Nature is a process that includes creation & destruction. We can't stop Mother Nature. If man was around should he have stopped the erosion that is the Grand Canyon, the volcanoes that are Hawaii, the glacier that made the New England shore line, & more? No, what man should do is minimize his own impact on that that was created by Mother Nature so that generations can see the process that is Mother Nature. Well I'm off my soap box because it is starting to rain.
Mary has found us a "Moose Safari" & hopefully we will see moose this evening. We will be getting in late so the blog & photos will probably not get posted 'til Friday. It is time to get dinner put together so we can head out on the "Moose Safari". If we "bag" ourselves some moose, with a camera of course, we will share with everyone as soon as possible. Until then from our "Moose Safari" base camp (aka home) in Twin Mt NH because....
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
#94 Back Home, Again?
Sunday was spent getting ready to leave Bar Harbor. Mary's lobster hunt was officially over so our sights were set on New Hampshire. Yes, we are back in NH so we are sort of back home. This time we are in northern NH up near Mt Washington. Our ride from Bar Harbor to Twin Mountains NH was a little different from our normal travels. There are no interstates from point A to point B so we took mostly 2 lane state roads through the small New England towns in Maine & NH. The roads were good & we got to see more of small town America.Once settled in we decided to go to Mt Washington the next day. Tuesday we rode up to the mountain & I convinced Mary that it would be fun to ride to the summit so off we go. 8 miles of twisting, winding, narrow, no guard rail, climb from 1800' to 6288'. Oh by the way part of the road wasn't paved & wasn't wide enough for 2 cars to pass. As Mary says, "it was freakin' awesome!". The views from the top were unbelievable with the clouds floating by below us & clear views between the clouds to the bottom of the mountain. Again the only sound was click, click, click from Mary's camera( see FB).
Mary was so excited about getting to the top of the mountain she hadn't thought too much about the ride down. The road is not for the faint of heart. So much so that while we were at the top a gentleman had to make arraignments to have someone drive his car down because his wife was having a panic attack. All of a sudden Mary started to think about the ride down. This was just another case of Mary being the only one who didn't have faith in Mary. We took our time, stopped at pull-offs to relax, & had no problems with the descent. Mary was "Woo Hoo"-ing all the way home.
We stopped for groceries on the way & ran into our obligatory rain storm. A quick stop to don rain gear & we proceeded home. All in all an awesome day. Tomorrow we are on the lookout for moose on one of the guided "Moose Safaris". So tonight we will dream of mooses or meese or moose or whatever in our home in Twin Mountains NH because...
Home is where we park it,
Frank & Mary
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