Portland ME to Hyannis MA

The rain finally caught up to us today. It was heaviest this morning and by early afternoon had tapered off enough that it did not affect our plans.

We had to make the decision not to visit Boston this trip. We couldn't decide on only one or two things to do there and knew we had to see Plymouth today as well. Judging by the traffic only, we probably made a good decision. We still got to see a portion of the city driving through on the interstate.

A quick stop in Duxbury to the oldest cemetary in the United States to visit the resting place of George Soule. He was our ancestor who came over on the Mayflower. Once in Plymouth we first had a New England lunch of fish, chips and chowder and then visited the Mayflower II, a replica of the original Mayflower. It is not nearly as large as I was expecting and it's hard to imagine 102 people on board. We also saw Plymouth Rock. I was expecting something larger. The story behind that is quite interesting, I would recommend you check it out.

There is also an 81 foot granite statue in Plymouth called National Monument to the Forefathers. I will post some pictures later but it was really amazing. It is the tallest granite statue in the United States and was quite impressive.

From Plymouth we took the scenic route to Hyannis on Cape Cod, which is where we are spending the night. Some of the homes are amazing, we have enjoyed looking at the different architectural styles and the fall/Halloween decorations.

Tomorrow we plan to explore Cape Cod a little bit more and take a tour of a potato chip factory and check out some lighthouses. There is also an ice cream shop boasting that they have the best ice cream on the Cape so we'll probably have to check that out too. Then we will be making our way to Newport, Rhode Island to tour a couple "summer cottages". If you would like a sneak peek of what these families considered a "cottage", check out this link:

www.newportmansions.org

Til' tomorrow!

Bartlet NH to Portland ME

Our first three stops of the day were only a short distance from our hotel in Bartlet, New Hampshire. First on the agenda was the White Mountain Cider Company for fresh hot apple cider and fresh apple cider doughnuts. Yum! Next stop was the Mt. Washington Auto Tour. Mt. Washington is the highest peak in New England at 6,288 feet. The drive to the summit puts you well above the treeline and today there was 70 miles of visibility. The highest wind speed ever recorded was here back in 1934 at 231 mph. The building that the weather observers used at that time had to be chained to the ground to keep it from blowing away:

After the drive back down Mt. Washington we went to Wildcat Mountain and took a gondola ride to the summit. This gave us just another beautiful view of all the fall leaves and surrounding mountains.

Then it was time to head to Portland, Maine. For the first time on this trip we arrived at our destination before dark! We were able to spend some time out by the Atlantic Ocean at the Portland Head Lighthouse. Since we were there and had time we decided to see if there were any nearby geocaches. We ended up finding the very first geocache ever hidden in the state of Maine. It has been there for 10 years and has been found over 1000 times. After spending some time in the blustery wind by the Atlantic it was time for some chowder! We did a search for nearby restaurants and decided on Gilbert's Chowder House simply because of the name. Located on the waterfront in Portland, it did not dissapoint! We all had clam chowder in a breadbowl and it was first rate!

We are now checked into our hotel and have done our planning for tomorrow. It looks like Boston has hit the cutting room floor and we will not be spending any time there. We have found the time just goes by so fast and any time spent in the city just devours your time. Boston is a trip in and of itself.

So tomorrow we will be heading to Duxbury and Plymouth Massachusetts to visit the Mayflower replica and then we will be spending some time on the coast between Plymouth and Hyannis on Cape Cod. Here are few more fall foliage pics.

Lake Placid NY to Bartlett NH

Woke up to a sunny day. We didnt' spend much time in Lake Placid. Here is a quick pick from the road of the ski jump training facility. I always thought that would be a scary thing to do and after seeing these ramps, I'm convinced.

We are trying to find one geocache in each state. Our New York find was in Elizabethtown in this very neat Colonial Garden. I am sure it is even prettier in the summer when all the flowers are blooming.

Our route across Lake Champlain was via ferry. It was only a 15 minute crossing. The old Lake Champlain bridge was demolished and they are building a new one, scheduled to open later this year.

The drive across the Green Mountains was just gorgeous. Really hard to describe all the wonderful colors and I don't think the pictures do it justice.

A bit of a side detour took us through the Northfield area where we saw three covered bridges in addition to this one we saw earlier:

There is only one place in Vermont you can see two covered bridges at the same time and that is in the Northfield area and so it was neat to see those as well.

Our next stop was the Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Factory Tour. Honestly, we were not impressed. We had been enjoying the peaceful nature of New England and wondering where all the people are......well, we found them at Ben & Jerry's! That place was insane. And to top it off they were in between flavor changes and so we didn't actually get to see ice cream being made. We got a free sample of ice cream but since the line to buy ice cream seemed to extend clear back to Washington State we decided to move on. If you are a real Ben & Jerry's fan you would probably enjoy this. If not, I would not recommend taking the time.

Our next tour was a bit more successful. We did the granite quarry tour at Rock of Ages. They are mainly in the memorial stone business but the quarry was amazing. They are sitting on a quarry of granite that is approximately 52 square miles and extends 50 miles beneath the surface. If they continue to quarry granite at their current rate they will not exhaust the supply for another

4, 500 years. Here is a couple pictures of the quarry. Our only disappointment here was that the workers had already finished their day so we didn't get to see the actual work being done.

The color of granite is completely dependent on the area in which it is quarried. Barre VT granite is gray. The nearby Hope Cemetary will now only allow memorial monuments made from the Barre granite. This cemetary has extremely personal and creative headstones. Here are just a couple examples:

After the cemetary our main goal was to get to our hotel in Bartlett New Hampshire. The drive is very enjoyable with neat views around every corner.

Well, it is time to start planning tomorrow's adventures and then off to get some sleep.

Niagara Falls, Ontario--Lake Placid NY

We have arrived in Lake Placid. Today was a long day of travel spent mostly in the car.

This morning we enjoyed the beauty of Niagara Falls. The sheer volume of water that flows over the falls is incredible and it's almost overwhelming to be standing right near the brink as it rushes over the top. It would be very easy to spend a few days here marveling at this creation and checking out all the museums, shops and attractions. Obviously with a long drive ahead of us we had to settle for a bit of a whirlwind visit.

The wait at the border took about an hour and our next planned stop was in Lockport NY. We knew we had missed the 11:00 tour and thought we would have to wait until 1:00 but with the holiday they were running tours every hour so we just made the 12:00. The tour took us around Locks 34 and 35 on the Erie Canal. We learned a lot about the history of the canal and how the boats travel "uphill" 60 feet through the locks. Then we actually entered a large penstock pipe to tour the Lockport Cave that used to divert water to run three factories that used to be along the canal. The cave was blasted out of solid rock. The cave tour ended with a short boat ride inside the last portion of the cave.

After finishing the tour we watched several boats travel through the two locks, very interesting.

Then it was time to get some miles out of the way. Unfortunately that meant we had to drive a couple of hours on I-90. Traveling with all the toll roads is quite an experience. We paid $7.05 to travel on I-90 today. The signs are a bit confusing too. As we were exiting I-90 and were getting together the exact change for the toll we saw a sign that said "no cash". We thought that was very odd but put the cash away and got the credit card card ready. Hand the credit card to the toll booth attendant and he tells us "cash only". We thought it was kind of funny although he was kind enough to explain to us how the special express lane worked.

Anyway, after that the country started to get very beautiful. We are seeing lots of fall colors. We drove into the Adirondack Mountains and kept driving until the sun went down. At times it felt like we were in the middle of nowhere. After dark, we stopped for dinner at the Adirondack Hotel on Long Lake. Probably a very beautiful spot during the day!

After dinner we drove straight to Lake Placid. Staying in a nice hotel that suddenly seemed to materialize without much else around. Must be on the outskirts of town. We look forward to seeing this place in the daylight.

Tomorrow's agenda includes a ferry ride on Lake Champlain, a drive through the Green Mountains of Vermont, covered bridges, ice cream at Ben & Jerry's factory, a granite tour in Barre and a visit to Hope Cemetary.

Buffalo NY to Niagara Falls Ontario

We arrived in Buffalo and got our rental car. Here is a picture of Mom and Jason just before we departed from the airport. We have a navigational device that promises us we'll never

get lost....

We are pretty sure we will prove it wrong!

Our first stop was The Anchor Bar. This, according to their story, is where buffalo wings were invented. They did not disappoint. Buffalo is full of some amazing old buildings.

It took us awhile to get through Canadian customs. We assume all the people were going home from the Buffalo Bills football game. In finding our hotel we got our first glimpse of Niagara Falls and all I can say is AMAZING! I have been wanting to come here my entire life and it is not disappointing. I will say we are really looking forward to taking a walk along the river tomorrow morning as we find the falls to be much more spectacular during the day.

We had dinner reservations at the Skylon restaurant. Here is a view of the tower:

In this pic you can see the elevator car arriving at the restaurant and observation levels:

Unfortunately the dinner was a bit overhyped and it was way too expensive for what you got. The falls are lighted at night but not spectacularly so and overall I am sure the view is much better during the day. None of my pictures of the falls this evening turned out so you will have to wait until tomorrow for those. Just one of those touristy things you have to try once to see whether or not it's worth it.

Plan to take lots more pictures tomorrow and we have a couple of fun excursions planned. Our destination for tomorrow evening is Olympic Village at Lake Placid.

Here is a picture of the three of us:

In Seattle!

Checked in at the hotel in Seattle. Shuttle leaves at 4 a.m. so not much sleep tonight but who needs to sleep? Excited! Goodnight.

Let's Try This Again

Obviously, the blog idea didn't take off. One post over three years ago and nothing since.

In a couple of days I will be taking a trip with my Mom and Brother to New England. My Mom earned this trip as her 20 year anniversary gift from our employer. Aside from the trip after 20 years of employment (which is awesome), North Cascade Eye Associates is a great place to work! Many of our co-workers and friends have been listening to the planning for this trip for quite some time and are interested in our travel adventures. Hence the reason for bringing the blog back to life.

So stay tuned. And, huge thanks to Dr. Crowell and Dr. Siapco for this gift to my Mom. Thanks to Mom too for letting us join her on this adventure and putting up with thousands (dare I say millions) of payroll questions, HR questions, timeclock screw-ups and month end books that just won't balance for the last 20 years! Love you Mom!