NE Trip 2016
Day 4 - Wed Aug 31 2016

The day started with breakfast at Trader Duke's,  I got the Grilled Oatmeal, Janice got an omelette.  We ended doing what we are calling a "Monica" - that's where we split our dishes so we can share.  Then we checked out.

We went back to Burlington to visit the Lake Champlain Chocolate Factory.  Gourmet or high-end chocolates made with the best of Vermont's ingredients - and of course cocoa brought up from the tropics.  Lots of samples and a pretty good narrative as to how chocolate is made.  We got there a little early for the next tour, so we took a walk to the "Earth Clock".  Reminded me of Stonehenge!

It was only a 10 minute walk away.  We met a local and asked about Oakledge State Park and decided to go there after the chocolate factory.

By the way, Lake Champlain Chocolates was guarded by a huge spider!

We got to Oakledge about 2 and stayed for about an hour.  Very nice place.  This was also a property formerly related to the Webb family from the Shelburne Museum.  There was something called The Forever Treehouse, and a short walk to a cove the looked out across the bay to Burlington.

We took off north to the Champlain Islands.  We had a reservation for dinner at the North Hero House Restaurant and Inn.  We'd heard that Bernie Sanders had recently bought a place near there and had dined there.  Our waitress told us that he never did.  He did visit the small General Store just a 5 minute walk from there.  We ended up doing that too because we were early for our reservation.  Very nice place on the water (northeastern part of Lake Champlain).  Janice got a salmon dish that she liked.  I got sea scallops - probably the best I've ever had!

After dinner we took off for Montreal.  Took about an hour and 20 minutes.  We crossed the border into Canada - a really small border station with a friendly Canadian border guard.  Thanks goodness for GPS.  The signs are all in French - a smattering of English once in a while.  And hitting the city about 7:00 PM - a little daunting.  We got to the hotel, checked in, settled ourselves and then on advice from the concierge Walked a few blocks to the Maison du Jazz - House of Jazz.  Very cool funky place with a great quartet.  Got back to the room about 11:00 PM

Hoping to see Theo for dinner tomorrow night.  We'll explore during the day.  Probably Mile End.

NE Trip 2016
Day 3- Tuesday Aug 30 2016

Today was our second day in Burlington.  We slept late, not hitting breakfast till after 10:00.  We just went through the lobby of the hotel to Trader Dukes - the hotel's restaurant.  Not a bad breakfast.
We decided to see the Shelburne Museum today.  Just 15 minutes or so down the road.  Some very rich woman named Webb, whose mother-in-law was a Vanderbilt, founded the museum - mid 1950's I think.  It's not a building or two.  Or three.  It's over 100 acres about 10 miles outside Burlington, that is home to many buildings and exhibition halls.  Those buildings hold art and artifacts from many periods in American history, some directly related to the area surrounding Burlington.  We saw paintings by Grandma Moses, an exhibition of Circus Posters dating back to the 1800's, a couple of houses, one originally built in 1773 and the other in the early 1800s, an exhibit of 3-D quilts made by a Canadian Artist in the last 10 years, an actual steamboat that carried passengers on Lake Champlain that was moved from the Lake to the museum (during the winter when the ground was hard enough to support its massive 892 ton weight), among other interesting things. 

Super Hero

Circus Poster

Ticonderoga Steamboat

The houses, by the way, were moved from their original locations to the museum.   Parts of the houses were left intact, some were modified to fit the ideal of the owners of the museum.  Not exactly
historical, but still pretty cool.  Another interesting thing was the General Store.  A one stop shop for your mid 1800s shopper - including an apothecary, dentist office, barbershop and surgery center. 

Leeches - Modern Medicine!

We kept running into what we surmised to be a married gay couple.  Originally from the LA area, they sold their house there for "7 figures" then retired to a bigger house in southern Vermont.  A couple of nice guys.




We left there about 5:00 PM and went to the place we parked our car the night before.  We did a sunset dinner cruise around the lake.  BBQ chicken, roast beef and a ton of carb-laden foods.  It was about as well as could be expected food-wise.  Still, about 2 1/2 hours going west to the NY coast of Lake Champlain, then south, then west and back north to Burlington.  A lot of people onboard. employees from some corporate company, a ton of Russian exchange students and a crew of mostly other foreign students working there for the summer - hoping to travel a little in the US before gong home.  Our waiter was Valentin from Romania.  Nice kid.  I hope we tipped him enough.

Got back to Burlington about 9:00 PM.  A little drama at the hotel.  Neither of our card keys worked to open the side door we were using.  Some fellow travelers had to get in using that door, so they let us enter with them.  Then we discovered our cards didn't work for our rooms either!  A quick trip to the desk.  They had us down for another night, but apparently the key system doesn't talk to the reservation system.  The key system only had us for one night.  Easily remedied. 

Tomorrow - TBD.  But we do have a reservation for dinner at the North Hero Inn at 6:00 PM and then going directly to Montreal!  Woo Hoo!

NE Trip 2016
Day 2 - Monday Aug 29 2016

Seems like we did a lot today.  I'll try to recap without too much detail (can I do that?).  But I do have a few pics.

Ate breakfast at the Lake Front Motel (I think they called it a hotel - we beg to differ) restaurant.  Not terrible.  At least not as bad as the room - #24.  Very small, very uncomfortable - especially for the price we paid!  Absolutely no counter space in the bathroom.  Standalone pedestal sink - small.  The bed filled the room with barely enough left for a small table and a dresser.  I believe we had to step around each other to move around.  The good things about the room - it was clean and close to the main drag in Cooperstown.  The staff we met were actually kind of nice, despite what some reviewers said.  Thank god we only had one night there.  Neither one of us slept well that first night. We don't recommend this place and would NOT stay here again.
After we ate we took a walk for about an hour.  Someone mentioned the Otesaga Hotel.  Really high end place.  Quite beautiful and opulent.  It's how the other half (or 1%) does Cooperstown.
Here's the place where we had dinner last night

Mel's at 22

One more interesting thing about Cooperstown which is on Otego Lake.  The lake is the source for the Susquehanna River that flows south to the Chesapeake.

A tribute to the Susquehanna

Lake Otego - south is to the right

Not much else to do in Cooperstown.  We decided to leave.  Next stop - Burlington, VT.

As soon as we started out, we made the decision to stop at Lake George.  Not really out of the way, just a shift in the road to Burlington.  It was a good decision.  Lake George was surprisingly like an upscale Ocean City, MD - but even nicer than that.  The Lake is a BIG attraction - lots of people.

Lake George - looking north

We had a little snafu selecting the restaurant we wanted to try, but the place we ate at wasn't terrible.  Although I liked my food more than Janice liked hers.  I went to the men's room and found a relic of a "personal products" machine.  Yep - condoms for a quarter!  It wasn't operational, but I thought this was interesting:

MMMmm... Hot Fudge Flavored!

We stayed at Lake George for about an hour and a half then took off for Burlington.  Because we stopped at Lake George we went north along the west side of the lake instead of the east side of the lake.  Time wise - about the same.

So Burlington... Got to our hotel sometime around 5:00 PM.  Got settled in then drove to downtown Burlington - on the Bay.  About a 10 minute ride.  Nice ride that took us past the colleges.
Once in town we sort of got frustrated with finding parking, but finally found meters that weren't in effect after 6:00 PM.  We got there about 6:30.  Free Parking - Woo Hoo!
Saw a really nice sunset over the bay

Burlington Bay

We walked the short boardwalk.  It really is a boardwalk - no stores or other buildings.  Short, but nice.  We saw some crew teams working out.  We assumed they were from the local schools.  Walked around a bit more.  And finally settled on a place called The Skinny Pancake for dinner - it was a crepe place.  And they were having a free comedy show - well comedians working for tips,  Only got to see a couple.  They were OK.  The food was very good though.  We left after eating even though they were having a comedy open mic.

The Skinny Pancake

Walked a bit and decided to splurge on Vermont Ice Cream.  We found a crowded place practically on the water.
We both got creemee (soft serve ice cream).  Twist of Vermont Maple and raspberry.  Delicious!

Burlington Bay Market & Cafe

As we ate our ice cream, we walked up College St. a few blocks to Church St.  The Church Street Marketplace is about 6 blocks where cars aren't allowed on the street. Only 2-3 street actually allow traffic to cross Church.  Very nice.  Restaurants and shops.  We saw something similar in Charlottesville a few years ago.

Church Street Marketplace

Back to our hotel.  We were going to map out tomorrow, but Janice was beat and fell asleep.  I settled into updating the blog.   We'll see what tomorrow brings!

Sunday Aug 28 2016
1st leg of the trip
After much bustle, we finally pulled out of OM a few minutes after 10:00 AM.
We drove up to Hunt Valley and caught 83 north.  All the way up to the Harrisburg area, then onto to 81 north.  Ride was uneventful.  About 1:00 PM we decided to stop for lunch.  Scranton - a little local internet cafe type of place across from a church, called Zummo's

 

Nice place.  A bunch of locals, mostly younger, mostly on laptops or other devices.
The food was pretty good.  We both got chicken salad on whole wheat pita.  the chicken salad had cranberries in it.  Fresh and good.  I also got a cup of the daily special soup - zucchini and corn.  Cream based.  Very good, but I got it cold.  They zapped it for me.  Much better.

We were there about 30-40 minutes then took off again looking for a return to RT 81 north.  It got a little complicated, but after a turnaround, we got back on track.
This turned out not to be such an uneventful segment of the trip.  We were quickly into NY when we ran into some roadwork delay.  Seemed like we hit at least 2-3 stretches of roadwork - on a Sunday. There wasn't any work actually being done, but parts of the road were closed.
It was just before one of these stretches in NY that I was driving along side an 18 wheeler.  I was in the left lane, he was in the right lane - just two lanes.  I was moving a bit faster than him and maybe a car length or two ahead of him, when all of a sudden he sped up. That didn't bother me until I saw the sign that said left lane closed ahead.  We were heading to a single lane and another sign said roadwork next 12 miles.  I didn't feel like being behind the truck, so I decided to pass him before we got to the road narrowing.  I sped up along side him, intending to pass him (I was on his left).  Just as I was getting to the cab end of the truck, he sort of lurched in our direction.  Janice screamed and veered off a little toward the left shoulder.  It was a narrow miss, but I hit the accelerator and pulled ahead of him just seconds before the road narrowed.  Then the asshole tailgated me for close to a mile before backing off - actually I think we hit a hill and he just lost the battle of gravity,  The road widened to two lanes again and stayed away from him moving to right lane.  He, of course, passed me.  Then he sort of did a jig in the road - turning onto the left shoulder and back again - almost seemed intentional.  Or maybe he was drunk.  Anyway, after a few miles we had to exit.  Thank goodness he kept on straight.
One other mild adventure of note.  There was a guy keeping pretty close behind me.  I considered moving over, but there was slower traffic in the right lane.  He kept tailgating me. I happened to notice a NY State Trooper in a nook to the left side ahead of us.  I immediately slowed down to let traffic right of me move ahead of me, so I could slow down and move over.  I dropped my speed to 65 from 75.  The guy behind me apparently didn't see the cop until too late.  In my rear view mirror, I watched the cop enter the highway, start to tail us - me in front, the other guy behind me, the cop behind him.  A few seconds later the cop's lights went on and I drove off as I watched the cop pull him over.
Tough luck my friend.  But better you than me.
An hour and a half later we pulled into our place in Cooperstown - The Lake Front Motel.

Nice view from outside our room, but in general we aren't thrilled with the place.  Very small, maybe a bit musty or maybe it's from being close to the water.  But the good part... very close to the main drag in town.

Eddie

Cal

Earl

Frank

Jim

Brooks

We walked to the Baseball Hall of Fame, about 5-10 minutes away. We spent about 2-2 1/2 hours there.  Very cool stuff for a baseball fan.  Even an armchair fan like I've become these past years. But still...

Nothing like being taken back to a time when you believed in heros!







Dinner at Mel's on 22 - 2 block walk from the BBHF.  Burgers were good.uninviting as it is.
Back to the room - more to come tomorrow!

NE TRIP 2016

So here we go again.  Been a little over a year since our trip to California and Oregon in 2015.
This year, it's the northeast.   NE Trip 2016!
Our original intent was to do a foodie vacation in New England.
We modified a bit.  Still New England.  Still looking to find neat places to eat - but they could be an out of the way diner or a fancy restaurant, or whatever strikes our fancy.
It's just a road trip at this point.
We'll be leaving Sunday Aug 28 2016. Leaving Owings Mills and heading to Cooperstown NY.  Our first ever visit to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Then on to Burlington VT.  We actually are hoping to run into Bernie Sanders.  I know it's a long shot, but what the heck - we're on vacation.
Next, we're shooting north into Canada.  Janice has been to Montreal before, but it was well before we were married - 39 years this coming October.  After a couple days in Montreal we head up a little northeast to Quebec City. 
A couple days later we'll be motoring southeast across Maine to Bar Harbor on the Atlantic coast.
Then to Portland ME for a night before driving to Boston MA.
We'll be in Boston for a couple of days before heading home.  We do have another day between Boston and home, but we're casting ourselves upon the mercy of the wayfarer's wind. Whither thou bloweth, there shall we lay our weary heads.

Hoping to do a daily update here.  More as a journal of our travels than a need to share with family and friends.  Although we are more than happy to share this site with family and friends.

A little map of the intended journey