Vacation AAR...

...or, It's Been A While, But I'm Still Alive...

Yeah.

With the recent happenings in the news, I really haven't been feeling it in the ol' blog department, sorry. I'm unhappy with the state of what passes for political discourse in this country; dumbfounded that the choice comes down to a reality TV star and someone who, in a just world, would be serving time for treason; and heartbroken that, yet again, we have a terrorist wreaking death and destruction that gets blamed on inanimate objects.

Plus I went on vacation.

One thing those of you that have moved away from home can appreciate is that it pretty much automatically cuts your vacation time down, dramatically. You still want to see family and friends from the old place, so a few times a year you make the trek back from whence you came. I actually had a "first" this trip - I managed to make the trip without GPS.

It's about 500 miles from the new house in Virginia to my old neighborhood in MA, give or take a few miles. It takes us through Maryland, Delaware and into New Jersey, where we break from the GPS directions and split off onto the Garden State Parkway to do *around* NYC rather than through it. It adds about 20 miles to the journey but probably saves a half-hour of sitting in traffic, plus the pucker factor of driving 95 through NYC. The trip typically takes anywhere from a little over 8 hours to as long as 13 (that was the Sunday after Thanksgiving the year I moved).

So, the schedule for the week looked like this:

Saturday: Up at dawn to drive North.
Sunday: Father's Day breakfast with my family, then the Red Sox game at Fenway with my wife's. Got to run the bases with my kids, which was pretty much the highlight of the trip.

Not too many more of these opportunities, I fear. Before long, TheBoy will most likely have a job, so we'll have to plan trips around his work schedule. I remember growing up, my vacations with my mom & dad pretty much ended after high school, so we might have 2-3 more years.

Monday: Beach day!

Tuesday we headed up to the cabin in Maine, and spent the next couple days on the lake:

Interestingly enough, both kids managed to get in touch with their MA BFFs, and we took a total of four kids up to the cabin. In years past, we've harped on the kids to contact their friends when we had a trip north planned. Typically we start nagging a couple months out, and it culminates in frantic calls and pleading texts on the ride up. This year, because things were so hectic, we didn't even mention it; yet both kids independently got in touch with their best friends in MA and arranged for them to come along. We have found that, counter-intuitively, having more kids actually makes life easier - the kids pair up and leave each other alone.

Friday we left Maine in the late morning, drove down to MA and dropped the friends off, then went to my folks for the afternoon. Stayed for dinner and conversation after, then headed back to VA around 9 PM. Other than a spot of construction-related traffic literally two towns over from where my folks live, it was a smooth, quick ride home and we pulled into our driveway around 5 AM. It was exhausting, but a great trip overall. We never seem to have enough time to see everyone we want to see, and this trip proved no exception...

Glad to be back home and sleeping in my own bed, that's for sure!

That is all.

Fairwell and Fair Seas...

As of Sunday, for the first time in nearly 20 years we will no longer own a camper. Our home-away-from-home, the traveling sanctuary that has served us so well in the White Mountains, at the beach, on Cape Cod, and elsewhere will be picked up by her new owners and given a new set of adventures.

Farewell, old friend.

We bought the camper in March, 2007. That's seven and a half years, with an average of two or three trips a year. Some years we took it out more, a couple we didn't even get it out once. Even if the move to VA hadn't forced our hand, I think we'd have been looking to sell it in a year or two, anyways. The Dodge has another couple years in her (at least); I think we'd have sold the camper before trading it in and avoided another pickup.

But that's neither here nor there.

The biggest reason is that the kids are growing up. The last time we took the camper out - when TheBoy was 12 and BabyGirl G. was 10 - TheBoy complained about the bunk bed being too small. He had a much better time sleeping on a cot in a small tent with me than on the family trip - sure, part of that was the one-on-one attention, but I think the bigger part is the independence. He's asserting more and more every day, testing limits and boundaries, etc. and I think the last place he wants to spend a week is a small metal box with mom & dad...

Besides, we have a lot of exploring to do here in Virginia without bringing a camper along...

It's going to a friend-of-a-friend, through a family who lived on our street that also owns a travel trailer. They're going to be able to camp together, that sort of thing, and will get many years of fun out of the trailer; certainly more than we would have gotten. Their kids are younger, the folks buying the trailer are younger, I think she's going to a good home.

It got me to thinking, though. Some of my favorite memories growing up involved the small class C camper my folks owned. They bought it when I was 5 - I remember one of our first trips in it was a road trip out to visit family in Minnesota, and my sister was just a baby - and sold it when I was either 10 or 11. My folks had that little van-front camper for less time than we had our travel trailer, yet I still, some 30+ years later, have vivid memories of it. I remember nights spent listening to the foghorns of the ships passing through the canal as I "slept" on the bunk over the cab. I remember walking on the beach at dusk, collecting seashells.


I hope my kids have the same types of happy memories from our camper, and I hope the folks who bought it make some memories of their own...

That is all.

So, About That Monday...

Yeah, about that... Well, here's the thing. We took a long weekend and brought the kids to Busch Gardens in Williamsburg. We figured it was a good way to get the kids more interested in the area, and two days in an amusement park second only to Six Flags New Jersey (this is high praise, the kids tell me) appears to have helped.

We managed to hit all five of the big roller coasters multiple times in two days, and the children seem to have had a good time. That, of course, means that they fought a *little* less than usual, but as we've come to realize with our kids, we take the little victories.

The funny part about going to Busch Gardens is that I was here when I was a teenager. A friend of mine that I worked with at the local supermarket attended East Carolina University, and asked if I wanted to road trip down to help him move back in. I had time off, sounded like fun, so off we went on a road trip. It's pretty amazing, all things considered, but the single biggest memory I have from the trip is learning to drive a standard transmission (in a Mazda B2000 pickup) on the New Jersey Turnpike, with the toll booths every 20 feet...

Good times, good times...

That is all.


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Yet ANOTHER Upside to Living in VA...

I'm about half an hour from here:

Udvar-Hazy Center

So, my wife's sister came for a visit this past weekend, and since Udvar-Hazy is only about a half-hour away (and free, other than parking), we decided to head there for the morning. Her daughter is 7 and a fan of things that fly, so it was was a natural fit. Me, I was all-too-eager to head back to the center, having been there twice before, once with a good friend in 2002, once with my family and OldNFO (which, if you can swing it, totally ROCKS. NFO gives a good tour...)

Anyhoo, onto the pics!

My favorite plane, the SR-71 Blackbird

Off to the wild [gray] yonder

Shot of the floor - pretty packed!

Ongoing restoration project; not sure what it was.

Space Shuttle Discovery. You don't realize how beat up these things get...

This is the blistering technology used to put man in space...

This was really cool. The plaque reads: "To mark man's first landing on the moon the boomerang, the first aerodynamic shape conceived by man."

Way too cool.

Gossamer Albatross. First human-powered aircraft.

Danger zone!

Yeah, it was a good weekend...

That is all.

Scenes From My Summer Vacation...

Okay, I've been back for a week now, and summer's close drawing fast. Here's a few pictures from my recent camping trip to Cape Cod, and I hope it brings out just why I love the Cape so much...

There's the beach:

The Cape, being protected by the "arm" that sweeps out into the Atlantic, has gentler waters than northern shores. The undertow is nowhere near as severe as it is on the New Hampshire border, nor is the current as strong as further south. It makes for great swimming and body surfing for the kids, and a (little) less worrisome for Mom & Dad.

In the background is the jetty that lines the canal that goes out to the Atlantic proper. You can climb the rocks all the way out to the lighthouse on the end, and we did that on several occasions this trip. It's not particularly challenging, although BabyGirl G. did fall into a crevasse at  one point. A couple small scrapes and one scared little girl later, we discussed the importance of paying attention...

This is one of my favorite shots:

That's the boardwalk leading to the beach from the entrance to the state preservation. There's a little snack shop complete with concrete tables straight out of 1970, staffed by high school and college kids that seem to get younger every years. I love the shot looking up the boardwalk; it captures the beach potential, as just over that rise lies the sand and the surf.

The canal is always a great place to see some really nice boats:

That's a double hull catamaran we saw sailing the canal on several occasions. While I've never had the sailing bug, it's easy to see how being on the water can be an addiction.

And, for the motorheads:

The classic dune buggy, complete with fiberglass body and Volkswagen Bug chassis and engine. I love the boogie boards on top - they're still on the car as opposed to being out on the water for one simple reason: there's no flotation devices allowed on the state beach. There's also very little "surf" to speak of on the Cape, at least nothing more than a foot or so. Still looks cool, though...

Considering that I took well over 1,400 pictures, I may have some more to post later...

That is all.

Last Day Of Vacation...

Technically, it's really tomorrow, but all we're going to do tomorrow is break camp, drive home, empty the camper, and then I'm going to mow the lawn. Not really what I consider a vacation day. Today is our last day down on the Cape; our last 24 hours of real *vacation* time. It's the moment we've been dreading since we unhitched the camper from the truck last Friday, and it's rapidly approaching.

So what do we do? We sleep in, of course! The great thing about this vacation has been that we *have* to do exactly jack and squat. If we want to hang around inside the camper all morning playing "Plants Vs. Zombies" we do. If we feel like taking off at dinner time to go climb on the rocks at the canal, we do. Bedtimes are relaxed, mornings aren't rushed, and the days are a lot less hectic. That's what a vacation is supposed to be IMHO.

We also see cool stuff like this:


That's a Winnebago Brave from sometime in the 1970s. It looks like it has been used but well-cared for; there's honest wear on it and evidence that it's no show queen. They're around the corner from us and we pass it every time we head to the canal for a bike ride or rollerblading on the canal path.

It brings back strong memories, seeing that Winnie and being on the Cape. I've been coming to this campground since I was about 4 or 5, right about when that Winnebago would have been new. If only someone had a 1970s Dodge class C camper with the *awful* orange shag carpeting then I could really relive my youth...

Back to the daily grind next week, and normal grousing and blogging to resume...

That is all.

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Yes, More Vacation Blogging...

TheBoy and I have been doing a fair amount of bonding this vacation. From throwing a football at the beach (I seem to be improving at it, which is quite odd) to rollerblading along the canal, we have been spending a good deal of time together doing stuff - and also talking.

One of the things we've been doing is riding our bikes on the canal - there is a seven mile long path that runs along the canal (on both sides) that was a road built during the construction for ferrying equipment and workers to and from the active work site. After completion, the roads were turned into foot- and bicycle paths for public use. Going from our campground at the Cape side of the canal to the end (the ocean side) is seven miles out, seven miles back, for a total of 14 miles roundtrip. TheBoy was pleased to be able to make the round trip this time out.

He's standing in front of the Cape Cod Canal Railroad bridge at the West end of the canal, just ahead of Mass Maritime Academy. That's the end of the Canal, but the halfway point of our biking. The first time we traversed the entire canal was three years ago. We stopped at least ten times on the way out and about as many on the way back, an I probably traveled more than double the length of the trail doubling back to make sure he was okay when he fell behind.

Now? He frequently leads the trek out. We're not quite at the stage where we have to stop more for Dad, but I can see it coming. It's nothing short of amazing watching him grow. I keep counting my blessings - I know it won't be long before he's too cool to be seen with dumb ol' dad, and I consider that every vacation where we do things together could be the last (at least the last without significant eyerolling and drama). It's going to be sad when that part ends, but it's all part of growing up.

Today we're going to attempt to rollerblade at least halfway down the Canal. We made it about 2.5 miles last time before he wanted to turn back; he's pretty sure we can make it halfway. The great part about the Canal path is the lack of cars/motorized traffic - he was pretty shaky on rollerblades when we started, but now he's zipping along like an old pro. It will not be long at all before he's skating rings around his old man, and I am fine with that. I will keep doing whatever he wants as long as he still wants his old man around.

And don't worry, I have similar stories for BabyGirl G. as well...

That is all.

What It's All About...

Took this shot yesterday morning:



The kids and I set out for the beach at low tide to find sand dollars. Mom G. *loooves* sand dollars and requested that we bring her back one, so the kids took it to heart that we had to find a sand dollar for Nona. Off we went, in the rain, to comb the beach at low tide for sand dollars.

We found exactly one; TheBoy managed to spot it in the customary half-circle in the sand. Hermit crabs the beach was lousy with 'em; sand dollars not so much. They must either be a lot better at hiding these days; either that or a lot worse and the seagulls are getting them.

I just loved the way this shot came out, with my son off in the distance and my daughter heading out to join him in the surf. They're having a blast down here on the Cape (although the Canal cruise bored them to tears), and their dad's having a pretty darn good time too). Today we've got a long day of climbing on rocks, riding bikes on the canal, and looking for more sand dollars.

It's a rough life, but someone's gotta lead it...

That is all.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

What An Age...

Had to share this one.
So, yesterday, I'm checking my e-mail on the iPad, and I got an e-mail on my home account that I had a voice mail message. I was able, from my camp chair in front of my camper, to listen to a voice mail message left on my home answering machine from a doctor's office about an appointment the Mrs. had made that needed to be changed.
Naturally, I thought, I have to blog this.
So, using the same iPad - which I paid extra to get the 3G-enabled version, because Mama G. didn't raise any dummies - I banged out this blog post while sitting in that same camp chair watching my daughter ride her new bike all through the campground. Self, I thought, life is pretty damn sweet.
I've been InstaBooking a good deal of the trip, taking random shots from around the Cape as we recreate. It's partially because I want to make y'all jealous, and partially because it's a great permanent record of "What I Did On My Summer Vacation". All I have to do is flip through my Instagram uploads or my Facebook posts to relive my vacation - I can even pull everything from this week into an album, saved forever.
I remember back when you'd get a couple rolls of film for the Kodak Instamatic, and you'd get those developed at FotoMat. After a week or so, you'd get the happy fun pouch of joy containing your 48 pictures (and the negatives, in case the urge to suddenly build a darkroom and make copies ever struck, I suppose). Usually, there'd be about three or four really good pictures out of the group, a couple dozen mediocre ones, and five or six that made you scratch your head and wonder what you were trying to accomplish.
We took a Canal Cruise yesterday. I took over 400 pictures of both sides of the canal. It would have cost me a small fortune just to *buy* the film, let alone develop it - we gave TheBoy two disposable cameras to take with him to Boy Scout camp, and it was $22 to develop 54 pictures! I can go back through the pictures I took and simply delete those that didn't work - although thanks to the viewscreen on the Nikon, most of those are deleted as they happen.
Technologically, this is the greatest time to be a photojournalist. Expect a bunch of photoblog posts next week when I get home and can process all these pictures. Right now I'm over 800 pictures in three days; I expect to top nearly 2K when all is said and done - and these will fit on one memory card.
There are times when I really like living in the future.
That is all.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Beach Bound...

With any kind of luck, in the next couple hours I will join the oppressive throng of humanity attempting to reach Cape Cod. I'm fully expecting the 110 mile trip to take me somewhere between 3.5 and 4 hours, between the normal crush of traffic in the outer Boston traffic ring to the absolute dead freakin' stop as you near the actual Cape and the bottleneck of the bridges leading over the Canal to the Cape proper. The children have been instructed to bring sufficient electronica and such to keep themselves amused for an extended period of time, so I'm cautiously optimistic that we might survive the trip.

I've got a few posts pre-loaded for next week and will be blogging when possible/the mood strikes. Having both a smartphone and a 3G iPad means I can surf the internet/Facebook/Instagram/blog from inside the camper, on the beach, or even at the fish pier. I'm bringing the good camera and also the HandyCam, so expect some vacation blogging. So far [knocks on wood] the weather report is favorable, and the Cape is a positively gorgeous area. Blogging will most likely be on the lighter side, unless we get a rainy day or two.

I'll be back and in full force soon enough, but for now, the batteries need a recharge...

That is all.

Moment(s) of Zen...

As we ease back into another work week, I felt the need to reflect on the recent camping trip to the beach. I brought my camera along to capture the reason I like to camp at the ocean. Indulge me, if you will, and enjoy the scenery...

This is the view at the start of the boardwalk which brings you from the parking lot to the beach. The feel of the wooden slats on bare feet just screams summer.

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Here's the view as you crest the dune. This particular excursion we were graced with the image of the lone sailboat out on the water, which made a wonderful contrast with the vast expanse of blue sky, open seas, and beach sawgrass.

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Midweek beach scene at high tide. You can see the northern MA coast merging with S. NH, continuing up and along as far as the eye can see.

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Lastly, the kids playing in the water. Growing up as close to the ocean as we do, it's easy to take for granted the simple pleasure of playing in the surf or building sandcastles as the tide goes out.

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I'm going to have to cook something on the grill tonight just to recapture a little of last week, I think...

That is all.

Vacation Pics...

Okay, had to lighten things up a bit with some photoblogging from the trip to Nevada. I took the family with me - the Mrs. had been to Vegas before and was eager to return, and the kids were excited about going. Las Vegas is one of those legendary places they hear about from their relatives, on TV, and even in video games; and they were excited about actually visiting the city they'd heard so much about. So without further ado, some pictures...

Dam!

Yep, the Hoover Dam itself. One of the seven marvels of engineering. It's far more impressive in person, and even more so when you read about how it was built.

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Turbine

We were fortunate in that one of the giant turbines that generate electricity was out for repair during our tour.

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Small but fast

Managed to capture this quick snapshot of this little guy while we walked to the gift shop. He was almost as quick as Caleb at SHOT...

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Our hotel

That's the Luxor at night. It's pretty neat looking...

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*The* Sign

The kids *had* to have their picture taken in front of the infamous "Welcome to Las Vegas" sign...

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No Bloomberg *here*

BabyGirl G. actually took this picture with her camera. I thought it came out pretty nice!

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Yeah, we had a pretty good time... But next year I think I'm going solo...

That is all.

Las Vegas...

Someone asked me how Las Vegas was. I tried to think of a proper response, but all I could think of was:

Take every cliché, every trope, every overdone Hollywood boilerplate movie about Las Vegas. Then triple it. Even then Vegas is way beyond that.

It's loud. It's bright. It's crowded as hell. There's no open container law, so folks are just walking around drinking. The crowd is either 20 something or late 50-something - there were very few people in our age group there. Apparently the push to make Vegas more family friendly is over - there's very little for kids to do and pretty much anything puts you into a casino, where they're not allowed.

But it is kinda neat at night:



Many more pictures to follow. We're going to do Hoover Dam today and walking the strip in the daytime, and then tomorrow the SHOT Show madness begins. I figure tonight we'll get some good pictures of the Strip (yay! Unburied the good camera!) and then there will be some better pictures... Especially at night - the above picture doesn't do it justice...

If there's one thing for sure, Las Vegas is truly a one-of-a-kind place...

That is all.