Accidental Vacation Day 8

This morning we left Suffolk (the Virginia Beach area) and headed south to Morehead City.  On the way down we crossed over from Virginia to North Carolina.

We went out to Kill Devil Hills which is where the Wright brothers flew for the first time.

We listened to a talk about the Wright Brothers and it seems that while the Wright brothers flew first, the biggest contribution they made was the science and engineering behind wind design and flight control.  They invented a wind tunnel and tested over 200 different wing shapes to determine which gave the most lift and the least drag.  They also fine tuned propellers this way.  Secondly was their invention of wing warping which allowed a plane to control roll in addition to pitch and yaw which were controlled by elevators and a rudder.  Connecting the rudder to the wing warping mechanism allowed for truly controlled flight.  Really neat stuff.

The rail below the plane in the picture of their first flight above is the rail in front of the rock below (or a replica).  The rock is where the plane first lifted off and the 4 stone markers in the distance are the landing points for the 1st 4 flights.  Additionally they didn’t make any more flights that year after the 4 because the wind picked up and tossed the plane end over end breaking it into pieces.

The Wright brothers wrote to the Smithsonian institute to give them a list of locations with steady wind and lots of sand which is how they found Kill Devil Hills.  It was indeed windy the whole time we were there.

On the way out of town, we drive by the city of ManTeo which was cool.

and a nice sunset

We made it to our hotel in Morehead City and then went to Atlantic Beach and had dinner on the boardwalk which was really good.  Upon leaving the restaurant, we found some sea faring creatures that looked like they needed to be ridden.

Accidental Vacation Day 7

We had a relaxing morning at the hotel and breakfast with Andrea and Isaac before heading out. The plan for today was pretty much just to drive since everyone said not to bother with Delaware. They were right.

This is an east coast thing I guess, but instead of Carl’s Jr. and Green Burrito like they have in California, there’s Hardee’s and Red Burrito in Delaware.

The unfortunate thing about driving south (when you’re in the northern hemisphere) is that the sun is in front of you and consequently very hot. While not pretty, the umbrella did help with the sun issue but would have been bad if the airbag went off.

The most exciting thing in Delaware was probably when we got gas and found out that we were getting 35mpg instead of the 31 or 32 we got previously. This is likely due to the 45 and 55mph speed limits. One guy was nice though and head a sign in his front yard that warned us of the speed trap ahead.

Whoo, Virginia.

We paid our most expensive toll yet (unless you count the ferry from Connecticut to Long Island) for the bridge/tunnel toll across the opening to Chesapeake Bay. That would be Chesapeake Bay behind us.

We got to our hotel just relaxed for the evening since we spent 6 hours driving 290 miles today. At least there wasn’t any traffic so that was nice.

Accidental Vacation Day 6

Whereas the eastern tip of Long Island was really beautiful, as we drove west, it got pretty boring. However there were a few town names that amused us.

As we drove towards Manhattan we saw the below which is supposedly from the world’s fair, but really we remember it from the movie Men In Black. Culture isn’t our (my) stongpoint.

I like that the NYPD decided that they would commandeer the CPR acronym and make it their own.

Val’s skills at taking a picture out the window behind her with her left hand. Empire State Building.

Then we went through the Lincoln Tunnel and saw signs that campers (specifically) cannot have propane bottles in the tunnel.

After we got on the New Jersey turnpike I was able to get a shot of the Manhattan skyline. The picture is a little slanty, but we were on a 360 degree off/onramp and I was holding the camera out the window above the car trying to see above the guardrail since our little Aveo is so short.

Turns out that, like Oregon, you cannot pump your own gas in New Jersey (they have a code that locks you out from operating the pump) which meant that our stop for gas took 15 minutes despite being right off the freeway.

We met up with Andrea and Isaac at the hotel and then carpooled into Atlantic City for the afternoon. We wandered the boardwalk and had dinner and looked around a couple of the casinos.

So there’s 2 funny things about the picture below. First is that our friend Matt is too tall for the parking garage we parked in. 2nd is the claim that the extra $2 we’re paying for parking is for city beautification. Seems like it should be more.

Accidental Vacation Day 5

This morning we left Wells Maine started our trek south. We decided to take the ferry from New London Connecticut onto Long Island instead of driving all the way around through the city. The ferry was a really nice hour and a half ride.

Some pictures from the ferry ride…

Turns out Long Island is pretty rural and really beautiful. Lots of vineyards and farms and such.

We got to the hotel early enough to go to the gym before dinner which was great but then took a wrong turn on the way to dinner and ended up out in the boondocks. On the plus side, we found the “Eagles Nest” restaurant at a golf course. We would have eaten there but golf courses seem to close when it gets dark. FYI, this is funny because we have some friends who named their blog the Eagles Nest.

Accidental Vacation Day 4

This morning we left Peabody, MA and did a quick drive over to Salem to see the witch museum. Turns out the museum was sold out so we had to wait an hour and a half to get in. We made our way to the 2nd oldest cemetery in the US (according to the witch museum people) where there was a memorial to the 20 people who died during the witch trials. 19 were hanged, but one guy refused to admit that he was a witch so he was pressed to death. Not a good way to go. Had he admitted he was a witch (after being convicted of it of course) he would have been hanged and all his property forfeited to the state. Refusing to admit it meant an agonizing death, but his family got to keep their property.

The witch museum was pretty interesting, but sad as well. On a happy note, we had a really good hot pastrami sandwich for lunch.

We saw this house on the way into town and really liked it so we stopped for a picture on our way out.

New Hampshire! Do you think Bruce Willis had to license the slogan?

So it’s hard to tell in this picture, but it’s a freeway traffic circle. Crazy.

Maine. The way life should be apparently.

We drove along the coast partly to avoid the toll roads and partly to see the water. There’s a whole vacation community that looked pretty neat except that 30% of the houses were for sale.

Incidentally the fire station was also for sale.

Eventually we checked into our hotel and got a recommendation for a good place to get some lobster, this being Maine and all. Mnn, the famous lobster stuffed lobster. It was gooooood.

They also gave us an upgrade at the hotel that included a jet tub which was cool.

Accidental Vacation Day 3.5

So change of plans.  This trip was looking like too much driving so we decided to drop the roundtrip idea.  We’re now going to drop the car off in Orlando so we just have the drive south to do.  That will cut our daily driving from over 300 miles a day to about 160 if we only go to Orlando.  If we decide to make it down to the Florida keys, that’ll add some time but we’ll play it by ear.  We still get back to SFO at noon on Sunday the 26th.

Accidental Vacation day 3

This morning we saw the purported location of the first battle between the pilgrims and the Indians shortly after we left Connecticut and got into Rhode Island.  It’s over Val’s left shoulder.

Rhode island was beautiful but hardly counts as a State it’s so tiny.  It does have the barking crab restaurant though which is cool.

Oh and they have corn in Rhode Island too.  :)

We then went to Newport and did the cliff walk and saw a bunch of the mansions on the water.

After the walk and some clam chowder and pizza for lunch we headed up to Boston for state number 3 of the day.  We followed the red line around the city for the historic walk which seemed to have an excessive number of cemeteries.  Here’s John Hancock’s burial plot which is in the same lot as several other signers of the declaration of independence and such.

Not much to say about these…

oh and we saw Paul Revere’s house (and jetta?).

We’re now in Peabody, MA and will head through New Hampshire and up to Maine tomorrow.  We’ll probably start back south too, but we’ll see.

Accidental Vacation Day 2

States in play….

Virginia

~DC~

Maryland

Delaware

New Jersey

Pennsylvania

New York

Connecticut

We got a late start today so we spent about 8 hours on the road driving ~325 miles. To be fair we took the long way around New York City in order to avoid some of the tolls (~$25 we’re told). We still ended up paying $16 in tolls though.

TastyKakes!

Val wasn’t as excited as i was about TastyKakes, but she got some Nutty Bars (the big box) and was quite happy about that.