Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3 – Part 4 – Part 5
July 3 found us in Washington, DC. We were there 12 nights, and we really had not hoped to be there on the 4th, because of perceived crowds, etc.. It turned out that the crowds never really materialized.
While there, we took the subway into town each day, and visited many museums and many memorials. I was reminded of when Michael, Rachael, David, and I went to DC in 1982. My plan was to see all the museums on the first day and all the memorials on the 2nd day. LOL!
On the 4th, we were wandering in the misty humid air and found this unassuming pagoda. It advertised “Striking Iron: The Art of African Blacksmiths.” Why not? We entered.
“Going down?” the elevator operator asked.
We looked at each other. “Sure.”
And we were taken down to the most amazing totally underground museum! It was as if it were almost a secret. It turns out that it’s a traveling exhibit, and we just got lucky. Here are a few pictures. You can see far more of this fascinating exhibit here.
After dark, they started the big extravaganza fireworks show. Apparently, nobody really knew how to do fireworks in the humid conditions of that evening.
After the first few, the rest were buried in a dense cloud of smoke. This was the first fireworks show that I ever left early. So disappointing.
The fifth of July was even hotter! We went to the National Botanical Gardens. The hothouses where they grow the tropical Amazon rainforest plants actually felt cooler than outside. We were telling people that we came to DC because Phoenix wasn’t hot enough.
On the 9th, we visited the Hirshhorn. Wow, what a museum!
On the 10th, we visited the American Indian Museum. Again, not many pics with my phone.
On 7/11, we visited the African American Museum. While there are large sections of the museum that are upbeat, positive, and beautiful, I was disturbed to a great degree by the bottom floor.
I’m disturbed now that I took so few pics with my phone. Of course, I had no idea that my camera would end up lost, along with all of its pictures.
An Aside from the African American History Museum:
In my history classes, we learned that the slaves were brought over here “in boats,” and I never gave it a thought what that meant.
In reality, they were brought on slave ships, in conditions unimaginable to me. I will include here a diagram of a slave ship. This layout of a slave ship, describes how the traders could skirt the rules for how many slaves to put in the holds of the ship, by arranging them carefully. This diagram, based on the research of abolitionist Thomas Clarkson, was given as evidence during British Parliamentary hearings.
In the upper right corner, this reads, “Note: The Brookes after the Regulation Act of 1788 was allowed to carry 454 Slaves. She could stow this number by following the rule adopted in this plate namely of allowing a space of 6ft by 1ft 4in to each man, 5ft 10in by 1ft 4 in to each woman, 5ft by 1ft 2in to each boy, but so much space as this was seldom allowed even after the Regulation Act. It was proved by the confession of the Slave Merchant that before the above act the Brookes had at one tome carried as many as 609 Slaves. This was done by taking some out of Irons & locking them spoonwise, to use the technical term, that is, by stowing one within the distended legs of the other.”
For more information on this, please see the following links:
The trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Sourcebook
Social history for every classroom
Pennsylvania was next. Harrisburg or bust! We loved our RV park in Harrisburg, and the little church where we went on Sunday.
That’s where Jack discovered the delicious cheese pretzels for which we will be searching for the rest of our lives. Hint: They’re made close to Harrisburg. And I think that they are Tom Sturgis.
We loved the chocolate museum in Hershey. We also, of course, loved their chocolate gift shop. The Capitol was beautiful, and you can see more pics from there on my Harrisburg page here.
A few days later, we were in Newburgh, NY. We drove across the toll bridge to the little town of Beacon. There, we parked along the street and perused the little shops before grabbing lunch in a tiny cafe.
After lunch, we drove around a bit in search of a park. I knew that there had to be a park. And we found one! I can’t seem to find the park on the map; I don’t think it was a big state park. But I got a few pictures. The first 3 were from the dock at Newburgh.
Here’s another reason we love to have a tow car with us, even in a small RV. This isn’t a road we would have ridden a bike on. Ever. And we would not have been able to park even a small RV close to where we were. Our RV park in Newburgh was pleasant enough; we’d have just stayed there instead of going off wandering.
Next, we visited my Auntie in Madison CT for lunch at Lenny and Joes. And, for dinner, we dined with our friend Anne in Branford.
After a short but fun stop in Connecticut, we were off to Rhode Island.
Rhode Island brought us many adventures. Our first was the mansion tour we took in Newport.
These next pics are from The Breakers — the summer cottage that Cornelius Vanderbilt had built for his family..
After our tour, we drove back to Hopewell, to our campsite. This is where Jack realized that he didn’t have his phone. We learned a lesson that day: don’t leave your phone on top of your car and drive away.
We found a Verizon store and the gentleman was happy to sell us new phones. Mine had been so full of stuff, and it was a few years old, I opted to get one, too.
And it was in Hopewell, RI, at our RV park, where Jack had his first Lobster Boil. (I had ice cream!)
I have not talked about it much, but, my goodness, was it HOT in the northeast! We were most grateful to come home to our RV and its fine A/C every night!
Even on a 151-day journey, one has days that one must hustle along, or you won’t make it home by winter! We left RI on 7/24 and drove up to Freeport, Maine.
We stayed at a fine park outside of Freeport — the Freeport/Durham KOA. We stayed there a week and took in many of the nearby sights, thanks to the run-around-ability of our little Fit.
It’s probably in the tour guide rulebooks not to go to the Breakers and then go to any other Victorian-era mansion. But here we are in Portland, Maine, and we visited the Victoria Mansion. Its Italianate style is plenty ornate and it’s very well-preserved.
This was a home built for Ruggles Sylvester Morse and his wife Olive between 1858 and 1860. He made his fortune in the hotel business in New Orleans. Read more here.
The following day, July 25, we took the car to Portland and hopped the Bailey Island Ferry. This little boat took us around lighthouses and little islands, eventually landing at Bailey Island.
Boothbay, Maine has a wonderful place: Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens. We loved our day there.
The following day, 7/28, we returned to Bailey Island, this time in our car. We found the Devil’s Staircase and were all set to climb it and … it wasn’t really a staircase!
The following day, we drove the rig to Eustis, Maine and set up camp at Cathedral Pines Campground. Nearby, there was a one-way narrow road (again, not one I’d take even a small RV on) which circled up to a pretty lookout. I wish I could remember the name of it.
