Blue Ridge Parkway Trip - Day 2

Saturday, May 5, 2012

Traveled from milepost 0 - 85.9

We had breakfast at the hotel and then drove the guys to the beginning of the parkway. The day looked pretty good with only 40% chance of rain. It was overcast when they left but about 5 miles in it started to drizzle and then the drizzle turned to rain and it rained the rest of the day until we arrived at our next hotel. The clouds where low and some of the time we were driving either in the cloud or above it, very weird and kind of scary too since we couldn't see anything, scary especially for the bicyclists. It was good that the yellow center line was marked on the road otherwise we would not have known where the road was.

And off they go. . .

Karen and I stopped at several places. First at Rockfish Valley Overlook, then at Humpback Rocks where there was a mountain farm exhibit. After that we just stopped at several overlooks, if the weather would have been better we might have gotten more pictures, but as it was we couldn't really see much.

Rockfish Valley Overlook

Humpback Rock

Humpback Rock farm exhibit

Humpback Rock, main farm house

Humpback Rock, chicken coop

Humpback Rock

Humpback Rock, root cellar

Humpback Rock, bear proof pigsty

Humpback Rock, barn

We also stopped at James River where there was an old lock. We had to take a footbridge over the river to get there. We had a sort of small SAG stop at the parking lot there.

Rock Point Overlook

Flame Azaleas at Whetstone Ridge

James River

James River

James River Bridge, Parkway is above us.

Battery Creek Lock at James River

Battery Creek Lock at James River

Battery Creek Lock at James River

James River SAG stop

A traffic sign on top of a mountain

Driving inside a cloud

Our overnight spot was  Peaks of Otter Lodge. It is a very lovely place in the middle of the mountains and next to a small lake. Karen and I had a late lunch there. The guys finally arrived all soaking wet and freezing. They definitely needed a warm shower and dry clothes on. The hotel rooms were lovely but they did not have a TV, internet access not even a hairdryer. We had a lovely dinner in their dining-room.

One of the peaks at Peaks of Otter, view from the lodge dining room

Peaks of Otter, view from our balcony

Grounds at Peaks of Otter Lodge

Peaks of Otter Lodge

Giant Rhododendron

Blue Ridge Parkway Trip - Day 1

Friday, May 4th, 2012

We left early around 6:30am to go to the Blue Ridge Parkway trip. Poor Casey so wanted to go with us, but she had to stay home. She looked pretty sad. Our first stop was to have breakfast and ended up at the Burger King in Fishkill NY. Below is a picture of it, took it just because it looked so much different than any other Burger King we've seen.

Burger King, Fishkill, NY

Some light New Jersey Traffic

Some neat bridges in Harrisburg, PA

We decided to avoid the New York and New Jersey traffic and took I-84 to I-87 to I-287 to I-78 to I-81 and then in Harrisburg, PA headed down on Rt. 15 to Fredrick, Maryland to pick up Mark. We had lunch somewhere near Harrisburg at Wendy's. Mark and his family live on top of a mountain in this adorable old house from 1905 with carriage house and a lovely yard.

Mark's wife Karen, Mark and Jeff at their house

After we backed Mark's bike and stuff we headed towards I-81 to Waynesboro, Virginia. Karen and Joe were there already when we got there. We stayed overnight at the Quality Inn, with a whole bunch of other bicyclists who were doing the Skyline Drive. The hotel was pretty bad with noisy air-conditioner and  running toilet, we had to turn the water off for the night since it kept us awake.

Mark, Karen and Joe

Dinner at Scotto's Italian Restaurant, Waynesboro, PA

I guess better late than never. Here is the rest of our trip to Sarnia and about Easter, well sort of Easter, with the kids:

Wednesday was a busy day. When others went shopping Denise and I decided to clean and reorganize our mother-in-laws bedrooms. We did need the guys help carrying the bed and folding sofa from room to room. We cleaned both her bedroom and the den and changed the beds and furniture from room to room all along hoping that she would like what we did.We thought it looked better and now she has more floor space in the den, plus her own bed. Unfortunately I forgot to take before pictures, but here are the after pictures. If we had had more time we might have even painted the walls.

Den/new bedroom

                                Old bedroom/new den











Also later that day our nephew Adam came over with her fiancee  Adrianne. They just recently got engaged. We had pizza from Firenze's, another Sarnia tradition. We celebrated both Dave's and Mom Phyl's birthdays, which were not too long ago. Here are also some pictures of Dave and his family

Dessa and Daniella

                                                  Dave

Denise and Adrianne

                  Adrianne and Adam

On the way back home on Saturday we stopped in Rochester for overnight, where Matt joined us. We had dinner in the restaurant Laura was working and she ended up being our waitress. The next morning we had Easter breakfast together at Laura's friend Theresa's place where she was dog sitting for a week. After that we just drove home.

Laura, our waitress @ the Village Inn, Fairport, NY

                                                            Laura, our waitress

Lady, the cute "little" puppy

       My family :)

A Sarnia tradition for years now: have to have fries under the bridge. It is a cold day, well not cold, but there is a cold wind from the lake. Jeff and I bicycled there and back through Canatara Park. It was about 4 miles there and back.

Blue Water Bridge over St. Clair River

Lake Huron and the beginning of St. Clair River

Made it to Sarnia, Ontario. Left on Saturday morning on a nice sunny day. We stopped at Matt's place and had lunch with him. His place is quite nice when you think that it's all free too. Lunch was lovely (service a bit slow but then again he was a new waiter), at the Raspberries restaurant in Utica, New York. Then it started drizzling as we drove north. We went and checked into a hotel near Buffalo airport and then drove to Laura's boyfriend Jeff's house. He has a cute little Cape Cod style house in Orchard Park. We had dinner with them in Buffalo's Fat Bob's Smokehouse.

Sunday morning there was a pea soup fog all over Buffalo. There weather was not much better across the border, like it usually is in weather reports. Meaning there is nothing in Canada, while the States has clouds and rain etc. We took the long way to Sarnia. Went through towns I have never been. Took about an hour longer than the highway but there was not traffic.

Sunday Jeff and I went for a short bike ride through the park but it was really windy and cold. The weather has not been much better since then. Today, Wednesday was a bit warmer, but it is cooling down again and the wind has started blowing from the north. Jeff has been working everyday while I've been doing this and that. Found a craft store in town. I think it's fairly new and has a good selection of bit of everything. I did one kumihimo necklace and organized some photos and made a Shutterfly photo album. They had an offer I could not refuse this week. A free 8x8 album, just pay postage.



After 120,000 miles our gas tank is finally empty ;)












Is it a boat . . .  or a caboose???

No. . . it's a DOT truck from Connecticut going to somewhere in upstate New York 

 

Very strange looking cloud formations

 

Matt's apartment building from the back. His place is on the second floor

Matt's place from the front. Still all the 2nd floor windows are his place.

West end of the Welland Canal, Ontario

Just loved this house. Forgot which town it is in.

And that bicycle kept following us all the way.

Some freighters docked in Sarnia

Canadian Coast Guard kept their boats in that marina also. There were 3 of them.

  Kumihimo necklace I made this week