Category Archives: Roadtrips

Another stop we made was at Boldt Castle, which is situated on Heart Island in the middle of the St. Laurence River. It's in the process of being restored, but you can wander the entire castle - even the sections that have yet to be restored at all. We had to take a boat shuttle out to the castle, which Carter thought was pretty cool.

The inside of the castle was pretty cool. A lot of the plaster work has been repaired and the stained glass dome was impressive. And in addition to the main castle you can also walk around the boat house, the dove-cote, and the children's "playhouse" (which was a tower of its own, completed with a two-lane bowling alley in the basement).

During a hike at Robert Moses State Park - right on the Canadian border - we startled a raccoon while walking through the woods. It shimmied up a tree and stared at us for as long as we were within view. It was Carter's first time seeing a raccoon in the wild, and she thought he was pretty cute. The trail was super-muddy, unfortunately. But there was no one else there. The trail ran right along the St. Laurence River, and right across the river was Canada. Of course, it didn't look any different than our side of the river. I think Carter expected it to look obviously different.

One of our stops was at the Ben and Jerry's Factory near Burlington, VT. We took the tour and got ourselves a big bowl of ice cream afterwards. Carter was really impressed with the factory - she loved seeing the ice cream being made. We also saw the "Flavor Graveyard", where all the flavors that never caught on with the public end up.

Carter and I just returned from the road trip we've been planning for the last couple of months. We covered a little over a thousand miles and four states over the last four days. We're hoping to make this an annual thing, and to go somewhere new each time.

For this first trip we drove up to Burlington, VT and Lake Champlain, then along the St. Laurence River to Lake Ontario, through the Catskill Mountains (NY) and the Berkshires (MA) and back to New Hampshire. We got within a stone's throw of Canada, and passed through Mexico along the way - well Mexico, NY, at least. Heh.

Carter had a great time, and did amazing in the car - even on Day 3, when we had to drive for several hours without a stop. She looked out the windows and took pictures, colored her coloring book, listened and sang along to music with me, played road games - and when all else failed, she took naps. She loved staying in the hotels and swimming in the pools, too. And each morning she delighted in the various breakfast offerings at the hotels - I don't know where she was putting all that food.

We've got plenty of stop-specific details and photos to share, and will use them for a set of upcoming posts!

While in San Diego Lori and I checked out the museums and gardens of Balboa Park. The architecture down there was really amazing! Some of the buildings were so ornate.

This seagull hung out with Lori on the balcony for a while. I think he was hoping she'd give him something to eat. These same seagulls also hung out on the rooftop terrace where they serve breakfast. On several occasions I saw seagulls steal food right off of peoples' plates. They were pretty brave about it, too.

Here are some more photos from our walks around town while on vacation.

We checked out Sea World while in San Diego, as well. It was ok, but overly commercialized for my taste. It was more rides and games than animals, and even then every single animal exhibit forced you to walk through a gift shop on the way out. But the show we saw we saw with the seals was pretty entertaining.