NBNC>NY>STL>NY>NBNC: End of Summer 2015

Fireside at the site

Blink: today is May 8th and we have checked in at Mayfair Campground onto site 45 in Sylvan Beach NY;

Sadie

The "Glampers"

Blink: we have become friends with a group of upstaters; the Rosenburgs, the Brittons, the Bartons and the Browns. Our friendship quickly develops into a tight group; we have named ourselves “the Glampers”, aka glamorous campers.

Carol, Eric, Alex and Kyle

The Costello Family

Steve and Adrienne

Two at St. Thomas

Blink: it is July and we travel to Saint Louis to visit our children and grandchildren; we are re-energized with the love, laughter, reminisces, and memories of our amazing family.

Naussau

St. Thomas

Blink: we find ourselves cruising the open seas to the eastern Caribbean with the Glampers.  

St. Maarten

Day-trippers on tropical islands, themselves being paradoxes in affluence and abject poverty; communities that carry on without any concession to modern luxuries and resorts with panache on a par with Las Vegas. 

St. Maarten

Nighttime on the sea, when moonlight reflects near the horizon and the ebony of the southern skies intensely flaunts the bright swath of the Milky Way and some of the brightest stars in our galaxy.

St. Maarten

Antigua

Sunset at the Beach

Blink: it is September 28th and we end our summer journey returning to our home in New Bern.

Blink: 142 days where the sun has risen and set and the moon lit our evenings; days of leisure, of relaxation, of excursions on byways and highways, days of poignant, lasting memories imprinted on our hearts by aged parents declining in health.

Dave and Doug Costello

There are times when there are not enough words to sort out and express the feelings of these nearly 150 days in our rig. The impressions left on our hearts by so many. So here with a glimpse of our wonderful summer of 2015

Last fireside flames

Life is Short: Enjoy the Ride

NBNC>NY>MO July-August 2015

Our Daily Visitor

Thirty days hath September…..except for our summer road trip which hath 142 days. The first eighty days around upstate New York we have whiled the hours at campfires with fellow glampers and grill-to-table feasts.  Our new camaraderie, sparked by hours of ember glows have been keenly enjoyed with campmate Mayfair-ites and picnic table hopping to neighboring cohorts as we all indulge in pick-me-up liquid infusions and victuals. 

Debbie and Scott's Tree

 One of our congregations celebrated Christmas in July. On a warm, sun-filled Saturday Santa pulled into the campground on a John “Deer”. The Mayfair-ies prepared a holiday meal that included turkey, cranberries, and smashed taters with gravy. Dave made his famous-to-us eggnog spiced with Meyer Rum while Santa pulled out some secret gifts from his camo-bag.

It is interesting the conversations held circling burning embers – sometimes the Tower of Babel is recreated nightly. Three certain chat themes are shared: camp vehicle glitches, camping yarns, and of course, food.  In the course of the hundreds of campfires since our tent launch in 1973, I have decided that cooking is all about personal history.  The influence of our mothers and grandmothers and theirs, as well, is a legacy we all share, no matter where we grew up and in what decade. In our little Mayfair-ite circle recipes are exchanged, with hopes that we remember them the next day. Or we become very inventive as we infuse a little of this, a little of that to concoct the perfect palette pleasure.

Intermingled with home repairs and yard work at Dave’s folks’ home we have been day-trippers to ramble through the nearby counties of Madison and Oneida.  We found a gem near the hamlet of Fenner, a little shop operated by an Amish family, the Troyer’s, who raise grass-fed beef and daily bake fresh home-made bread and delicious cookies fill the shelves every Friday and Saturday.  The Troyer’s stock their shelves with authentic Amish goods including jams, jellies spices, and dry goods for baking and cooking. Fresh processed cheeses from the milk produced on their land. The shop is simple with its white-washed walls, hewn beams and gas lights.  The uniformed Amish baking and helping customers are reposed and noticeably there is no background noise of radio or television and no conversations among the teenagers. It is a sterile environ.

Pompey Center NY

The definition of a back road is a road away from the main road. That is what we traveled as we crossed over the country roads of the town of Manlius. Dave’s great-greats settled in this area during the mid-1850s, having emigrated from the famine-worn isle of Ireland. We are surrounded by beautiful hardwood forests of maples, oaks, and birch. Dairy farming is common throughout this area as we go up and down a series of steep hills and wide, flat valleys.  We ascend Pompey Hill where at a rise to 1,728 foot we can view seven surrounding counties.

The Costello Family: Dave, Carol (Davis), Steve, Karen

During the third week of July we have made an impulsive decision to get our kid/grandkid fix, and so we wrap up the campsite to travel to the mighty Mississippi and level down at Sundermeier RV Park in Saint Charles.  Our kids are thrilled as well.

On July 27th we headed to where all sunsets begin, to the west. We are homeward bound to St. Charles Missouri (fondly referred to as St. Chuck’s) where we doffed our hats and hung our coats for fourteen years. We lived a whole of seventeen years in the Saint Louis area but St. Chuck’s has been the favorite address for us during our 40+ years of home ownership.

And so we begin our journey and observations along the way.

Seeing truck drivers and people texting while driving is very distressing and disturbing.  To be traveling on an interstate at a nominal 65 mph while following a tractor trailer that swerves and veers across lane markers and then to see that said driver is texting is not only irresponsible and careless of the driver but reckless with those who share the road along side of him. A study was done of texting truck drivers who took their eyes off the roadway for an average of 4.6 seconds to text.  At only 55 mph, this compared a driver traveling 371 feet, or the approximate length of a football without looking at the roadway!  A typical crash only takes 3 seconds of inattention to happen. Not only is he putting his life at risk but everyone who maybe following next to him.  And is it an assumption that this does not matter unless a driving tragedy affects you and your family personally. How sad.

Kudzu:  no matter where you drive, highway, byway, parkway you will see the invasive vine smothering plants and trees.  It seems that has taken over the edges of our roadways. And our government is responsible for its uncontrollable infestation.  What really surprised me is that this weed was brought to the United States way back in 1876 to be used as ornamental plantings in the south. Then it was used as cattle feed and a government agency responsible for controlling erosion decided it would be a wonderful method of soil control.  It is incredible the growth of this weed which is about a foot a day.  As we travel westward we see how kudzu has morphed into monster-looking coverage.

Reaching the familiarity of Illinois and Missouri we cannot but help to “remember” this’s and that’s. Leveling down on site 72 at Sundermeier’s we can’t wait to revisit the familiar and comfortable “knowns” of Saint Charles.

Our Daughter, Carol with her Dad and Mom

As we near the end of our hello-goodbye tour in the Midwest we reflect on fourteen days of visiting former neighbors and co-workers. Coming across new roads, restaurants and neighborhoods.  Going back to memories made ten, fifteen, twenty years ago. We have become conscious of several things: 

1. You can never go back – the proverbial saying, things change, is so much more apparent as we grow older. We made a trip along the Mississippi River to the small town of Hannibal, infamous for their native son, Samuel Clemens, aka Mark Twain. Years ago we always stopped at Sawyer’s Creek for delicious soup n’ salad, now the restaurant has closed and you can get a rubbery hot dog. Also very disappointing was finding that our favorite Christmas shop has become a purveyor of made in China garbage.  

Our Son, Steve with our "daughter" Adrienne

We ventured over to the other side of the road to the Mark Twain campground, where we had camped several times, including when our son-in-law was working up the nerve to ask for our daughter’s hand in marriage. Disappointment two; the campground is empty for the middle of the summer. Shaking our heads in disbelief we continued onward a few miles to Hannibal; the empty storefronts told the immediate story of gloominess and an economy-despair. Disappointed in what we thought would be a great day we returned to camp with less memories made on this trip.  

2. We are reminded during our time here how much we miss this area. We met with the owner of our former home and had the opportunity to see the improvements made interior and exterior on the property. We have reconnected with several neighbors, friends and co-workers who had been such a part of our lives for the seventeen years we lived here in the midwest. And we learned how much we have missed these special people and the poignant events of their lives. 

Steve and Adrienne Costello

3. Most importantly is how much we miss our children and grandchildren and the interaction of their lives; the good, the bad, the joy, the sadness; the every day of living.  

The Davis Family: Our Daughter, Carol, our "son" Eric, our grandsons, Kyle and Alex

We catch glimpses of the child in our grown children that touch our hearts; quirky smiles, childish quotes that have repeated themselves for over forty years, the eye signals that bring to mind a remembered moment in time that sits in our hearts.  

Second thoughts of regret of moving so far away for our grandsons and missing their school plays and events.  And experiencing the bizarre, the weird and the unexpectedness of watching them grow into young men.  Above all, this summer trip to the Midwest reminds us of our love of family and our family of love.

LIFE IS SHORT: ENJOY THE RIDE

NBNC>NY July 2015

Upstate FHRvers

As sometimes happens the stars align and we find ourselves in the same zip code as other Harborites; in this case we met up with Dave and Polly Brown and Art and Karen Pethybridge (listed in alphabetical order so as not to minimize each couple) although it was great to share hugs with Karen and Polly and Polly and Karen! The Brown’s trekked from their native region of Adams NY, where they parked their motor home and will be (have by this posting) returned to NBNC to get back to the boating life. Art and Karen followed the Seaway Trail to Oswego from their recent journey to Ottawa. 

olympian 10

We all met at Rudy’s Lakeside in Oswego, where the very best haddock and clams can be found. Rudy’s is a 60+ year old landmark on the shore of Lake Ontario, fondly remembered in my youth as “The Loop”.  After a wonderful afternoon of visiting, eating and continued visiting we parted company with Art and Karen knowing that we would be seeing them again this summer and joined Polly and Dave on an excursion to their neck of the woods in northern Jefferson County. 

We too traveled the Seaway Trail (rte 104) northbound and followed The Brown’s over the rivers and through the woods, stopping enroute to check out  a computerized dairy operation sitting on 1,500 acres with about 1,000+ holstein producers of top grade milk,  Hi Hope Farm, owned by Dave’s brother who recently passed away, is operated by Dave’s nieces and nephews.  

During our brief tour we were impressed with the machinations of the milking parlor. Once a chore that came at 4 am and 4 pm the dairy industry has joined the 21st century of technology where the bovine wears an ankle bracelet that reads her weight, vitals and amount of milk produced at any given time. Even her steps are recorded. It was an incredible operation to see. After ogling at mc-mansions along the Henderson Harbor coastline we bid adieu to Polly and Dave and will reunite with them during Octoberfest at the Harbor.

 

Good times continue with our fellow campers here at Mayfair. For July 4th we had an afternoon picnic sharing themed foods of red, white and blue. Imaginations took hold and the patriotic feast was thoroughly enjoyed.

Waiting for the din of the washing machine to complete its spin cycle and the endless tumbling of the dryer to suddenly stop to the silence of the room, I become swathed in warm towels as I fold clean, fresh laundry.  It doesn’t matter how far away from home you are there will always be dirty clothes to launder, floors to sweep, carpets to vacuum.  And so it is on this first day of July that a torrential storm hammered at the screen door and metal roof of the campground laundry room.  The skies darkened, the heavens grumbled and I became a prisoner of the laundry room. We have experienced consistent downpours, light, heavy, driving rains during these past four weeks.  I cast my eyes around the four-walled room to see if I might have the resources to begin building an ark. 

Could I put something together that would be seaworthy, I wondered. Two outdoor chairs, a floor stand fan, wood shelving, bedding sheets; if put together right I could float back to the campsite in style and keep my feet and laundry dry. And so I stared out the screen door while time lagged and puddles became lagoons. A slight break gave me hope as I began to gather baskets of folded clothes, now cold, to scuttle to the jeep a mere fifty feet away. Anyone who knows me knows that I am terrified of thunder and lightning. And so with trepidation I quietly opened the screen door with the hope the storm gods would not hear my apprehensive breathing or the squeak of the door hinge. I hesitated a few seconds too long because as I was two steps onto the yard a thunderous growl mushroomed across the dark clouds followed immediately with a clap of lightning. 

(not my photo)

(I wonder why they call it a clap of lightning. Who do you suppose would applaud a lightning storm, other than meteorologist Meredith.)  Back in the laundry room I peer out at the bleakness, my options are limited; Dave is off the reservation visiting with friends, I am a few feet from the jeep but my chickenish continues to hold me prisoner. The arc project is beginning to become a reality.  Ninety-four minutes later the layered clouds begin to lift, specks of sunshine touch the ground and I am getting up my nerve to combat my fears. Grabbing baskets, books, keys and phone I bravely crash out the screen door leaving its slamming echo in my wake, jumble key locks and clothes into the Jeep and courageously drive back to our campsite. Once inside and clothes put away and dry socks on my feet I am thankful 1. That clothes remained dry; 2. That it did not begin to rain again; and 3. That no one saw me as I talked myself into bravery.

not my photo

How long has it been since you have walked along a rural roadway?  Our campground is about five miles away from the maddening crowds of beachgoers and boaters in sylvan beach, so we can walk out of our campground and take pleasure in the panorama of a crayola box of greens as far as we can see. The heady scent of the countryside is a fusion of earthen loam with gentle winds weaving over cultivated rows of field corn not yet ready to silk, of a freshly oiled asphalt road, and the essence of summer heat pulling up from the earth remnants of dinosaur-like peat blended with wild foliage and flowers. 

not my photo

Take a second – go ahead, we’ll wait- can you see the fields swaying, and the butterflies winging lightly from flower to flower, can you smell the purity in the air, can you feel the sun’s warmth as you slowly close your eyes and stretch your face to the heat of sol and listen, ever so patiently, to the reverent sounds of summer in the country; birds chattering to one another, cows mooing, frogs ribbiting.  What could be more peace-filled. I wonder, could this be heaven.

Life is Short, Enjoy the Ride

NBNC>NY June 2015

These past few weeks we have adjusted quickly to our new and improved square footage of the motor home.  The passage in the corridor is more sizeable, the turning radius in the galley is more generous, stretching out on the couch while watching tv is more comfortable.  

All in all, it is great to have our wheeled-home fastened, secured, and patched up.

 As we have settled on site 45 for the remaining of the summer, we have been fortunate to befriend several neighboring campers and have begun an ease of friendship where we share a harmony of common camping stories, evening firelight around the campfire, and the pursuit of happiness of food, drink and leisure activities for the weekends.

One Sunday excursion we biked along “Clinton’s Ditch”, the engineering phenomenon of the 19^th century.  Pedaling along the tow path of the Erie Canal you cannot help but conjure up visions tradesmen and families, whose lives evolved on floating houses, drifting along the waters from town to town.  As romanticized as it may sound, life on the canal was laden with difficult survival. A freight boat, most likely owned by a family, was probably captained by the father and the cooking for the family and crew overseen by the mother, while the children, if old enough, would walk alongside the mules on the towpath to keep their pace steady.  

Because of the transient nature of packet vessels, children were educated only as far as their parents’ knowledge. Other traffic on the canal included packet boats and passenger vessels, as well as tradesmen who encouraged travelers to contribute to the gambling crafts and their own personal coffers.  All along the canal on any given Saturday night there was sure to be altercations and the occasional canaller splashing into the canal after departing one of many taverns that lined the waterway. Ghost footprints from the 1820s spirited up through our bike spokes as we cycle over these tree-lined lanes while toads croak as our mile markers.  Our next excursion along the watered ditch we will plan with a picnic.

While the big rig rests under the shade of poplar trees our  Jeep becomes our mode of travel and we find ourselves dawdling through hamlets, villages and towns with no direction in mind, no clock to watch tick-tock, no plan to hold fast to.  One of the villages we are learning more about this year is Sylvan Beach and its surrounding region of Verona and Vienna, established as a strategic center during the French and Indian War. Oneida Lake is the centerpiece of Sylvan Beach and the territory was dominated by the Oneida Nation for thousands of years, as well as the nations of the Onondaga, Seneca, Cayuga and Mohawk.

Because of its location on the white-sanded shore of Oneida Lake, Sylvan Beach became a popular resort community during the late 1800s and early 1900s; respectable boarding houses, well-appointed hotels, cottages and restaurants were established by the late 1890s. Boardwalks, vaudeville, a carnival-like area that offered thrilling (at that time) roller coaster and carousel rides, trapeze artists, daredevil female high divers to woo the crowds with their abandonment of propriety. Similar to so many prominent lakefront communities across America, Sylvan Beach declined after the beginning of the 1920s. Those prestigious community leaders who had vision of grandeur and could gaze along an avenue and catch a glimpse of their imagination achieved soon died and the visions died as well. Sylvan Beach has been the subject in the past decade of ghost hunters who feel pretty positive of the significant incidents of paranormal sightings.  Perhaps the ghostly vestiges of those canellers who stepped over the water’s edge on those late Saturday evenings.

Today, as we walk along the beach and the side roads, there are ghost whispers of what once was a fashionable setting. Although most of the original buildings became victims of fire and deterioration, some of the amusement park still stands, albeit crookedly. The beach draws crowds of weekend boaters who dock along the canal and enthusiasts joining the muscle car buffs as they display their pristine rides, and craftspeople sharing their wares on the green. A sleepy little town during the week, Sylvan Beach becomes the reminiscent nostalgia of lifestyle and reflection of the past.

In our neck of the woods there is no shortage of eateries that complement the amount of legal tender in your pocket.  On Thursday evenings we find ourselves deckside at Crazy Clam in Sylvan Beach to appreciate their clams ‘n cans and receiving the service of their great waitstaff.   We have also feasted at Dinosaur Bar-B-Que, where we indulged on their award-winning bar-b-q and homemade corn bread. The atmosphere at Dinosaur is a blend of bikers, blue collar, and business suits. The unfortunate problem is parking on Syracuse surface streets; their parking meter system sucks! Just sayin’! 

We have dined at Cinderella’s, Eddie’s and the Pancake House, all in Sylvan Beach. Cinderella’s is the best outta three.  Farmer’s roadside stands are beginning to show up with fresh rhubarb and strawberries.  Cornfields for human consumption were being plowed and planted when we first arrived in May and look to be a few weeks shy of meeting the elephant’s eye on the fourth of July because of cool and wet weather, but we are looking forward to first harvest with a stick of butter and a pound of salt! And, of course, we stopped into Heid’s for a coney and Byrne Dairy chocolate milk.

beer du jour

wine du jour

Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sunday evenings we usually gather around a campfire and swap tall tales of camping woes and wonders and share the good, the bad and the ugly of camping.   And we all agree wholeheartedly, that camping is the best, no matter if tenting or glamping (glamorous camping) in a class A rig or 34’ fifth wheel. And we gather for "special" occasions - Saturdays- to share food and drink.

Life is Short - Enjoy the Ride

The weeks to come will be filled with more picnics, time with family and discovering, discovering, and more discovering