Travels

Niagara

Brielle

One day I went to Niagara with my family on my road trip. We saw some 200 feet from the ground falls. There were Horseshoe Falls, American Falls and Bridal Veil Falls. It was so cool! I went to the bottom of Bridal Veil falls.  I felt wet! It was so cool! I went on the Hurricane Deck. I could hardly breathe and I couldn’t look up because water was falling on me. It felt like ice cubes falling on me. It was the awesomest falls I ever saw. Back in the day people went down them in barrels. I think that would be cool. And some survived and some didn’t. It was very rocky. I wanted to see the fireworks and the falls glow except we didn’t see them.

Kids on the hurricane deck   American Falls from tower

— Brielle (transcribed by Steph)

 

Color Blind

Caden

I think I’m going color blind because all I can see in Vermont is green Green GREEN! The nickname green mountain state fits it. Vermont is one of the places I could live. All the mountains and trees, that is what I like. I also liked the lake we went to. beautiful scenery. WOW! Then we went to a playground about 300 yards away and had dinner. That was really nice. One thing we did before that though, was going to Dakin farm. It’s strictly a maple syrup farm during the winter or spring or whenever maple surple season is, but they also have tons of other things to sell. meat products, cheese, mustard and other spreadables, fudge, (that fudge was amazingly creamy) candies like maple candy, chocolate covered peanuts, that sort of thing, but their main product which they have shelves and shelves and shelves and- (you get the point)shelves of is Maple Syrup. They had four kinds of syrup with varying amounts of sugar and whatever else they put in there. Light (which we got because it was the least sweet), Medium, Dark, and I forgot what they called it, but when I tasted it I almost swore to myself never to eat sugar again. I almost forgot! (not really, there’s no way I could forget this part it was the best.) You could sample almost EVERYTHING!!! Almost all of it was really good! I’m really going back in time so I’ll keep it short but this was cool. We got to go on a Ben and Jerry’s factory tour and my favorite part was tasting the ice cream. There was a flavor graveyard where the past flavors are remembered. We will remember them in our hearts- but mostly our stomachs. We only stayed in Vermont one full day so we missed a lot and I can’t wait to go back there sometime.

So long,

Yours truly. If you don’t know who that is, that’s me.

Vermonster Menu

Caden

If you ever go to Vermont, make sure to visit Dakin farm. They sell a ton of stuff and have seemingly even more free samples. That place is great. Did you know that Yoda from star wars has been to Vermont? It is the green mountain state and Yoda’s a green monster, so I guess he likes it there. We saw some signs of Yoda at Lake Champlain. First on the beach we saw signs like Yoda snot and maybe one of his friends run over by some vehicle. (It was really just some gross algae.)
Green slime
Then when we ate dinner, the stuff we ate was a bit suspicious. Here’s a little menu:

Yoda brain spread on crackers. (mustard from Dakin farm.

Yoda intestines. (Sausages from Dakin farm called Kabanos.)

Yoda fingers. (Snap peas)

And for desert: Candied Yoda. (Maple candy from Dakin farm.)

Okay so the last one wasn’t that creative, but in real life that candy was good! Thats all for this monstrous menu so,

T.T.F.N Tata for now,

Caden

P.S. If you want to learn more about Vermont, go look at Dacen’s post. If you want to learn more about what we did in Vermont look at my post then Dacen’s post.

P.P.S. I’m done now. Bye!

What Vermont tastes like

Huck

Since we were in Vermont we wanted to learn about maple syrup.  Steph located a place a bit south of our campground called Dakin Farms that seemed like a place we could learn something and try some of the sticky sweet goodness.  So we loaded up the family truckster and headed through the hills along Lake Champlain to Dakin Farm.  Its not maple season right now so we missed out on seeing how its done live, but they had some videos and a little museum/learning center where we were able to get a feel for what all goes into making maple syrup.  They also had a store full of meats and cheeses and jams and spreads and dips and, of course, maple syrup.  I think we tried just about everything and ended up buying some stuff for our picnic dinner we had planned for the evening out by the lake.
Big ol bottle

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I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream

Huck

I was undecided about going to Vermont but Steph made an executive decision to go so I booked us a couple of nights at a campground in Shelburne near Lake Champlain.  Our route there from New Hampshire would conveniently take us right by the Ben and Jerry’s factory so we made sure we left early enough to stop in for a tour and maybe a cold treat.  The name Vermont literally translates to green mountain, and man, let me tell you the mountains are green….freakishly green!  But they were beautiful.  We arrived at Ben and Jerry’s which has RV parking and we ate lunch in the parking lot before taking the tour.  While we grazed on our lunch, the holsteins in the pasture just outside the rig grazed on their lunch too.
Us

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Spoiled

Huck

Grandma spoiled us!  So did Aunt Sara and Uncle Mike.  Grandma met us at a Cracker Barrel on our way to Chester New Hampshire and treated us to lunch.  Then we followed her along the twisty, windy roads to Aunt Sara and Uncle Mike’s house where we were going to try to driveway surf.  The driveway was long but mostly straight so I was able to get Ava in a good spot to spend the weekend.  First order of business though was to fix Ava’s leg which wasn’t too hard but took longer than I’d hoped.
I backed Ava and the Beast up that! Read more →

Surgery

Huck

Ava has been limping along with her one good leg and a temporary stump leg after her right leg broke.  It has actually worked out fine but takes more time.  Her replacement leg arrived at the UPS store near our campground at Wompatuk State Park and we barely arrived in time to pick it up before they closed.

The part came with zero instructions so all I had to study was the video from loveyourrv.com.  The confusing part was how the motor attaches to the leg.
New leg

I decided I’d just have to dig in to figure it out as I go.  To do the work I needed the weight off the landing gear and so the Beast would be tasked with holding up Ava during the surgery.  We were heading to Steph’s aunt and uncle’s house to hopefully driveway surf so I figured that would be a good time to do the work; right after arrival at their house.  This way we could use their house while Ava was in the OR.

We arrived and I actually impressed myself backing into their 100 yard long driveway and placing the rig in its resting spot with only a minor adjustment at the end.

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Freedom Trail

Huck

Yesterday we were able to get about half of the Freedom Trail completed, so today we were targeting the 2nd half.  We knew what we were doing this time so before we left home I dismounted the truck’s antenna and we cruised on out to the Braintree station.  We go in to pay for parking but this time I’ll do it myself.  I insert the ticket and it says I owe $7.  I insert my credit card, it sucks it in then spits it out saying it can’t read it.  I try it again…sucks in, spits out, no read.  I carefully look at the diagram and realize that I had the stripe pointing the wrong direction.  I insert the card the correct way and after a bit it says “Rejected”.  It is then that I notice a separate card reader that is probably where I should have slid my card to make the payment.    Oh  crud, I think I just jammed my credit card into the ticket slot instead of the credit card slot and now its eaten my card!!

I go to find an employee to help and there she is.  The same kind woman who helped us yesterday recognizes us and says “oh hi!  You’re back…can I help you?”  I explain to her that I put my credit card in the wrong slot but then she assures me I did it correct.  She presses the “Need assistance?” button on the machine and a crackly voice comes on “yeeees”.  She explains that the machine ate a card.   It takes several calls to get someone to arrive and during our wait Carol asks about our day yesterday, and our trip and she talks to the kids.  Eventually someone comes and opens the machine to find….no card.  She says “are you sure you don’t have your card?”  Come on, do you think I’m that dumb?  I humor her by pulling out my wallet (a rubberband around my cards) to prove that my Discover card is….hey…wait a minute….how did my Discover card get in my wallet?  Am I really that dumb?  My brother is a magician….I have never had the skills to do any slight of hand until this moment.  I’m so good in fact that my hand was even quicker than my own eye!!  Seriously, I have no idea how that all went down.  But here is the cool part.  Carol was awesome!!  She was so much help both days.  She was so kind and genuine and interested in us that we just had to get a photo with her.  Thank you Carol for all your help!!

Carol Read more →

Allergies

Caden

When we left New York everyones allergies started acting up. Everyone started talking about Mass-a-a-chusetts! Bess me! So sorry, but thats what happened. All through Massachusetts we were sneezing. Boston was a bit of a letdown. I thought the freedom trail would be a bit better, but it was just a lot of old buildings. I liked Paul Revere’s house the most. We went to bunker hill and climbed the monument that was there. It was so high you could see the ocean blue. Here’s a fun fact for ya: the bunker hill monument came before the Washington monument. The designer of the Washington monument lost the bunker hill contest so he entered a design that he knew was a winner. Smart guy. I liked the first cemetery we went in even though the clock right next to it struck twelve noon when we walked in. That was creepy. John Hancock, Mother Goose, and Mr. Revere are buried there. We got a tub of Ben and Jerry’s icecream to share, and it was delicious. We took the train to and from Ava every single day except for a rainy day and the night we went to Mom’s cousin Courtney and her husband Ty’s house we had tons of tacos, we played with the two dachshunds, and we watched TV. That was a fun night. That pretty much wraps our visit to Massa-a-a-chusetts! Bless me.

See you in New Hampshire,

Caden

Boston

Huck

We had a full 3 days scheduled in Boston and the first day we woke up to cold and rain.  Since we hadn’t really had any down days for awhile we decided we were due so I worked, Steph ran errands and the kids played Legos.  All three of them played all day with all the Legos.  It was really fun to hear them playing together and to have them come out and show their latest designs to me.  They were preparing for some epic battle which they finally had at the end of the day.  It left their room a total disaster…a minefield for adult bare feet….but they had fun.
Pre battle

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