2021 has finally arrived! Thank God! In this post we'll share our New England adventures from July 2020. COVID was STILL raging on and we were quarantining on the road in our converted Sprinter Van.
Darin and I had begun talking about starting a Youtube Channel during our cross country trip. Stay tuned for how that pans out, more on that later.
We had just finished off the Great Lakes and Niagara Falls. Since we were traveling with no itinerary we pulled out the atlas and spotted the world famous Lake Placid and the Adirondacks. We did a rare thing and got on an interstate for a few miles to get to Watertown and made our way to Hwy 3 headed east into Adirondack Park. This is a beautiful area I hope to revisit during Fall. A friend recently posted some awe inspiring photos of the Fall colors from this area. Lake Placid, made famous by Betty White and the 1980 Winter Olympics, is a pretty place surrounded my Mother Nature showing off. We drove into the quaint Lake Placid tourist area and decided to get out to stretch our legs. We walked around town and grabbed dinner. The Olympic Training center was at the end of the main drag.
The sun was setting and it was time to find a sleeping spot for the night so we drove around a bit and saw some great neighborhoods. We came across a New York State Marina and pulled in. We had a quiet night and a great sleep right by the water. It really is amazing how easy it is to find a peaceful night's sleep when you are a self-contained tiny home on wheels.
When we first decided to hit the road there were a few places we knew we wanted to see, one of which was Stowe, Vermont, for obvious reason. Hello! We are TheRollingStowes after all. Well at that point we weren't, we were just the Stowes. That development will be discussed in our next post, so let's get back on track. Stowe VT is worthy of the drive to get there. The town is very cool and has a great ski resort. I had been there many moons ago with a few friends but I was not a Stowe at the time so it was all about the ski lodge back then. Bear with us as we share all these Stowe pictures.
Ok, there's more but you get the idea! We bought lots of schwag and met some great folks!
Another Vermont must see is of course Ben & Jerry's Creamery, so off we went. We do like our ice cream.
We were sharing our travels with family and friends, I believe I've mentioned that my mom follows us via the FindMy app. Well so does my son, so he pointed out that there was a granite quarry in the area that just so happened to be on a reasonable route for us to go see it. The visitor center was closed due to COVID but we found our way to the quarry, which was posted: Do Not Enter. We entered.., I moaned and groaned about breaking the rules but was very impressed by the sight of it all. We do like to see the weird off-beat places and this one did not disappoint.
After Granitesville we got back to US Hwy 2 and headed into New Hampshire. We blinked and almost missed it! Of course we were driving through the thin part, it is somewhere I would go back to, maybe during the Fall? We quickly entered Maine, which was another place we really wanted to see. I highly recommend the western rural area of Maine. The thing we thought and talked about the most was how easy it must be to just hide out in a place like this. We drove miles without seeing another vehicle and any homes we saw were set way off the road. There are cliches for places like this in the South... Anyway, we made our way to Pittsfield ME, crossed a river onto what seemed to be a tiny little island and pulled into a parking lot of an abandoned building right on the water. This was the morning view from the windshield. We woke early and moved on.
Now that we were in Maine, it was time to find a point of interest. On a previous trip we went to the most Northwestern point, Cape Flattery, WA. So there had to be a most Northeastern point, right? I consulted good ol' Rand McNally again and pinpointed Quoddy Head State Park. The drive over was great and totally different from the drive west of Interstate 95. It was populated but not overcrowded, there was an old charm about it. I could live there. The Machias River was an unexpected gem, check out these pictures:
Quoddy Head State Park was a rugged display of nature. We spent the afternoon looking around, hiking the trail and dipping our toes in the Atlantic Ocean. But remember we are in Maine, when in Maine, eat a LOBSTER Roll! And eat I did!
We had officially made it from coast to coast. It was a great day, we headed south toward Portland and found Fort Knox! Wait, What!??! Fort Knox? We had to stop for this. This Fort Knox was built between 1844 and 1869, it was the first fort in Maine built entirely of granite. It was an impressive fort but it wasn't ever actually used in defense of Maine.
We spent the night in Cape Elizabeth overlooking the water at the end of a road near a closed down restaurant. This is apparently a popular fishing spot.
We finished our New England visit by heading down to Hyannis Port for a day of shopping and sight-seeing. The political comedy in that little town is over the top, we bought the stickers.
The weekend was upon us and we wanted to see Darin's daughter without interrupting school and work so off to New York! Please subscribe so you get updates on our journey. We have seen some spectacular sunsets and waterfalls along the way. Next we'll show off the beautiful sunrise at Montauk, the Jersey Shore and the lush green of Shenandoah National Park, plus a surprise visitor!