Road Trip!!

We've never explored the upper right-hand corner of the U.S, so since we have this RV, we might as well use it, right?  Friends Bob and Mary invited us to join them for a week in New Hampshire in September, so we decided to do some sightseeing on the way to and from.  We've made so many good friends while cruising on Serendipity, and we decided to scare them and visit them at home.  We started the journey by stopping in Johnson City for an overnighter with Rusty and Nancy (who were probably the most terrified, since we dropped by for a night or two several years ago and stayed 3 months).  We then spent a gorgeous day traveling the Blue Ridge Parkway.  What amazing scenery!  It's so beautiful that it doesn't look real -- yet another one of many sights far too beautiful to capture on film (but we keep trying).

overcast, but still beautiful

our home and our car

don't lean back!

We spent the night in Waynesborough Virginia, in a campground absolutely packed with visitors -- and some who looked like permanent residents, with porches, hot tubs(!), portable garages, outdoor rooms, underpinning, driveways, landscaping, flagpoles, etc.  It's a whole different culture than cruising, but similar in that it has its own "rules" and a distinct (that is NOT my tongue in my cheek!!) community of travelers.

Day Two was spent traveling north to Hershey, Pennsylvania.  We drove in 4 states in an hour's time!  The countryside through Virginia and Pennsylvania (our time in West Virginia and Maryland were far too brief to record) is absolutely gorgeous -- apparently the drought was restricted to the farmland further south, because the countryside was lush and green and the farms absolutely HUGE.  The farm structures are much larger than the homes, and the homes are quite impressive themselves.  We visited the Hershey factory, getting a personal look at all the goodies.  We were impressed to learn how much Hershey himself impacted the community.  He built a whole village for the workers at the Hershey factory, including recreation, shopping, schools, and health care facilities.  He endowed the city with funds so it could continue to thrive, and also provided for scholarship education at the Hershey School for children in need, to continue in perpetuity.

YUM

Night two was spent at a park in PA whose amenities may have been slightly exaggerated in the writeups.  Unlike the VA park, it was almost empty (of course Labor Day would be over in a few hours).  The decorations at the office/store were unique, and reminded us that redneckedness (new sniglet; NOT to be confused with red nakedness) isn't confined to the deep south.  We would've liked to visit the Amish settlements, but weather was headed our way that made us hurry north.  Hurricane Irene had already blistered the land, and heavy rains were on the way again.

very convenient

Day Three saw us hurtling (this isn't a Miata) through four states also (PA, NJ, NY, CT), and we spent several hours traveling about 20 miles.  We didn't know the George Washington Bridge and the Bronx would be backed up at 2:00 in the afternoon....but we do now!  We arrived in Norwalk CT to overnight at WalMart.  This was the first time we'd ever slept at WalMart, and we highly recommend it.  WalMart and Sam's Club offer free overnights in their parking lots, and it's very convenient to have anything you might need just a few yards away.  We also found some rest areas that offer free overnights as well as pumpouts and water.  Sweet!