Here we are, on the road: We’re in Lake George, New York

September 21, 2013 Lorraine’s report

Hello once again from our rig, parked in Lake George Escape RV Park in Lake George, NY. It's Saturday evening; tomorrow is our 41st Anniversary and we will be going out on a cruise in the morning to celebrate. So that means we need to get out blog out again tonight.

So if you recall, last year we had our 40th anniversary party in August. It was a lot of fun, and we had a bunch of nice friends come out and help us celebrate. It was an awesome time of our lives. Many thanks to all who came and celebrated with us..

This year we are all the way across the country, in New York, by the Adirondack Mountains. Chuck and I will go out on a Lake George cruise for about 3 hours, have a brunch and tour this part of the Adirondack Mountains. It should be wonderful!

We went out yesterday to see the leaves in the Adirondack mountains and found them to be slowly changing. Chuck took us on a long drive into the mountains. The rolling hills, the trees, the clouds, the birds and everything made for a wonderful drive for us. We went to Indian Springs NY, and they were having a Moose affair or something going on. There were a lot of antique dealers displaying all their wares. It was a lot of fun to just walk through and see "all the junk" they were showing. It never ceases to amaze me what some people will pay a lot of money for.

So far, we have really enjoyed New York. There is so much to do here. And to top things off, we came here and found this area to be having a Balloon Festival. What an unexpected event that happens here every year. We didn't know this was going on and it turned out to be a nice find for us.

So last Sunday we traveled again. We got to Schenectady, NY, a park outside the area, set up and spend a quiet evening home. Monday found us going into Schenectady to stock up on food stuffs. We do most of our shopping at the Walmart.

Tuesday found us headed into Cooperstown to go to the Baseball "Hall of Fame". Now I must say, I liked the Baseball "Hall of Fame", but I really liked the Football "Hall of Fame" better. I guess that is how it goes. I must know more about football. They had the start of it all clear through today's happenings.The "Hallowed Halls" of the baseball "Hall of Fame" are one more of out bucket list "to dos." And Chuck told them he was a veteran, so they let him in for free.

Wednesday found us having to take care of several things. When we were in Turning Stone, the driver's side window blind broke. It just came down, all by itself- no one was around to pull it down. A new part was needed so Chuck had it sent to us and we had to send back the old one. We needed to find someplace where we could mail a package Fed Ex for us.

Also, my washer door in the rig wouldn't open, one day this week, so Chuck finally found a way to open it. He got it open, but a part of the handle broke. We went to several places around here, before we ordered the part. It came in yesterday, and Chuck fixed it for me. Sure seems like one thing after another.

The third thing that happened was a sensor for the car tires and that needed to be replaced, but it took a while for it to find us, even though we waited for it several times at several places. This was actually the first unfortunate thing that happened to us. I am glad it was only 3 things, so hopefully that is all we have to deal with.

So after taking care of all the stuff, we asked the person at Fed Ex what there was to see and do, since it was pretty early in the day, and he told us we should go check out the New York State Museum, just a short distance from where we were. We plugged in the name and went to find it. It was only a short distance away and we headed off to see it.

There was so much information in that museum. And it was totally free. I think what made me feel sad was all the mementos left from 9/11. I liked what a small child wrote, it said

"My dad isn't garbage." That struck me pretty hard. From prehistoric times and the elephants to today's world, this museum had everything. We didn't have enough time to complete it all, only until 5 pm to finish that museum, but it was well worth going. We decided we would like to return and go through parts of it again.

Thursday we got up and left; we came on into Lake George, NY. This park is pretty big, there's camping/RVing for about 500 or more-not sure how many sites there are. In the summer time (high season), it is pretty expensive to come here. When we came, we didn't know about the Balloon Festival. Once we moved in to our spot, it looked like 30 to 50 more people came in, and there is still lots of room for everyone.

Today we went into Lake George and I shopped a bit. This is a destination area for tourists, and there must have been tons of them here for the balloon fest. It was exciting. We didn't go to the festival last night or today. They had it at an airport today, but the day we got here, it was at a city park. We watched them inflate 27 balloons and they were all taking off in the warm late summer breeze. Today, it was pretty windy, so we didn't go.

So moving on down the road, Hope all is good with everyone. Happy Anniversary to Chuck, Love you to the moon and stars and back again. I would be lost with out you!!!!!

Hugs to all,

Lorraine

9/21/13 Chuck’s report

First, I’m writing this on Saturday night because tomorrow is our anniversary and we have plans for the morning. We have been married 41 years and the last 6 we’ve been full timing on the road. Happy Anniversary, Honey and thanks for being by my side all these years.

We’ve spent another good week in New York, we like this state and all things to see and do here. And we’ve seen and done a lot this week for sure.

There is no shortage of green grass for Misty around here, sort of reminds me of back home in Washington with all the grass, trees, bushes and mountains. There are more deciduous trees here compared to back home, that’s one of the main reasons we’re here.

Of course the temperature in the winter here gets really cold, down to –30F. I see lots of places talking about snowmobiles, snow skiing and snow shoeing plus ice fishing. I don’t plan on being around here to check that out, however, we like the weather in Arizona in the winter.

We haven’t seen many large fields around here except for hay fields but there are lots of apple orchards. And of course, the apples are now getting ripe so there are lots of farmer’s markets around selling apples and pumpkins.

Last Sunday was moving day for us, we left the Casino in Verona and drove to Duisenburg, NY, outside Schenectady. We stayed at Frosty Acres campground, usually $57/night but with our RPI membership we only paid $18, nice to have that membership here in the NE as there aren’t too many 1000 Trails parks out here. We were assigned a spot on the top tier, overlooking the pond below, pretty nice site. After we got set up Lorraine made a nice pork roast dinner for us, um um good.

Next morning our new shade package came in and I took down the old one and installed the new one. We had all of our window shades replaced at the MCD factory in Texas back in ‘08 but they have two new generations by now and don’t have repair parts for our generation, therefore I had to buy a whole new one. They do have a “loyalty” price for folks who are updating their shades so we got 40% off the price of the new one. It takes a bit to replace a shade, it helps to have long screwdrivers and long fingers. But the new one is in place and it’s nice to once again have working shades on that window. I’ve been leaving it closed when we are stopped and held up with Velcro strips when we are traveling.

While I was working on the window shade, Lorraine did some laundry. On the last load, the front door of the washing machine wouldn’t open, it was locked. I tried pushing all the buttons, turning all the knobs, turned power off/on and even unplugged it but it didn’t unlock. I also tried doing an extra spin, hoping if there was some water in the tub it would pump out on the spin cycle, still no luck.

Tuesday morning I actually pulled the manual for the machine and it suggested doing quick wash to see if that would unlock the door. Once again, no luck but I did figure out how to manually operate the switch but found it to be broken, maybe that’s part of the reason it didn’t open. But at least we were able to get the wet clothes into the drier. Now all I need to do is order a new latch to attempt to repair this.

But first things first, we had planned on today being our trip to Cooperstown, the Baseball Hall of Fame. We had a nice trip over the mountains and through the woods because we took the back roads all the way, very scenic. In fact, when we got to Cooperstown I was a little surprised because it was so “laid back” compared to the Football Hall of Fame in Canton. Of course the buildings were built in 1930s but still they are a bit underwhelming to say the least, at least on the outside that is. Neither Lorraine or I am really big baseball fans we did our visit to the hall.

They suggest everyone start out watching a movie then tour the hall. The movie had just started before we got there and they don’t let anyone enter after its started so we did the first two sections then backtracked to see the movie. I was surprised to see the All American Women Professional Baseball section to be just like the movie, even the team names were the same. They have a section where each major league team has a locker set up, Seattle has a Felix Hernandez jersey plus lots of stuff from other players. There was lots of info about Babe Ruth, of course and this being in New York there was way too much stuff about the Damn Yankees, ha.

I really liked the section about all the different ball parks, they had pictures, movies and even a couple of displays of some of the more famous fields. Once again, Lorraine liked the World Series winners’ rings, just like the Super Bowl winners’ in the Football Hall. We must have taken pictures of 25 of the player’s plaques, even though we’re not big fans, there were lots that we knew or at least had heard off.

And for anyone who may want to attend, the admission price was $12 for seniors but military veterans get in free, thank you. So we paid $12 for both of us and spent about three hours, a good deal I thought.

After our tour we drove though town to see what else was around, not much except for the area around the hall and most of that was baseball associated. We didn’t go to any of the store, just stopped by a park for awhile then drove through a nice, big hotel parking lot to see the building. After we left town, we headed back for our campground, once again on the back roads. We were both tired after we got back and just had a quiet evening together and ate leftovers for dinner.

Wednesday morning we headed into Albany, I had to find a Fed Ex office to return our old window shade and find an appliance repair place to buy the latch for our washing machine. I don’t know how we lived without a GPS, I know we used maps but they aren’t as available as they used to be, but we found both places and got what we needed. At least at the appliance repair place I was able to order the part, they don’t stock those latches but could get one the next day. Unfortunately, we were leaving the next day so I called the campground here in Lake George and they agreed to let me have it shipped here, it should arrive on Friday.

At the repair place I asked the guys if they knew of anything we should see in their area of town. They talked it over and suggested we might like the New York State Museum a few blocks away. So once again, with the aide of our handy GPS, we found the place. The admission price here was even better, free. The gal behind the desk said the residents of the state paid big time for it, however.

Once again we felt we lucked out and found a good place to learn about the area. The museum has lot of historical and cultural, starting with the ice age through today. Of course they have a large section set aside about 9-11 with some exhibits and stuff from “ground zero”. The only problem I had was we didn’t get there until around 2 pm and I wanted to get out of town before the rush hour started so we only had about two hours, we could have spent twice that amount of time with no problem. I would suggest if you are every in Albany, NY. you add a trip to this museum to you itinerary, I don’t think you will be disappointed and like I said, the price is certainly good.

Thursday morning we got ready for travel and headed out, once again it was a short travel day. We are at Lake George Escape RV park, just outside Lake George, NY. When we checked in they sent us to an area of all pull thrus but the sites only had 30 amp electric power. And the site they assigned to us was too narrow plus it had trees in the way for us to make the tight turn. We unhooked the car, checked out a couple of different sites and returned to the office. The gal didn’t seem to be too surprised to see us return, I didn’t think, she must have know the site wouldn’t work for a big rig. But she was pleasant enough to work with, in fact, she gave us a site that a work camper had left. It is one of the few that have an open view to the SW for our satellite plus 50 amp power and sewer plus full cable hookups if we wanted. But we were able to get our satellite to lock on so we didn’t need to use their cable hookups.

We are in Adirondack National Park, it is huge, I think it’s the largest National park in the US, larger than Yellowstone, Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Glacier and the Great Smoky Mountains parks combined, over 6 million acres. I think about half is privately owned but except for town and such, even that is sparsely developed. New York is a fairly big state and a goodly portion is the Adirondack Park. We have never been here before so we want to see as much of this beautiful area as we can while we are here.

When we checked in the gal at the desk also told us about the annual balloon festival in town, starting the day we got here. After we got set up, we headed into town to check it out and see about maybe going to the balloon launch later that afternoon. The festival started back in the 70s and has now become one of the largest events in the area. In fact, it has been named one of the top 100 events in North America. And it all started because they area residents were looking for something that might bring visitors to the area after Labor Day.

One of the best things about this is it open to the public, free of charge. We were there for the opening ceremonies and happened to snag a good seat on one of the picnic tables in the park. They had about 25 balloons lift off that afternoon, what a site to see.

Friday we headed out to do a driving tour of part of the park. We drove as far as Indian Lake (remember the Partridge Family song of the same) via the back roads. We went up about 1200’ in elevation during our drive and more of the trees up there are turning than down here. It was a very nice trip and I guess I can see why they call them the Adirondack mountains although they don’t compare to the big ones out West. But they are the largest we’ve seen since we were in New Mexico on this trip.

We were thinking about returning today to the Balloon Festival to see the big lift off of over 100 balloons but the wind was blowing too hard and the forecast was for rain so we decided to forgo a return trip. Instead we headed into town where Lorraine wanted to check out a few of the stores (tourist trap type places). After Lorraine looked around some of the shops, we returned back to the rig and decided to start writing our blog.

The weather has been pretty nice for the week, cool enough that we needed to change into long pants vs shorts but I’m still holding out and not wearing a jacket yet. The afternoon temperatures are getting to the low to mid 70s and some of the night time temps have dropped into the high 40s. We do get lots of early morning dew everyday and it just started raining as I’m writing this.

We are heading out on Monday, heading North to see a different part of the Adirondacks. We will probably be in that area for 4 days before heading on into Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. I checked today and it appears the trees will be turning colors earlier this year than normal so we are still on schedule to be there during the prime viewing time, at least we hope so that is.

I know Lorraine has taken a bunch of pictures so I’ll go through them and add some here, probably a lot.

Erie canal along our route.

Good views in Upper NY.

Frosty Acres, the campground we stayed at near Schenectady, NY. They grow dahlia here too.

Baseball Hall of Fame on the right and following.

On the right is an old baseball found in someone’s attic, from back in the early 20s.

#42 was Jackie Robertson’s, the first colored player to play pro ball.

The All American Girls Baseball, they do have a section set aside for them just like the movie showed.

And of course, there was the Babe, Ruth that is.

Joe DiMaggio’s jersey on the left. On the right is a set of baseballs that shows the percentage that Ted Williams hit when in that portion of the strike zone.

Who says Pete Rose isn’t in the Hall?? Even has a section for Seattle.

A large section for Hank Aaron.

That ball on the left was the one Hank hit to tie Babe’s home run record, they don’t have the next one that broke the record.

Some of the championship rings

Hank Aaron on the right.

Frank Robinson, Johnny Bench, Reggie Jackson.

Effa Manley one of the women in the Hall, Babe Ruth and Stan the Man.

Ted Williams and Dizzy Dean.

More of the outside of the Hall.

A roadside side about William North, I have no idea. A pond at our park.

GE has a big factory in town.

New York State Museum. The flag was flown at Engine 6 Firehouse after 9-11.

Some info and notes from 9-11, some very sad. Some of the salvage from the building was hauled away to the dump and may have had human remains in it, as per the newspapers shown below.