NorthEast Trip: Day 14-16: Oh Canada!

Day 14: See ya later, Acadia! It's Canada time!

When we woke up, it was drizzling, so we packed up our camp as quick as we could to get the heck out of Acadia. Farewell, crowds and traffic! It's time for civilization again...that's right, it's Canada time, baby!

The entire drive was forests and more forests. There was one "gas station" which was hilariously someone's house with a hand-painted sign that said 'gas' on it. It was tempting to check it out and start a side-adventure by entering what is clearly the beginning of a horror movie, but we were too excited for Canada. Other than that, there was nothing but trees (this is not a complaint...I loved it! But definitely drive that route with a full tank of gas or you are doomed).

It was a 3.5-ish hour drive to our Canadian campground in New Brunswick and at first we were concerned that we would get to the campground WAY too early. However, there's a time change (I did NOT know there was a time change after 'Eastern' time...) which meant we got there at 2:30pm (only 30 minutes earlier than check-in) and Paul acted charming so we could check in right away.

This was our first time to Canada (Paul went briefly at age 14 but that doesn't really count). It's funny...whenever we research other countries for our previous trips, we do all sorts of research so that nothing surprises us...but I guess we didn't really think Canada would be much different so we did zero research first. 

We forgot that they use different currency, so we had to find an ATM for their loonies, toonies and wizzle wazzles. When we got to the New River Beach campground, we were confused by the electric hookup and had to figure out if Canada uses different electric amps than us (they don't) or if we just accidentally got an rv hookup and thus actually did NOT have electricity for the night (yep, bingo). 

And then there were the bizarre symbols along all of their roads. Perhaps they got tired of writing things in both English and French on all of their road signs...? But whatever it is, the symbols are, for the most part, very confusing and hilarious. It made for great conversation as we guessed what they all meant. You're driving at 110 km per hour and rush past these tiny squares with images and there's no time to sit there and try to decipher them...I don't know what these Canadians were thinking, but it is entertaining at least! 

Here's some fun ones for you to figure out. Remember, you're driving past these tiny squares really quickly, so don't spend more than a few seconds looking at it before guessing what it is!

This is just a few of the many many signs we saw. How did you do? Did you figure out what they all mean?

After we unpacked a little bit, we decided to do the nearby hike. The description made it seem like it was 3 miles long. But it turns out it was 3 miles to the point where the trail changed names to something else and then 3 more miles, so we ended up doing a six mile hike. And there were only a couple other hikers the entire time, yay Canada!

We were pretty darn tired after that unexpected long walk, and it was 7pm before we stumbled back to our partially-made campsite. Paul put everything up and I made dinner. Teamwork for the win.

The hike was nice. It made me kinda sad though, because the forest is dying due to the Emerald Ash Borer insect issue.

But whenever there were views of the cliffs and sea, they were very lovely views indeed.

If this is the view of the ocean for most of our trip, we'll be quite blessed!

Day 15: Fundy Trail Parkway and the eternal RAIN

Today was supposed to be this really cool drive that took all day. The Fundy Trail Parkway is this beautiful drive along the ocean and you can pull over to see pretty overlooks and do small hikes to waterfalls and other cool things.

BUT. It rained ALL day. At first it was just a slight drizzle but it was also unfortunately super super foggy. As the day progressed, the fog stayed but it rained harder and harder.

There were a few mini-breaks in the rain and fog/mist that allowed us to see some of the beauty here and there. I wish we could have done this drive on a clear day. I bet it's amazing! If we ever can get back to this area again in the future, we want to do this parkway drive again.

Fingers crossed we can make that happen! But in the meantime, it was kinda a bummer to not be able to enjoy the whole thing. Still, we tried to enjoy what we could.

Day 16: Our first storm, Hopewell Rocks and Meeting Someone From the Online World

Last night was our first storm while camping (both on this trip and otherwise!). Luckily, when we got to our campsite for the evening, the rain made us decide not to put up the tent part of our camp setup. We just squished everything inside with us and slept in a slightly uncomfortable setup in our vehicle.

Around 10pm, the drizzling rain started picking up and it got very very windy. Maybe this is what storms are like right on the ocean coast, especially here. It got so windy that I was super concerned we were going to flip over. I was certain we'd wake up the next morning to upside-down campers all over the place. 

While there WERE damaged screen tents in the campground, we (and everyone else) managed to come out unscathed....but very tired. 

As we looked around the campground for storm damage, more thunder and dark clouds were on the horizon so we packed up in the rain and got out of there ASAP.

We debated about going to Hopewell Rocks since it was raining so hard, but by the time we got to the parking lot, it was an off and on drizzle, so we decided to check it out.

I'm glad we did! Hopewell Rocks is super beautiful. It's a crazy place that is super affected by the tides...it rises to up to 50 feet between low and high tide! We got there just after low tide and walked around on the ocean floor, admiring all the stone shapes and little caves and such. Paul helped them hold up the biggest rock for a while, man he's strong. 

Then we hung out in their cafe and visitor area for a bit so that we could see the same place during high tide (this is what they recommend for everyone and it was super cool, so keep that in mind when planning your own Hopewell Rock trip!).

After that, we headed to Nova Scotia! Sometimes the internet can make random cool things happen...at some point in time, I met online-only someone named Tawny. Random correspondences created an opportunity to see her on this trip. Tawny generously offered to host us for the night and even though she was mainly a stranger to me/us, we decided to be brave and adventurous and accepted her lovely offer.

We met up at a restaurant (NOTE: if you are EVER in Wallace, Nova Scotia, check out Wiley's by the Wharf! They were incredible! Great food and super nice! And bonus if it's your birthday, they go above and beyond!!) and then followed Tawny and her family to their homestead.

It's a beautiful homestead and I tried not to get too jealous of her sheep (and other livestock), many acres, and multiple outbuildings. We had a lovely chat long into the night and woke up to a delicious breakfast. And fresh coffee (no more instant coffee!). Having a night to feel at home was really great after two weeks of mostly camping. 

We've found that on each of our trips some of the most memorable days are when we meet kindred spirits: There's the Irish guy who drove us around to show Cris all sorts of ancient cairns and stone circles, Paul's family in the Netherlands who brought us into their homes and offered us coffee every 5 minutes, and the Austrian man that sat with us and his neighbors to enjoy some beers and awkwardly try to speak each others' languages. And now the Nova Scotia family who invited us in to their home for a night and left us with full bellies, delicious jam, farm-fresh eggs, and a jar of goats milk.

Northeast Trip: Day 10-13 - The rain in Maine falls mainly in Maine

 On day 10 we finally made it to Maine! We explored Wolf's Neck Woods State Park for most of the afternoon.

There's an eagle in the top of the tree just left of center, yep I'm a photographer. It was pretty cool but also quite warm. We both planned to spend the first 10 days in shorts and t-shirts and then change to longer clothes once we got up to Maine, but it turns out we should have packed many more warm-weather clothes. If anyone knows someone in the market for a 17 year old vehicle that smells like sweaty feet let me know, otherwise we might need to burn this stankwagon to the ground. Here's some less stinky lady's slippers:

The next 5 nights will be camping so we got a surprisingly nice motel for cheap (shoutout to Traveler's Inn in Brunswick). Before that we stopped for some lobster rolls. The place was highly rated so we were excited for our first taste of Maine lobster! I don't get why anyone eats there: tiny bun, plain lobster, bad coleslaw on the side, $62. 

Day 11: Acadia National Park

After working all morning we stopped at the Maine botanical garden, but it was almost 90 degrees so we didn't feel like looking at flowers in the heat and decided to just leave. We drove to Acadia and made our way to "the quiet side" to the Seawall Campground. The road along the coast was recently washed out (later we walked to see it and there are huge sinkholes that took out the entire road) so it took a bit longer than expected. It's a nice campground walking distance to the ocean so we set up and read books on the rocky shore. Somehow I took zero pictures today, but it was still nice.

Day 12: Hotcadia, Saharacadia, Heatwavecadia (maybe one of these works?)

So hot. It was 90+ degrees by 10AM. We tried a hike, Cris bailed halfway but I sweated my way to the top of Acadia Mountain.

It was pretty but not anything mindblowing. We cooled off in Echo Lake which was nice but extremely busy, which at the time we didn't realize is the least busy part of Acadia. 

We finished the day with lobster at Thurston's. They catch their own lobsters and you can pick out which one you want to eat. It was amazingly good and cheaper than the lobster roll debacle. As we ate there was a storm that cooled it off a bit so we could sleep.

Day 13: Ewww, people

There is not nearly enough parking for how many people go to Acadia and we're still not even in the busy season. Each lot we went to we had to wait for a spot to open up and there were huge lines of cars parked along the road everywhere. We hiked 3.5 miles around Jordan Pond which was a pretty nice and easy walk. 

Half the hike was on single-lane boardwalk so it was pretty annoying to have to stop and let the continuous horde of people going the opposite direction. 

It was really hot still so Cris decided to just read by the beach while I climbed Beehive Mountain. It's only a couple mile hike but it goes straight up the side of the mountain. There are a bunch of switchbacks that have iron rungs attached to rocks as ladders and handrails so it's pretty strenuous. It would have been amazing if there weren't so many people (notice the trend?). I've never been on a hike with a queue. It was pretty much climb three ladder rungs, stand on the ladder for 5 minutes trying not to look down, climb the rest of the way up. Then wait 5 minutes so the next person cleared the thin walkway over the precipice, then wait again. It was pretty agonizing in the hot sun but the views were nice. 

I explored some side paths, listened to some children scream about the leaches that were swimming by them in the lake, and then made my way back to Cris. 

The drive back to the quiet side was nice, but we were happy to get out of Acadia the next day. The heat did put a damper on our enjoyment since we cancelled a couple longer hikes, but I don't think we'd come back anyway just because of how many people were there. There are prettier and less busy places all through New York and Vermont. 

NorthEast Trip: Day 7-9 - ebikes and weehikes

We really need to come up with a better name for this trip, NorthEast trip lacks a certain panache. Maybe just "The Nor'easter" or "PePaul's Big Adventure". Whatever we call this it's time for the Dainings to go to a tourist trap!

Day 7   I (Paul) love a good cave and a good river and a good skydive (bad skydives are particularly bad), so we found a place with two out of the three. Stone Bridge and Caves has it all (but not skydiving): a 180 foot long bridge of stone over top of a rushing river, gem mining, waterfalls, and walkways cobbled together by a half-blind toddler. 

It was actually pretty cool. The river cascaded over a few small waterfalls and then went underground forming a rock bridge over the river. It's hard to take pics of holes but you can see how the river just disappears. Apparently there's a big lake right under the gift shop. There was also another cave where pretty much the entire thing was filled with waterfalls (again hard to photograph holes filled with water) 

We had fun and saw some trout. New bucket list item: catch a trout in a pitch-dark cave....naked.

Day 8

Today we threw all of our plans out the window nearly killing a nice Vermont couple. We had planned on more hikes up mountains but were kinda sore and sick of that so we rented ebikes and rode 28 miles. Now we're a whole new kind of sore. 

There's a really nice bike trail through Birmingham, VT all along Lake Champlain. 

The view over Champlain were beautiful with mountains in every direction. Once we got past Birmingham there were fewer people and the path becomes a causeway, it's just a 20-foot wide pile of rocks in the middle of the lake with a bike path on top. It's super cool. However, boats need to get past this random thin strip of land so there is a "cut" where boats can go through. As a result a bike ferry is needed. Two guys run a ferry that only asks for donations, you load up your bikes and they ferry you the 50 feet to the other side of the cut. A drawbridge would be more efficient but a ferry on Lake Champlain is so much more glamourous (extra 'u' added for class). 

On the other side is South Hero island which has a winery, a nice beach, and a brewery. We got some pretty terrible beer and rested for a while on the beach. Ebikes are much easier to ride than normal bikes but we were still pretty tired after only half the trip. There was a big sign advertising maple cremees at a farm so we stopped. Turns out cremees are just ice cream. Some of us are afraid of lactose so we sadly moved on.   

We were biking from 10AM to 5:30PM so that's all for today. Definitely rent a bike and do this trip if you're ever near Lake Champlain, it's wonderful. 

Day 9

This is our last big driving day (6ish hours) so not much else is going on. We stopped at Lake Willoughby, VT. It's a beautiful lake without too many people around so we grabbed a beer and enjoyed the views. 

After a two mile hike we were a bit warm so we went for a dip. The water was cold enough to take your breath away but I've read that cold plunges are good for the soul or something. Souls replenished we headed towards Maine.

NorthEast Trip: Day 3 - Day 6: A Trillion Steps, Grand Canyon, and Gorges

 

At the top of 1000 Steps!

Day 3: A Thousand Steps and Hyner View

It was a six hour drive to our next location in Pennsylvania. After working in the morning, we packed up and headed off.

To make the drive more tolerable, we stopped about halfway to do a hike called: Thousand Steps - Standing Stone Trail.

Years ago, some jerk-boss wanted his miners to quarry at the top of a mountain. There was no way to get up there, so the jerk-boss had his miners carve out what ended up being approx. 1,000 steps (it's more like 1,050) into the stone to get to the top. 

Every day, the miners had to trudge straight up a mountain on the uneven stone steps that they had carved out to get to work. And at the end of their 12 hour mining shift, they had to stumble their way back down. 

Super crazy. What is also crazy is that Paul thought it sounded like a cool first hike for our seven-week long adventure. It ended up being approx. 2 miles of hiking and it was basically straight up a mountain and back down.

Our legs could barely hold us up by the time we got to the bottom of the mountain again....maybe not the best 'warm up' hike to do. Laugh. However, it was absolutely beautiful up there and it was a great workout/hike.

We stumbled/crawled out of the car to our campground for one night at Hyner View State Park. NOTE TO SELF: come back to this state park in the future for a longer time! It was a small campground with great showers, electricity, and a perfect loud stream right next to our camp setup. We really liked the campground and wished we were there longer.

This area of Pennsylvania is absolutely beautiful (Paul was drooling over all the flyfishing streams!) with rolling green hills and streams everywhere. We are already talking about coming back for a longer time so Paul can go flyfishing and we can check out the area more.

Day 4: Hyner View Overlook and Pennsylvania's Grand Canyon

The first thing we did when we woke up was drive up the mountain to the Hyner View Overlook. When the winds are right, hanggliders fly from here. Unfortunately, the winds weren't correct on this day so we didn't get to see that. I tried to find a way for Paul to hangglide here but that didn't work out. Maybe if we come back in the future we can make that happen!

Hyner View Overlook was super beautiful. It was a great way to see the entire beautiful area of Hyner View! 

After that, we drove for a few hours to see something that is called "Pennsylvania's Grand Canyon". Our interest was piqued. We had a few options for hikes and chose one that sounded pretty cool. We drove all over the place on windy roads through the mountains. The final 20 minutes of the drive were intense gravel roads that went straight to the bottom of the mountain.

We got to the location in the directions/g.p.s. and...it was a dead-end with no trails. So we wasted about 40 minutes on this one, since we had to turn around and head back out on the same gravel road. The joys of adventuring in the unknown!

After that long waste of time, we headed to the next option on our list to see this so-called Grand Canyon. We went to the Overlook area at Leonard Harrison State Park. It was an overlook and a canyon-rim hike of about 2-3 miles. 

It was nice and very beautiful, but maybe not quite as grand as the Grand Canyon in the west...

From there, we headed for our camp for the next two nights: Watkins Glen State Park. The whole drive there, Paul was trying to figure out why he knew the name 'Watkins Glen' and then remembered JUST as we got there that it is a Nascar racing track (he knows it from video games). The track is right next to the campground so that was kinda loud. Also, after being spoiled at Hyner View campground, with it's seclusion and hot showers and such, Watkins Glen campground just couldn't compete (crowded and bad bathrooms).

We also had our first encounter with an attached tick....which was an interesting adventure as well. The northeast is supposedly covered in ticks, so we did kinda expect this to happen. 

Just a glimpse of the beauty of Watkins Glen Gorge

Day 5: Watkins Glen Gorge: AKA the Most Beautiful Place in America

Look, I can admit: I've got a bit of a strong bias here: I've always preferred Europe to America. For history, culture, and everything in between. But I'm trying to find something cool about America to wax poetically about. It's one of the reasons we're doing this trip.

And I might have finally found it. Watkins Glen Gorge is easily one of the most beautiful places I have ever been to. 

I'm embarrassed that I've never even heard of it before. So if you're like me and never heard of it, allow me to introduce you to the sheer beauty of Watkins Glen Gorge. 

Now add it to your own bucket list and savor it with your eyeballs, too. Everyone should see this beauty!

We did about 5 miles of Gorge hiking and it was a lovely day. We have been talking non-stop about doing more in Hyner View area all the way through Watkins Glen. There's just lots of beauty up here to see and many more trails to take!

Day 6: More Gorges and a Botanic Garden

Sadly, it was time to leave this area of the world and head off for the Syracuse area of New York. We'll be back, Watkins Glen! 

We started by enjoying a wine tasting at Lakewood winery, which is just outside the Watkins Glen campground. Their wine was okay.

We then headed for Robert Treman State Park to see another gorge. There was a mile long hike that went around it and in it. It was a lot of up and down and totally worth it. It was very beautiful. Not as beautiful as Watkins Glen, but still very nice.

After that, we headed for Cornell University's Botanic Garden. Their botanic garden is insanely huge. WAY bigger than what I'm used to from Clemson University. We walked through their wildflower forest/garden and herb garden and vegetable garden before running out of time and steam. We probably did about 4 miles of walking there.

I wish I had gone to a University with a garden setup like this! I probably would have majored in something that landed me a job at a University garden. And I would have walked in them all the time and probably interned there or something. It was amazing!

After that, we crashed at a hotel for the night in Syracuse. It was nice having a normal shower and toilet for a little break from campground stuff. 

Next up, we're heading for Vermont!

NorthEast Trip: Day 0 - 2: Hello Virginia!

Day 0: Driving Day & Caverns

In typical 'us' fashion, we decided to casually get to our first destination (Virginia) by driving up the Blue Ridge Parkway instead of using busy highways through busy cities.

It was a great choice, as our 6 hour drive was absolutely delightful and relaxed. We rarely saw other vehicles and went for long periods of time without a stop sign or traffic light. The scenery was delightful, all green hills and occasional still-flowering mountain laurel. 

About halfway, we stopped at Linville Caverns in North Carolina. Paul is in love with caves, and this was a great one to check out. We've done plenty of cave tours before, but this one was a step above the others in terms of being really really close to the cave walls and such.

There was one part where the tour guide said that if you were uncomfortable with tight spaces, we should just chill in the cave "hall" and wait. I tried going through the squeeze and it was SUPER tight, so I waited in the "hall" and Paul and others in our small group went through to check out the other room.

If you like caves, that's a great one to check out!

After that, we headed the rest of the way to our campground in Independence, Virginia. Note to self: check online later to see if the temps are always that lovely in that area all the time...maybe I can convince Paul to move there someday!

It was the most perfect ideal summer evening. We got one of those tiny cabins at the campground (the ones that are basically walls around a bed) so we didn't have to unpack much. If it wasn't for annoying neighbors (humans are the WORST) with their constant loud music and screaming child, it would have been perfection. 

The pasture hike at James Monroe Highland House

Day 1: James Monroe Highland House

We drove another 4-ish hours to our first actual place for our adventure/trip. We chose to camp in the Charlottesville area for two nights so that I could see my bucket list item: A Monticello tour and also the Rotunda at the nearby University of Virginia. 

We had the Monticello tour set up for Day 2, so we filled Day 1 with the driving and then the afternoon at the James Monroe Highland House. James Monroe was good buddies with Thomas Jefferson and made his home RIGHT next to Jefferson. 

We pulled up the lavish driveway, lined with live oaks, and the parking lot for the James Monroe place was pretty much empty (unlike Monticello, which was harder to get tickets for and the parking lot is always full).

We were pretty confused why the parking lot at poor Monroe's place was so empty but it soon became clear: the original house burned down a long time ago and they put up a pretty lame "replica" in its' place...and they wanted lots of money to tour the fake Monroe home, too!

So we decided to just do one of the free hikes on the property. It was about 3 miles of walking and it was very lovely. They are in the midst of healing the forest by adding lots of native trees, so it was great to walk through the baby trees and read the labels for ideas for healing our own forest.

After that, we went to find our campground for the first two nights of our trip. It was definitely a bit more rustic than we had thought it would be....the only way to get water was by filling it in the outdoor shower, which was a half-stall outside in the middle of the campground (very awkward) and they had ONE pit toilet for the entire campground. 

The nice parts were that we asked (and received) a lot very far from everyone else, so we felt completely alone in the forest. Plus, Paul got to fish in their pond and caught a bunch of bass. 

The Rotunda!

Day 2: Monticello and the Rotunda!!

Once upon a time, I took a college class that was basically about Palladio, an Italian architect who inspired a huge architecture movement in America. That Palladian architecture movement in America was led by Thomas Jefferson, so our college class spent plenty of time talking about Monticello and the Rotunda at the University (that Jefferson founded/designed). 

Ever since that college class, I've been wanting to check out Jefferson's designs. So it was nice to finally see these beautiful buildings! 

We started by trying to go to the free tour of the Rotunda at 11am. However, life got us a bit delayed, so by the time we got to the University and found parking, it was already 11:30am. 

So we strolled through the University grounds on our own. We found the Rotunda and the original college area and I entertained Paul with information about it all. He LOVED it. (laugh). 

Then we headed to Monticello for our 2:15pm tour. The tour itself was great (super cool to see all of Jefferson's wacky inventions throughout the home) and then we toured Jefferson's gardens. Sigh... Jefferson was an odd guy, with a love for architecture and also botany, so his gardens (and the gardening things that were learned and preserved due to him!) are pretty cool. 

I fan-girled all over Monticello for a few hours and then we headed back to our super rustic campground for the final night.

Next up, Pennsylvania!

Beautiful Monticello

The Dainings are Going on a Crazy Road Trip to North Eastern Canada!

We've gone a bit crazier than normal this summer and decided to do a SEVEN week trip this year instead of our normal three week trip.

Plus, we're doing half of the trip by camping in the back of our vehicle (and the other half of the time in airbnbs). Eep. 

The goal is to slowly travel up the Appalachian Mountains into Nova Scotia before heading west to Michigan for some time with family. 

Google maps won't let me show you our entire trip for some reason (gotta love random "updates") so I put the map of our journey into two map images below. (Please note: in typical 'us' fashion, we're avoiding almost every single city...Philadelphia and Boston were tempting but sounded too stressful to include. We really hate cities....)

 Why This Trip? Why Seven Weeks?

There are a few reasons for doing this trip and also for the length.

1. Our darling precious pup Achilles passed away last fall, and this is the first (and probably only) time in our life we have no dog tying us to our location for long periods of time. We figure that we should take advantage of not having a lot of responsibilities (we also recently moved and don't have much of a homestead situation set up yet either) by doing a longer trip.

2. We wanted to go back to Europe for seven weeks but plane tickets are ridiculously expensive this year. We're hoping they go down in price in future years, but we just couldn't justify that cost this time around.

3. Nova Scotia aka 'NEW SCOTLAND' is named that because it's similar to Scotland in geography and weather. Well, we flippin' loved Scotland so this sounded like a cheaper alternative to flying across the pond.

4. It's been a bucket list item for me since I was a child to see Prince Edward Island (aka Anne of Green Gables!!!). This seemed like a fun time to include that into our adventure.

5. We've been wanting to see both coasts of Canada for a long time now. We're headed to the west coast of Canada next summer so it sounded like a great idea to see this coast first.

6. For my 40th birthday, I friggin wanted to eat lobster in Maine....so we're doing that. A lot. 

7. We've been curious about camping in the back of the vehicle for a long time now. We've done a few weekend trips and enjoyed it and now we're curious what it will be like to adventure like this for longer periods of time. If we like it enough, maybe this will just be what we do every summer...live like nomads in the back of our car and soak up adventures left and right. 

--> I'm sure there will be plenty of moments of discomfort on this camping trip, but we've already talked about how we won't snap at each other (even if we don't sleep well) and we'll laugh it off instead of letting it get us down. It's all about attitude and we're going to try our hardest to make it fun.

But what about work?

We nerded out and got Starlink so that we can work from our campground sites every day. Both Paul and I are working this summer. I took two weeks of time off scattered in those seven weeks, but for the most part, we plan on working every morning and every evening and adventuring in between. 

Anyway, that's the plan for the next seven weeks of our life! Fingers crossed we get good weather and safe driving!

We won't update this travel blog every day but we're going to try to post every few days. Stay tuned!