Tag: vacation

Our vacation this year was built around a Dickerson family reunion in Vermont at the end of July.

We flew to Pittsburgh, PA on July 22 and from there drove a rental car up through Erie to Niagara Falls.

We had been debating how to travel and considered taking the train to Chicago and then driving from there. But then I learned that sleeper-car prices on the train have more than doubled since we last did that and it wasn’t cheap to begin with. So that was now well into ridiculous territory. After debating a few other ideas and since Jess was just home from the hospital we decided to spend a lot less money than the train, but fly first class. Which, after accounting for paying extra to pick seats, check bags, get carry ons, and buy food, was not really an extravagant price difference. And it was a rather pleasant experience to have enough room to put your knees directly in front of you and move your arms without your elbows being in someone’s face.

Since our flight out left at 6:20 in the morning we got to have a not-terrible breakfast after takeoff. The meal descriptions only mentioned the entree and not all the sides. So along with eggs, hashbrowns, and sausage the meal came with yogurt, a croissant, a pain au chocolate, a fruit cup, and whatever you wanted to drink (even milk! which made Corinne very happy). Metal flatware, actual glasses, and a hot towel. Fancy. But not quite as enjoyable as train breakfast.

Spent the first night in middle-of-nowhere western Pennsylvania after we decided we didn’t want to drive any more.

The next day we drove up to Erie and toured the Presque Isle Lighthouse. We had lunch at Pizza Hut, which was actually quite good, before buying some groceries at Aldi and continuing our drive north.

We arrived in Niagara Falls that evening checked into the hotel, and then walked over to Canada. Mostly to do it. I had filed all the paperwork at work in case we wanted to do it and we had brought our passports and birth certificates so now we had to make it worth all the effort. So we went across the bridge, walked around a little, and had dinner before returning.

Oh, we managed to time our trip to leave Livermore while it was having one of the coolest summers in 40 years to visit New York which was having a heat wave. So it was hot and humid. Which most of the family is not used to. That was a little challenging, but we survived.

The next morning I went down to check out the hotel’s included breakfast. It was insanely mobbed and didn’t have much to begin with. So I walked across the street to the Culinary Institute of New York’s Patisserie which has fresh-baked goods every day. We had bagels for breakfast and various other pastries and treats during our visit. Great little spot that didn’t seem to be well known–it wasn’t busy anyway.

Our goals for the day were Maid of the Mist and Cave of the Winds. We walked down to the park and almost walked straight onto a boat for the Maid of the Mist, but about a dozen people in front of us a woman appeared to have broken her leg while boarding. So everything stopped while she was tended to. Took about 45 minutes to get her on her way to a hospital.

By that time the sun was starting to break through the clouds and it was getting hot. So we opted to leave the ponchos off during the boat ride. The mist felt great.

Pictures, of course, do not properly convey the scale. It’s a little overwhelming just how tall, how wide, how loud–how much water there is pouring over those cliffs.

After our boat ride we went back to the Culinary Institute of New York for lunch in their restaurant. Food is prepared by students but since they care about what they’re doing you get pretty-good food for a reasonable price.

After some lunch, rest, and drying off we headed over to Goat Island for the Cave of the Winds tour. We did wear the ponchos this time, but that didn’t help the gallons of water landing on our feet. It took a few days to get our shoes dried afterwards.

Then we walked down to the Horseshoe Falls observation point.

Back to the hotel for some more rest and drying off before dinner, but in the meantime I went on a fool’s errand looking for aloe vera. We had gotten a little sunburned in our walking around all day. I figured I could find a pharmacy near by catering to tourists, but I was wrong. I walked a few blocks to a 7-11 which was inexplicably closed. Tried a gas-station convenience store and a gift shop which were both unfruitful. So I gave up and got in the car and drove to a pharmacy.

It was during this excursion that I learned the area around Niagara Falls gets sketchy quickly once you get more than a few blocks from the State Park. Makes you wonder where all the tourism money is going.

Dinner was chicken strips at Church’s–also right outside our hotel.

In the morning, after more breakfast from the Patisserie, I walked back down to the Maid of the Mist gift shop to buy a magnet. Then we packed up and headed east to Lockport.

The girls had April 21st off of school, so I took the day off work and we made a daytrip out to Columbia. Corinne’s been learning about California’s gold-mining history this year so I thought she might enjoy Columbia since she doesn’t remember our previous trips.

On the way we stopped at Knights Ferry Recreation Area on the Stanislaus River–which we haven’t done before. Just went down and played at the shore of the river for a bit. Then looked at the bridge (which is closed pending repairs).

Then into Columbia for lunch, wandering about, bowling, candle dipping, and panning for gold.

Mom said she’d take care of our cats for a couple days so we could do a short trip to Monterey.

We stayed at the Best Western in Marina which is almost as close to the beach as you can get. So after checking in we walked down to the ocean. It was cold. I wore pants, a long-sleeved shirt, a windbreaker, and a hat. I also went to Walmart and bought a couple blankets and was wrapped in one. I was still chilly. The girls pranced about and played in the waves. I don’t know how they didn’t freeze, but once Corinne was shivering we packed it in and went back to the motel.

The next day we drove into Monterey to go to the aquarium. We parked downtown and walked around Old Fisherman’s Wharf a bit. But before we got to the wharf we passed a patisserie and bought crepes. We had considered waiting until our way back, but it was good we didn’t because they were closed then. They were pretty good, though they took an oddly long amount of time. On the wharf the girls found a cow-bench to sit on.

At the wharf there were sea lions basking, and barking, on the shore. We walked the length of the wharf and then along the shoreline trail a while before hopping on the free trolley to finish the trek to the aquarium.

Corinne and Heather have very different approaches to such places, so I went with Corinne while Jess stayed with Heather. Corinne was upset when the bat rays wouldn’t come over to her for petting, but on our 3rd visit to the touch tank she was able to reach them and was very pleased about it.

Then it was back to the motel and the next day we headed home. And the day after that (Father’s Day) I took Mom & Dad back to the train station.

We had originally planned to stay another day, but we were all feeling like it was time to be home. And this way there are still things we haven’t done for our next visit.

So we packed up and headed out on the 13th. We stopped at the Pima Air and Space Museum in Tucson on our way out.

I had no idea saguaro cacti grew so tall! I had expected something like 10-feet tall, not 20-feet tall.

It was hot at the air and space museum. We knew it would be, but thought we could see a few things fairly quickly and mostly stay inside out of the sun before it got too hot. But the 30-minute loop we did outside just about did in Jess and the girls.

Lots of things to see there though when it’s not too hot to stand and read the signage.

After the air and space museum we got lunch at Brushfire BBQ, which was pretty good. After lunch we headed onto something less conventional–the Mini Time Machine Museum of Miniatures (on the other side of Tucson).

I’m not sure how “Time Machine” makes its way into their name, but it’s a building full of miniature scenes which was fun to look at it. And it was air-conditioned! It included a “Fairy Hunt” for the girls to complete. That is, throughout the scenes were something like 12 fairies they needed to find to get a little prize at the end. We found them all and they got to pick out a sticker and eraser or something.

One large room was all scenes related to fantasy and holidays (mainly Halloween and Christmas) which was probably the most fun part.

But the other areas with more realistic to life scenes were cool too. They were more interesting from the view of noticing how many details are included such that a photograph can fool you as to what you’re looking at. Like the bookstore here, which is about 10 inches tall:

And they had these pencil tips that had been carved like this in what must have been an incredibly painstaking process:

And I also liked this old European street scene:

After those stops we drove for 4 hours and stayed the night in Blythe, CA. Then up the next day to thread the needle across Los Angeles between morning gridlock and afternoon gridlock. And we had an almost perfect run. We got slowed down by an accident for just a few minutes on the north side of LA. Once safely through LA we had dinner at Wendy’s and then up I-5 and home.