The Toads Go East - Day 3

A fitful night led to the discovery that at seven o'clock in the morning, the temperature was a measly eight degrees Celsius. That's winter weather, that is. Still, it was dry and the shower water was hot, so it wasn't all bad. At least the sun was up.

I happened to speak to a couple who where camped up the way, who I knew to be Brits because they had a couple of UK registered motorbikes parked outside their tent. They were on a coast to coast tour of the US and Canada, having had their bikes shipped to Halifax in Nova Scotia from Southampton. They'd already been been to Vancouver and were on the last few stages of their return to the UK, heading first into the Adirondacks in New York, then to a cottage by the sea in Maine. They were a lovely couple, so adventurous and clearly older than me! Even in my youth I'd never have done a trip like that but this, it seemed, was one of many for this couple. It was lovely to talk to them.

Mrs T and I enjoyed a leisurely breakfast before rousing the tadpoles and breaking camp. By some strange influence, we had hitched, dumped the tanks and were turning out onto the road at ten-thirty, which was some kind of record I think. Today it was a four or five hour run to Middleboro, Massachusetts, where the KOA campground stands midway between Boston to the North and Cape Cod to the south. The nearest coastal town is Plymouth, of Mayflower fame, which will be nicely comforting for Mrs T as she is a Plymouth girl herself; not Mass. you understand, it's Devon in her case.

The initial route took us along US20, a switch-back road through the hills heading towards Albany in the Hudson Valley. It was a lovely run in the sunshine and the Toadmobile was showing a very creditable gas mileage of 15.7 litres per 100 kms. I don't know what that is in miles per gallon but as we normally average about 19 or 20 lphk, that was pretty good, especially given how hilly it was. We dropped down to Albany, joined the Interstate system again and crossed the Hudson River on the Berkshires Arm of the New York Thruway as we made our way to Massachusetts. From the river we started climbing again, this time into the Appalachians; not a steep climb but it was long, over the State line and ever upwards, now on the Massachusetts Turnpike, or the Mass Pike as it's known. We normally cruise at around 60 mph but the hills were lowering our speed, not dramatically but we were down on our average. The gas mileage went up, too, but not as much as you'd think. The summit of the Mass Pike was shown as a little over 1,700 feet and once past that point we started to drop down again, towards Springfield. The road signs warned of steep grades, which are a trailer's worst enemy, but actually it was all relatively easy and we hit Springfield with the gas mileage looking sweet again. Simpson fans should note that there is a Springfield in every State in the US; Matt Groening knows his geography.

From Springfield we stayed on the Mass Pike until we were not too far from Boston, then dropped south towards Middleboro. I'd imagined that Massachusetts was all verdant farmland but we spent pretty much the entire trip surrounded by woodland, even as we approached the Atlantic coast. Anyway, our destination was reached about an hour after the Satnav had estimated because we hadn't been travelling at the speed limit. 

The Boston/Cape Cod KOA (Kampgrounds of America) is the first commercial campground that we'd booked for some while. They're not the leafy glades that the State Parks offer and tend to have their visitors parked in neat rows, quite close together. What they do have is the "full hookup", electric, water and sewer connections, which means we can use all of Towed Haul's facilities without worrying about filling and emptying different holding tanks. KOAs also tend to have a laundry, kids' facilities and swimming pools, which is why we're here for seven nights, the longest we've camped anywhere. We had paid a little extra to get a slightly bigger site with a patio and attendant furniture. Having backed neatly in against the patio, I set about destroying the table that had been provided by tipping it onto its side in an attempt to refit one of its little plastic feet. A couple of the ceramic tiles that made up the table top fell out and one broke - one-nil to me I believe! Actually, this KOA is quite nice as it's a little wooded and quite spread out. We have reasonable Internet access and a cable TV hookup if we feel like going out and buying a bit of coaxial cable. We have a cable system in the trailer but have never used it, us not being great TV watchers. It's tempting to get a cable given that the service is free but then if we buy a cable, it's not free!

After the morning's very cold start, it was hot and very sunny in Middleboro. The evening was a beauty so we decided to make our way to Plymouth, to get the lie of the land as it were. The big tadpole had set his heart on eating at an IHOP (International House Of Pancakes) and seemed most put out that we wanted to look at the Ocean before eating. The harbour front was busy as there are lots of eating places down there, and we had a bit of bother finding a parking spot. When getting our ticket, we fell into conversation with a Scotsman who'd spotted the small tadpole's Chelsea shirt and made a disparaging comment. So, on our first trip to New England, we found ourselves talking football with a Sweaty. What a strange world.

The evening was lovely, though, and we watched as a couple of Cornish Giggs were launched into the harbour, one a lovely clinker-built model that would have graced fishing village in Cornwall. 

We did make it to IHOP in the end, which was a huge sacrifice for Mrs T as she doesn't really like what they serve, so the big tadpole really owes her now. They gave me a free cup of coffee, for no other reason than they'd already made up the bill, which was nice. I say free but the bill was extortionate so maybe it was what I deserved.

Tuesday's activities are set so I hope you'll be able to come back and see what we were up to. Hold tight for another exciting adventure!

The Toads Go East - Day 2

The covered bridge at Glimmerglass State Park

Sunday.

The daylight revealed quite a reasonable parking job the night before; straight and level, which is always a bonus. The site we were on was quite neat, with a fairly level pad of crushed stone, a bench and tables, a fire pit and little barbecue on a stand, all set in woodland. Like the other New York State Park we'd visited, it was very neat and tidy. 

Our neighbour opposite complimented us on our nocturnal parking skills, which was nice, and then in answer to my question about the showers, said that he'd seen worse; was that a recommendation I wondered? Sure enough, the showers were OK, not up to Ontario Parks standards perhaps, but still serviceable. The plastic curtain on the front of the stall was streaked with mud, which is something I've come across before here in these US parks; what do people do in there?

Back under the awning, I sat and watched the campground wake up as the clouds scudded, rather quickly I noted, across the blue patches of sky that I could see through the tree tops. All of a sudden a short, sharp shower of rain appeared. It soaked everything and passed off as quickly as it had arrived, which was a bit odd because it didn't look particularly rainy, before or after the shower. 

Later that morning we walked off towards the beach on the edge of Lake Otsega and were surprised at both the number of people coming into the park to enjoy said beach and the wind that was whipping in off the lake. Well, despite the wind, the lake was beautiful, surrounded by high, wooded hills that were peppered with expensive looking houses, more of which later. The beach and grassy picnic area was filling up with large family groups, admittedly huddled against the wind in sweatshirts and blankets, but it looked a really pleasant place to be on a summer Sunday. The water close to the beach was marked out into a swimming area and as well as a lifeguard on a high chair on the beach, a cold looking lifeguard was also occupying a floating high chair some yards off the beach. He or she was all muffled up against the wind and probably wondering about the wisdom of being a lifeguard in New York rather than California. Still, there were people in the water so I'm sure he or she was coiled, ready to leap into action. I might just note, in a mildly controversial manner, that in a country that allows just about anyone access to a gun, the Americans seem to be possessed of a fervour concerning other types of health and safety. Just saying loike.

The Park's grounds are also home to a lovely covered bridge, in the manner of The Bridges Of Madison County. This one was long out of regular use but had been well restored and was a pleasure to explore. I bored the tadpoles with observations about its construction and Mrs T did the Clint Eastwood thing and took the photographs. This bridge claimed to be the oldest covered bridge still standing in the US, but it was so well restored that it barely looked a few years old. 

We then took a trip into the local metropolis of Cooperstown, which nestled at the other end of the lake in a fold in the hills. The town was named for Judge William Cooper, the father of the noted American author James Fenimore Cooper, whose works included The Last Of The Mohicans and Otsega Lake was known as Glimmerglass in his books. The approach to the town down the western shore of the lake was one long string of big lake-front houses, all equipped with boat docks of course. We passed the Glimmerglass Opera (the US answer Glyndebourne by the looks of it), the Fenimore Art Museum and the opulent Otesaga Resort Hotel (complete with the 55th best golf course in the US!), which was all very posh. The town today, though, is famed for being the location of the National Baseball Hall of Fame, which truly is Mecca for all baseball fans. The town's pretty Main Street was occupied almost exclusively with baseball themed shops and restaurants, and why not? Pretty much all of the (many) people in town were there to visit the HOF. So many were wearing team shirts, hats and the like but some were kitted out in full baseball uniform. This was, we discovered, because there was a small stadium at the back of the HOF where the faithful come and play short games, just to say that they've played at the Cooperstown Dreams Park. I'm not deriding any of this but baseball is to me what cricket will be to most Americans; nonsensical. Still, Cooperstown makes a year-round living from the Hall Of Fame and good luck to them, I say.

Back at Towed Haul for the evening, we settled into Monopoly as the evening drew in. We had intended to go and visit the stately Hyde Hall at the other end of the Park, but we never left the trailer, so intent were the tadpoles on losing to my mean Monopoly skills. 

Monday was set to be another travelling day so I fell into bed at quite a sensible hour, albeit that the cheese sandwich I'd had at nine-thirty was destined to be my downfall. Ho hum.

Anyway, more tomorrow, toad fans, as we head east to the ocean.