Long Day Driving

I can’t remember the last time I slept 8 hours, but I think I got 8 1/2 last night. Still groggy, we enjoyed a relaxing morning and a nice breakfast. Martha did yoga with a video she brought. Off in the distance we heard a lot of children making a lot of noise. As I walked up to the bathroom, I saw a lot of cars parked through the trees. Someone on a microphone was yelling out instructions and what sounded like 100 kids were shouting back replies. It sounded like a drill sergeant from my VMI days, but the kids were obviously having fun, and it was obviously a big, popular event. Then there was music played on the loudspeaker. I wanted to go over there to see, but we needed to get on the road. We didn’t see much of this park, but it’s a huge lake with a nice campground and beautiful fields. 

We got on the road at 10:00, winding along small country roads and small towns along Pennsylvania countryside until getting on I83. With heavy truck traffic, it is much like I81, which we eventually got on. It takes a while to get through Pennsylvania, and we were glad to finally cross into New York. I was surprised when a warning light came on. “Gas cap is loose”. Never having seen that before, I looked in the side mirror, there it was dangling by it’s little cord. Geez! 81 is no easy place to stop, but found a weigh station that was closed and put the gas cap back on. Now how the heck to you rested that alert? By the time we go to Syracuse, it was rush hour and were diverted by the GPS to avoid traffic. Sometimes you feel like you just shouldn’t pay attention to that thing, because they are often wrong and will take you on some screwy routes, but this time, it worked great. My big rule is to be in camp by 5:00, but we still had a ways to go. Now I was getting tired and grumpy, but tried to hold it together. Finally arriving at Delta Lake State Park at 6:00, we checked in, found our campsite, backed in, leveled the trailer and unhooked. It rained a little while we were doing this, but just as we finished, it poured. I was happy not to be in a tent. 

Martha had said she didn’t want to become an alcoholic on this trip, having seen how Kelly and I had cocktail hour every night on our trip three years ago, but after driving on I83 and 81 in heavy traffic all day, you need a drink!! She had made some ratatouille before we left and we had some leftover steak from a nice dinner with our neighbors, Danis and Reetie. Adding some potatoes, we had a nice dinner. By then the rain had stopped, so we walked out the back of our campsite to the lake to see a beautiful sunset. Nice and cool, we opened the windows and finally enjoyed a cool breeze.