Day 5 - The secret New York

After chatting till late with our great hosts, and the children playing games till too late, we still awoke reasonably early. We played and chatted more until midday before venturing out to the parks. We considered visiting Manhattan and doing the typical tourist things but decided against it. We wanted to do things the children would enjoy and we could afford. Also, we didn't want to get lost in the city again. I looked back at our tracks the day before and they look like I signed my name with all the wrong turns we made!
So after the park mentioned below, I called the family which would host us on Wednesday evening and dropped in. Before Lana and I could introduce ourselves, the children had all gone inside and were playing together. An hour later, whilst Lana and I were chatting, their oldest son came into the room and began, "My friend Eric...". Yep. This socialization thing is a real issue!
After a sad farewell, promosing to see each other the next evening, we left and the children saw a Chuck E Cheese store (See here for our last visit). Same overpriced pathetic pizzas with tokens. Next time we go we won't worry about the food and just get the tokens!
More chatting and playing finished the day marvellously.

Typical NY street

Typical NY street

All one sees of New York in movies and television is mostly Manhattan - skyscrapers, trash, crime, high finance, no families, no trees, and so on. But we discovered a completely different New York - Long Island. This felt very similar to Melbourne, albeit with more local regulations and controls over citizens' lives. More about that later.
This photo is a typical suburban street in Long Island. Lots of trees, nice houses, places to walk and play. And many people we spoke to have always been Long Island residents and don't see any reason not to be. We found parks, gardens, lovely family homes, lots of families, quiet streets and busy highways.
This was a very pleasant surprise.

The Royal Wave

The Royal Wave

We'll probably post a number of Rose travelling photos. When Eric is sitting in the middle seat - next to Rose - he likes to play with her. Once when Eric was playing some game with Ariel, Rose reached over and pulled his shoulder obviously complaining that he was ignoring her! Who says 1 year olds can't communicate?
Here Rose is giving the royal wave to all her loyal subjects.

Planting Fields

Planting Fields

On Tuesdays our hosts had their "busy day" which means we went exploring. The first suggestion was to visit Old Westbury Gardens - especially made attractive by the free ticket our hosts had! We pulled in to the drive in front of the closed gates and hailed the gardener. He told us the gardens are closed Tuesdays - but - we could go to another garden. I asked him the name, pulled out the GPS thingy and off we went.
Planting Fields Arboretum is an amazing place. It is a maintained old estate with huge gardens and paths. Plants are flowering often and the greenhouse has a children's activity which has the children searching each section.
This picture is one of the greenhouse areas.

Welcome to New York

Welcome to New York

After foolishly relying on my GPS thingy, rather than the wiser counsel of the family we were visiting, this was our first view of the entrance to New York - the Holland Tunnel. We paid $6 for the privilege of having a first hand glance at graffiti covered damaged buildings, trash strewn streets, lots of traffic and many wrong turns. The buildings tended to hinder the satellite reception, too! Apparently the state of the streets and buildings is better than it used to be!
At least we were able to experience New York city without too much pain. But then we came to the part of Long Island where we are staying. This is an amazing part of New York. From what little we had seen of New York from TV and film, we did not realise that there were lovely parts of suburbia within a short distance of Manhattan.

The best laid plans ...

According to our GPS estimates (which assume no traffic) we would be arriving in NY by about 4:00pm. Unfortunately, being Memorial Day weekend, there was some roadwork not far after we started. We travelled 4 miles in one hour.
The road was much clearer after that, but we observed NY/NJ drivers are a lot "busier" than those down South. One vehicle, containing two young ladies, happily stayed in the left hand lane (the "fast" one) obviously hopping and bopping to their music, oblivious to all the cars tailgating and swerving around them. This gave us a great example to explain to the children what tailgating was, and why not observing surrounding traffic can also be dangerous.
Anyway, we finally got to the entrance to NY about 5:00pm.

Day 4 - Roadside America 2005

Roadside America 2005

We arranged to meet another homeschooling family at Roadside America. With the GPS thingy we asked for a route which avoided all highways so we had a rambling trip from the hotel across all the back ways through rural PA. This is also a very green part of the country with lots of dairy farms servicing the chocolate factories of Hershey and Nestle.
We saw a few Amish people and at one point were behind a buggy and cart.
There is a Pennsylvania Dutch gift store next to Roadside America. I asked whether they had any Dutch Licorice. The lady looked surprised and said she had never heard of that, perhaps I was thinking about Holland Dutch. Pennsylvania Dutch is not at all related to Holland Dutch. The store has what must be one of the oldest cash registers I have seen. Not surprisingly, they only accepted cash.
Roadside America is very good value. The lady guarding the entrance checked twice to make sure I had the correct number of adults and children and reminded me that children under six for free. I assured her the number was correct.
The display is basically a huge train set with buttons around the outside allowing visitors to activate parts of the display. Some buttons activate a train or trolley, others will make a conveyor move or playground work. On the hour is a patriotic night time display with some Christian messages.
This was well worth the time to visit.

Packing Trouble

Packing Trouble

After asking and receiving much advice from other families on the 4RealLearning homeschooling forum in which we participate, we went out and bought a back pack from Walmart. It is a smaller one without the big supports which folds up nicely and is a good size so Ariel and Eric can carry Rose too.
When we brought it home, Eric put it on and carried around Rose so she would get used to it. She doesn't mind, and likes to flop sideways to grin at her bearer.

A talking Deer Head

A talking Deer Head

Cabelas has everything the hunting man might need. Guns, bows, ammunition, camouflage everything, knives, GPS units and of course, a motion activated talking deer head. Just what every home needs!

If you succumb to the desire to get one yourself, here is the link online.

Cabelas

Cabelas

Our friends were delayed so they suggested we meet them at Cabela's just up the road. Cabela's is a store dedicated to wildlife - and how to hunt it. Inside are displays of hundreds of stuffed animals from bears to chipmunks and about 50 varieties of deer. This wasn't just a store - it was an experience!

More Translations

It took a while for us to work out lots of clothing terms.
Aust - US - notes
Apron? - Pinafore (The type of thing Anne of Green Gables wore)
Pinafore - Jumper (The dress where a T-shirt is worn underneath)
Jumper - sweater
Sweater - sweater (Aust refer to a sweater as a fine jumper. A jumper is normally woollen)
Lemonade - Soda/Pop/Coke ("Lemonade" in Australia is Sprite/7 Up?etc, with the generic term for all fizzy sugar drinks being "Lemonade")
Lemon sweet drink - Lemonade (US Lemonade is a nice mix of Sugar, water and some lemon. The closest Australians would have is lemon flavoured "lemonade")

Notes for travellers

Now that Lana has arisen, we just wanted to add a few more notes so far.

Free refills are a great idea. Most restaurants in Australia charge for each drink, whilst most family restaurants in the US provide free refills for most drinks for dine-in patrons. So we tend to order only one or two drinks for the family and we share the cups. This saves about $8 a meal which tends to add up.

The NC mum had a great personal ring tone for when her husband called. We heard the telephone sound the Lone Ranger theme and she knew her husband was on his way home to rescue her.

In Virginia some use a different word for Shopping trolley/cart/buggy. The Walmart sales assistant was packing our bags and ask us "Do you want to pack your basket?" We looked around for a basket and asked for more information. She asked again and finally pointed to the shopping cart. "Aha!" we cried, "we have found a new word for the trolley!" The assistant just grimaced as these strange aliens.

Day 3 - Pennsylvania the rural

We have made it to Pennsylvania. 5 states now - SC, NC, VA, MD and PA. We visited Hershey World and saw an Amish horse and buggy on the way to the hotel. We hope to see more tomorrow.

With a name like "Chocolate World"...

Hershey's Chocolate World, Hershey PA

After briefly visiting the Shoe House, we made for Hershey's Chocolate World, Hershey, Pennsylvania. Parking was free for the first 2 hours, no entrance fees, and there was some free activities. We joined in a tour through a factory exhibit which showed the various stages in the production of Hershey's chocolate. On the wall of the rather long passage leading to the tour carriages were some TV screens with short videos showing how cocoa beans are grown and harvested. They were fascinating.
Whilst we were watching, everyone went past us wondering why we would bother with something educational. We learned that Cocoa plants only grow within 20 degrees of the equator. The beans grow in pods which are harvested by hand and then fermented and dried. Very interesting stuff.
The tour was also worthwhile. Visitors were placed in little two seat carriages which went through a series of displays showing each stage of manufacture. Fascinating.
The most humorous part was as we were leaving and being channelled towards the Hershey Shop, a lady behind us whined, "They didn't even give us the free chocolate!" Around the next corner they did hand out a small sample chocolate bar to each participant, and this explained why everyone seemed so keen to just get through the thing. We were happy to learn how chocolate was made.
In the end, Lana got her souvenir teddy bear and badge, we learned about chocolate making, and pondered about visiting the Cadbury's factory in Tasmania when we eventually return to Australia. Yummo!

There was an old woman who lived in a ...

Shoe House PA

Just outside of York, Pennsylvania, is the Shoe House. It was built some time ago by a shoe maker to promote his trade, but now is a tourist destination offering a rest stop, tasty ice-cream and tours of the house. The icecream is home made and the price reasonable. Luckily I was able to assist Clare with her icecream. It was too tall for her, so with some jusdicious assistance, I reduced it to a more managable size!

Off route - recalculating!

As we were planning on doing a lot more visting this trip, we invested in a Garmin iQue 3600 - a combination GPS and Palm organizer. It has proven marvellous. When we start the trip we place it in the car thingy which connects to power and a speaker. Then we pick the address from our address book and say "Route to this address". It then calculates the route and uses voice prompts warning of upcoming turns and directions.
If we happen to miss a turn because either we misundertood the instruction, or were in the wrong lane, the unit announces "Off route, recalculating." The children now call it "Dad's new calculator".

Stargate Offices?

Stargate Offices

Is this where the government has cleverly hidden the Stargate Project? No-one will ever guess the real purpose. Passers-by will just assume it is an interesting bit oif architecture, and Australian Tourists will post photo's of it for their friends. The perfect cover!

Skyback rider training

Viva Viennaaaaaarrgghh!

After Mass we visited the Memorial Day weekend fair in Vienna "Viva Vienna!". There were rides, stalls, displays and fine food. Ariel went the night before with our host's oldest daughter and some of her friends. One of the rides Ariel tried was this one. When James saw it today, he immediately thought of the "Skyback Riders" from Dinotopia and wanted to give it a go.

Health food at the fair

Deep Fried Oreos. Hmmmm.

Fairs are always a riot of noise, people and interesting foods. I don't know if this will be a big hit back home, but for $3.00 brave souls could have purchased 5 Oreo Cookies dipped in pancake batter and fried.
Woohoo! Stand Back!

Day 2 - Virginia is Green and we're not terrorists!

After leaving North Carolina we went straight up the main Interstate. This is not a very exciting route, but it was the most direct. We stopped at the Virginia Information Center and found an interesting park at which we could stop. We asked the children whether they would like to stop at the park, or get to the family earlier. Unanimous - get to the family quicker.
When we arrived, our host family's children were waiting at the front and started jumping up and down, "They're here!". Our children were glad to be there too!
Before we could really introduce ourselves properly, the children had already met their counterparts and gone off to play. The father had expressed some concern to the mother we had been liasing with, "You don't even know these people - they're just names on the Internet. They could be terrorists or anything!"
We all got along famously and are looking forward to visiting them in the future when we do a trip to Washington - not on a long weekend.