Thomas Woodrow Wilson (06/8/25)

 Leaving the coast, we didn’t want our path to Massachusetts to go through any big cities, so we took a longer route, with a  couple of one night stops. One of those was in Verona, Virginia. We weren’t actually planning on doing much there but we arrived early in the day so we looked around to see what was there. Turns out, the birthplace of President Woodrow Wilson was a mere 15 miles away.

Woodrow Wilson 1856-1924

U.S. President 1913-1921

It’s listed as his Presidential Library but the tour guide was quick to point out that it really is just the place he was born and his parents moved the family away from here when he was a year and a half old. His father was a Presbyterian minister making $1000 a year in Staunton Virginia, but a parish in Georgia offered him $3000 a year, so off they went. 

The Manse is the building his family lived in, and also served as the parish hub.  The private rooms were mostly on the lower level and the public rooms were on the second level and had a separate entrance.

 

Of course, the difference in luxury level was immediately obvious.

After high school Wilson attended several colleges, changing his concentration of study a couple of times. After finally receiving his bachelors degree from Princeton, (history and political philosophy) he eventually went on to receive his graduate degree from John’s Hopkins University.

After teaching at several colleges he went on to be the President of Princeton in 1902.

Being a man of action, he felt that the pace of accomplishing things in the academic world was too slow, so he  decided politics would be a better fit, and he ran for the office of governor of New Jersey.

The museum was interesting but left me with a lot of questions- more than I feel I should have had. The displays were very disjointed and only told part of the story.

Wilson was married twice. Several plaques talked about Ellen,  his first wife and their children, but it wasn’t until much later in the exhibit that you find out she died in 1914 and he eventually married his second wife, Edith.

Both wives were  apparently genuinely devoted to him and his wellbeing. In 1919 while touring the country by train, Wilson suffered an apparent stroke. His cognitive abilities seemed relatively intact, although he suffered some physical issues for quite a while.

During that time, his wife Edith worked to keep the public from discovering the severity of his infirmity, and helped him navigate the decisions he needed to make on a daily basis. Some called her the first female president.  Eventually he fully returned to his duties and finished out his second term.

Several momentous events took place while he was in office. To secure his re-election, he ran on a promise to keep the U.S. out of the (first world) War.  Unfortunately  Americans were being killed by German submarines, Germany was trying to convince Mexico to attack the U.S. and our “allies” were running out of steam.  It became clear that we may have to enter the war after all...

In 1917 Congress declared war and and army was amassed- from a force of 130,00 in 1917- to more than 2 million by 1918.

After untold US losses, the tide began to turn and late in 1918 the Germans looked for a way towards peace. The armistice took place on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month- a day Americans now call Veteran’s Day.

Several other events took place during this time:

Between 1918 and 1920 the deadliest pandemic in history (still?), the Great Flu Epidemic infected more than 500 million people, killing 50 million or more.

Several amendments to the constitution were enacted during his presidency.  Wilson, having traditional southern thoughts on women, was not exactly a champion of women’s rights, but in 1916, giving in to political pressure, he assured them he was fighting for their cause, and in 1920 they were granted the right to vote.

One of the more positive things he championed while in office was the federal reserve. It is still in place today.

One of the most significant changes in the world during his tenure as President was that in 1913, Great Britain was the world’s major power, and when he left in 2021, The United States was.

Wilson died in 1924, about 3 years after he finished his second term as president. 

Beaches, Baby! (6/4/25)

 

Living much of the year in the western half of the country, I really miss the ocean. I grew up swimming in the Atlantic, in MA and New Hampshire.  Hitting the beach was high on my list of things to do, and hitting the beaches further south than MA was even higher. The water felt toasty warm!

Our first beach stop was Emerald Isle North Carolina. We have never been here before, but it is now high on our list of places to return to…

The RV park we were in was walking distance to the beach, which is a huge deal.

Our first day we had to take care of some business in the morning, but spent the afternoon reading on the beach.

Our second day we combined the beach with hiking. We packed up towels, and lunch, in our beach chairs, which we can wear like backpacks.

We walked two miles down the beach, stopping whenever we felt like it. At the two mile mark we stopped for lunch,

and then meandered back, again, stopping to relax and enjoy the water.

That night we decided to go out to eat, and were delighted to learn that a seafood restaurant featuring live music was within walking distance.

We sat and enjoyed a drink while waiting for a table for dinner.

Our second beach stop was Virginia Beach, Virginia. Our RV park was not on the water this time, but it was a close second. There is a trolley that runs all day, until after 9 pm, every 20 minutes. You can get dropped off anywhere along the beach.  We packed a lunch and chairs and headed to the water.

The ocean here is a bit colder, and a bit rougher than North Carolina, but we still loved it. (that is not us, lol)

The trolley was so easy to use that we took it to the beach, then back to the campground to change for dinner, and back to the beach again.

Walking along the boardwalk, we looked for a souvenir to buy but came away with nothing. There had to be 20-30 beach volley ball courts all along the beach.

Again we couldn’t resist a restaurant with a view of the ocean, so we headed to Waterman’s for an early dinner.

We only had two nights in Virginia Beach before we needed to move on.

Skipping ahead, our third beach stop was Niantic Connecticut. It took a couple of days of driving to get this far because we were avoiding cities. We did stop a couple of museums along the way, but I will insert those posts after this one.

I lived in Connecticut for about 6 years but I had never been to Niantic. The RV park we stayed in here was also not on the beach, but has a free shuttle that will pick you up and drop you off wherever you want.

We didn’t have as much time here so we didn’t bother with chairs. The shuttle driver dropped us off at the far end of the 1 mile boardwalk, and we walked all along the beach towards town. Once there we had a late lunch at a restaurant before heading back to the campground. We are only an hour and a half from our destination in Massachusetts.

New House Update:

On  our way to the beaches we made a short stop in the small town of Hickory North Carolina, which has some fantastic furniture at fantastic prices. After shopping the huge furniture mall, we ordered our great room furniture from one of the stores. Since they are custom, it will take several months to get them.  Good timing- I hope.

Now that we have officially broken ground on the new house in Green Valley, we are receiving regular updates from the Supervisor:

Two Weeks in Laurel Springs, NC (5/30/25)

 

Meeting up with good friends Mike and Julie was one of the highlights of our trip east. We haven’t seen them in a couple of years but those hundreds of days melted away in about 2 minutes and then it felt like it was just yesterday- except that we realize how much we miss having them in our daily lives.

Our two weeks with them was busy, but not busy. We explored, we spent time with them, and with their friends, and we took time to just relax and enjoy.

We shared some meals, including a pot luck dinner…

and we shared campfires….

and we even shared meals around the campfire!

One of our adventures was to a local winery that had an event with live music and several vendors, and of course some wine tasting (cider for Paul)…

Being close to the Blue Ridge Parkway, there is tons of great hiking in this area.

One of our hiking days was spent at Grayson Highlands State Park… we first hiked the 1.5 mile  Rock house Ridge loop…

After which we took a break for a picnic lunch...

Our second trail of the day, to Big Pinnacle,  was a little more difficult with some rocky areas, but totally worth the views…

A few days later we combined hiking with music. We headed to the Blue Ridge Music Center where we hiked about 2 miles of the Fisher Peak Loop trail, without finishing the full loop.

As we returned to the music center we could hear the music starting up so we ate our lunch before heading to listen.

We managed to fit in one more day of hiking in our two week stay-

We walked about two miles along Bluff Mountain Trail, then called it done, and found a spot for lunch.

On our days off from hiking Paul and I did some exploring on our own- we found some pottery we liked at the winery and went to the potter’s  store to get more.

Mike and Julie (and other seasonal campers) have a pretty good garden that they tend to in the campground and Paul volunteered some time helping them do some planting.

I had promised myself I would get caught up on my blog ( I think we all know how well that went) but I had so many pictures to go through and organize- at least I got SOME done!

Memorial Day was quite gloomy so an impromptu party in the “barn” kept us all entertained.  Of course Paul and I helped with the quesadillas!

And then it was time to move on-

Yo Yos (06/22/21)

 
These days it seems like Paul and I are yanked in one direction, then yanked back in another, before we have had time to take a breath. Such was the case with our trip to Massachusetts.

We limped into Massachusetts in early June, having broken a leaf spring on the trailer somewhere between Virginia and Mass. I am always grateful that Paul is so handy that he can diagnose and fix many issues with our vehicles.  He ordered the part we needed and had it shipped to the RV park.

Our with plans were to spend time with our son, and family and friends. However, soon after we got there, Paul’s mom in El Paso started having some issues we needed to deal with. Not being sure if we could do it from afar, we made plans to head back to Texas, just to be safe (she has since improved to the point that we don’t have to rush back). 

We gave ourselves a few days to cram in as many visits as we could, and we did pretty well.

We saw our photo-shy son a couple of times, my brother and his wife, my sister, aunt, and my childhood friends….whew. All in a few days.

After we started the trek back, his mom started doing better so we slowed the pace down a bit.

One of the RV Parks we found along the way was Dixie Caverns RV. We only spent one night there but we arrived early enough to take a tour of the cavern.

Although we have seen plenty of caverns in our travels, this one was pretty darn good.

We took a southern route, partly because RV spots would be easier to come by, but also to go through Florida, so that we could stop and say hi to our friends Mike and Julie. We never have a bad time with them and a bonus this time around is that we met their long time friends Deb and Rick.

All too soon we were on our way again, but our next stop was another happy one for me.  A few years ago we spent some time at Myrtle Beach and I fell in love with the idea of swimming in the ocean without going numb-having grown up in the northeast, I only knew about frigid water temperatures. Although Myrtle Beach wasn’t on our route, Gulf Shores, AL was.

The state park we stayed in also has bikes that you can borrow- so we did that early in the day before it got too hot.  We didn’t go very far, only about 5 miles, but it was fun, anyway.

Once we were done with our ride we headed for the beach, where I spent most of the afternoon in the water.

Continuing our slow trek westward, our next stop was New Orleans. We elected to stay at the French Quarter RV Resort- a very pricy resort but it comes with some perks.  Our site has a private outdoor bar, complete with TV, and we can walk to Bourbon Street from here.

Announcing to our family and friends that we were headed to NOLA produced a frenzy of emails, texts and phone calls. Did we know that there was a potential tropical storm headed that way? Yep, we did. That’s probably why the RV park had availability on short notice. We kept an eye on the weather, knowing we might have to hunker down. We did get a fair amount of rain, but very little wind, as the storm shifted east. It was just enough to make it fun sitting outside watching the weather channel.

Knowing the storm was coming, we spent our first night in NOLA on Bourbon Street, looking for live music and Hurricanes (the drink).

Pat O’Brien’s was our first stop (for a decent Hurricane) before heading to other venues for the live music. We found several bars with music we enjoyed, so we had a great evening flitting around from bar to bar. Apparently Bourbon Street just recently reopened, so some of the venues were short on entertainment.

The next day we figured we’d better walk off some of those drinks. so we headed to the waterfront, about a mile or so away. Along the way we stopped at Musical Legends Park for some food and live music. 

We had a lunch of typical New Orleans fare- a frozen Hurricane, Jambalaya, and beignets. I guess we didn’t really walk off the previous night’s drinks.

Next stop: Texas.