On Saturday, August 26th it was time to leave Croton-on-Hudson, New York. We had absolutely loved visiting New York City, Sleepy Hollow, and Scranton and there were about a thousand more things we wanted to do…but we were also exhausted and looking forward to a few weeks at a slower speed. We packed up and headed to Delaware where we would spend 6 nights at Lum’s Pond State Park in Bear and then 7 nights at Trap Pond State Park in Laurel.
Starting out was a little rough and discouraging, though. It turns out that New York has some strict rules about its roadways and that the main road that runs from just outside of Croton Point Park and down through New York City does not permit trucks pulling trailers. We pulled up the correct route for our vehicles on the GPS and headed out. We hit a few traffic slow downs which caused even more delays. About an hour after we left, I happened to notice where we actually were – which was crossing a bridge that would have been about 15 minutes from our park if we had been able to use the parkway. Instead, we spent an hour detouring around it in a big circle to finally get where we were going.
It was a long drive (almost 4 hours), but we eventually made it to Lums Pond State Park in Bear, Delaware and got settled in. The park had really nice, large sites set up in a loop with a big grassy space in the center which was perfect for walking Harley. We were also about 15-20 minutes from restaurants and grocery stores so that made us very happy as well.
On Sunday we took a drive over to Baltimore, Maryland which was about an hour away. We did a little shopping and drove around town playing Pokemon Go before grabbing some fast food and returning home. We were still pretty worn out from our time in New York and it was really nice to just take things slow.
On Wednesday evening, we drove into Philadelphia (about an hour away) for dinner. We have been to Philly a few times before and have already visited the Franklin Institute, the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall, Ben Franklin’s Grave, the zoo, and the Eastern State Penitentiary. While we love so many things about the area – our favorite is the food!
You can’t visit Philly without having a cheesesteak. You just can’t. Or, maybe YOU can but WE certainly can’t. On previous visits, we have visited the big names (Pat’s, Geno’s, Tony Luke’s, and Dalessandro’s) and tried several smaller, less known places as well. For us, the debate about who has the best sandwich has always been pretty clear – I have always loved Pat’s and John loves Dalessandro’s. We didn’t waste any time trying to find someplace new- we just wanted to enjoy our favorites so we picked up one sandwich from each of our top picks. We also picked up my favorite cannoli in the whole world from a bakery just across the street from Pat’s and next to Geno’s. We took our feast to a little park right next to Dalessandro’s and ate while we watched some very tiny children have football practice then headed back “home” to Delaware.
On Thursday, John took a half day so he could do something that he had really been looking forward to – bike across Delaware! Delaware is a really small state and we were staying in the northern tip which is less than 20 miles across. He had decided long ago that he was going to ride his e-bike across the area and this was the day we picked. We loaded the bike into the car along with Harley and set out for adventure.
We dropped John off at the border of Delaware and Maryland near Chesapeake City and planned to pick him up in Delaware City on the border of Delaware and New Jersey in a few hours. There is a beautiful bike trail that runs along the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal and offers some really beautiful views of the area.
Harley and I went on to Chesapeake City where we explored a little dock area and a park. We got back in the car and drove over to Delaware City where we were able to find parking and walk along the canal for a bit. There was a large grassy area in their downtown area right off of the Delaware River and we ran around and chewed on sticks (Harley more than me). We could see the island that holds Fort Delaware off in the river and then we got in the car and drove through Fort Dupont State Park where we spoke to a lovely park ranger and got directions to the end of the bike trail and the Augustine Wildlife Area where we saw several really cool birds and a fox (we weren’t fast enough for too many pictures, though). John finally called and let us know that he had finished but that his bike battery had also died so we went and picked him up and headed home for the day.
On Friday, it was time to make the hour and a half drive from Bear in the northern part of the state down to Laurel in the south. The drive was fairly uneventful and we easily got settled in our new spot in Trap Pond State Park. I have to take a minute and say how much we really liked this park. There were 5 loops of campsites that each had their own play area for the kids and bathhouse. We were in the “A” Loop and our bathroom was super nice. I understand that this was recently rebuilt and that the other loops haven’t had theirs upgraded yet but that it is in the works. All of the loops end with common space along the lake and the park is full of trees which make the campsites very shady and comfortable.
On Sunday we drove down to Chincoteague Island in Virginia for a boat tour to Assateague Island and hopefully a look at the wild ponies of Assateague Island. Both the captain and the guide were super friendly and knowledgeable about the area.
We were able to see the horses from pretty far away and we learned so much about the horses and the area itself. These horses are descended from Spanish stock – probably survivors of shipwrecks that managed to swim ashore to the island. The herds have survived on the island for around 300 years! Over the last hundred years, they have been managed by the Saltwater Cowboys – a group of volunteer firemen on Chincoteague Island.
Following the boat tour, we walked around Mariner’s Point for a little while and just enjoyed the beautiful day.
We still had a little bit of time before we had to get back to Harley so we decided to drive over to Assateague Island for a final try at seeing the horses. We were able to pull off the main road through the park and see the horses off in the distance.
We also drove to the overlook area and walked the trail there – but again they were pretty far away. We managed to get a few good pictures and enjoyed just watching them through the lens of the camera which works like binoculars so that was pretty cool.
Finally, on the way out, we happened to look to the field next to the car and we saw some of the ponies walking right along the fence line! We didn’t get very good pictures here because of all of the trees and bushes in the way but it was really neat seeing them this close.
We were excited about visiting a few other places around Delaware and Maryland during our stay and were looking forward to enjoying the beautiful park we were staying in – but then the temperatures spiked to the high 90’s. Thankfully, we had picked up and installed a entirely new air conditioner (our original mini-split completely died on us in August and our temporary portable unit just couldn’t keep up with the heatwave) so we were very comfortable in the house- we just weren’t able to leave it.
My body also decided this would be the perfect week to get a cold so I was down for a few days with that. What rotten luck.
We ended up leaving Delaware a day earlier than expected as well. When we get to a new place, we always make sure to take in our truck GPS unit and get it updated and check out the route to the next destination. Our move from Laurel, Delaware to Virginia Beach had us taking a 3 hour route across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel but it turns out that the tiny house is right at the height limit for the tunnel. There were also wind warnings on the bridge that didn’t sound great for driving a high profile vehicle (like our house) across. We decided that rather than take chances with the wind or risk being turned way at the tunnel due to height, we would just take an alternate route around. This new route came in over 6 hours! And with the heat and me having been sick we didn’t want to spend that much time in the car. Plus with gas stops and bathroom breaks that would have probably ended up putting us closer to 7 or 8 hours which is longer than we like to drive and longer than we like to have the animals stressed out during a move.
Thankfully, John was able to find a KOA Campground at King’s Dominion Amusement Park that would take us for the night so we decided to leave Trap Pond on Friday, drive the 3.5 hours to Richmond, Virginia then finish up the trip to Virginia Beach on Saturday. We hated the fact that we didn’t get to enjoy as much of Delaware as we had wanted but it was time to move on.
It’s really hard for us because, due to the fact that we have to have electric and water connections and some parks won’t allow tiny houses or pit bulls, we absolutely have to plan ahead for our travels. This creates a schedule that we must adhere to. We have now been moving every 1 to 2 weeks since March and, honestly, we are getting tired. We are already booked up through the end of this year but starting in 2024 we will be slowing down and spending more time in each location. We still plan to travel full time but we will be spending around a month between moves so that we can allow ourselves some days to rest and still be able to have more time to experience each destination – and we have some fun stuff planned so I can’t wait! In the mean time, Virginia Beach, here we come!
