"Rise free from care before the dawn, and seek adventures."- Thoreau

We went to Walden Pond today and it surpassed all of my expectations. I can see why Thoreau felt so inspired there. We did a hike around the entire pond and found a private spot to jump in and swim. It was so refreshing after hiking. The water was a perfect temperature and was clear and deep. I would have loved to have gone out to the middle where it is supposedly 90 feet deep, but with two kiddos we had to get going. We saw chipmunks and all sorts of birds including a brilliantly colored blue jay and a duck that was hiding its blue feathers under its wing. The whole experience made me want to buy a little farmhouse somewhere in the woods where I could read, hike, and swim all day. Here is a bit from Walden where Thoreau explains why he went to live in the woods. It has inspired me in the past and is bouncing around in my brain throughout this trip: "I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion."

After Walden, which by the way Che hiked the entire time--woohoo--, we drove to Brookline to check it out. It seemed Hobokenesque and livable, for a short period of time. Then I convinced Cesar that we had to go to a Friendly's while we are up this way and since we frequented them on my family road trips growing up, and boy was he shocked when we got there. I was wearing cut-off shorts and he said, "Is this what you are going to wear?" I told him, "I will fit in perfectly." And I did. We ate some awful food and horrible dessert, sat next to people that should be on doctor-prescribed diets, and were seated by a hostess who obviously just finished taking a meth hit, which she made in the sink of the restaurant. However, our kids were EXTREMELY loud and I did not feel bad about it at all.

Sabine news: This AM she woke up and looked over at the dark part of the hotel room and said "Dark. Scary, ghost." She also is now screaming "Ann" or "Annly" when I am in the bathroom, copying her father...argghhh. She also told Che, when it was her turn to play with Cesar's IPhone in the car, "Bine's turn, ha ha ha ha ha", with the correct intonation and rhythm.

Our Time with the Learned

Our drive from New York to Massachusetts was very easy and gorgeous. We went on a smaller highway through Connecticut and the trees were huge and lush; we even found a great classical station that calmed Che down and got Sabine to sleep. It was fairly uneventful until we got close to Boston and noticed tons of traffic backed up going in the opposite direction. We noticed about eight police cars all stopped, some of which had hit a small car that was rammed up against the divider. There were news reporters all around and helicopters flying up above. After watching the news we found out that we witnessed the outcome of a high-speed police chase. Exciting! No one was hurt, except for the driver whom the police punched in order to get cuffs on him.

We went straight into Cambridge and met up with a great old friend of ours, Max Grinnell, who was funny and entertaining as always. Max is an "urbanologist" and he answered our question from a previous post-- bucolic is to country as cosmopolitan is to city. I do not think Cesar is convinced that anything city could be good. He is a bit more like Thoreau, whom I am rereading in anticipation of visiting Walden Pond, who said "What is a house but a sedes, a seat?--better if a country seat." Our lunch lasted quite awhile and the kids were very well behaved considering the circumstances. The last time we were in Cambridge it seemed too crowded and dense, but this time we drove through some really nice neighborhoods and I could see the appeal. We headed to our hotel outside of Cambridge and hit a TON of traffic, but found our hotel easily and were pleased that our room was clean, big, and had a fridge and microwave. We are in Massachusetts for a couple of days so it is great that our hotel was not a big dump-- no roaches (of any variety) here!

Today Cesar had to work, so I played with the kids in the room and tried to convince them NOT to run around all over the place and jump from bed to bed. That did not work out too well. Luckily, Cesar was able to take a little break so we took the kids into Concord (this is where all my favorite Transcendentalist peeps hung out) and it was amazing! I loved the whole town, the shops, restaurants, houses,--everything was perfect. Besides wanting to see where Thoreau and Emerson chilled out (and were buried--Sleepy Hollow Cemetery looked like a really lovely place to spend eternity), we went to Concord because our favorite children's book publisher, Barefoot Books, has a flagship store there and they had a craft and story time event today. Here is a link to the store: http://www.barefootbooks.com/story/about_us/our_stores. I love how colorful and kid-centered the store is and we purchased some great books for the kids. On the way home we stopped at Whole Food to get some healthy food for the fridge and now I am about to convince the kids that they should take a nap...

Five States, 48 Hours, Farms, Frogs, Friends, Family, and Two Ticks

We left Herndon, VA and headed north to New Jersey on Saturday. We hit traffic almost immediately, which gave us a chance to reflect on the many benefits of living in St. Croix. We survived the scary four-lane highways and traffic jams, and added Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania to our states-that-we-have-visited list, and ended up meeting the Croneys at Joe's parents' house outside of Philadelphia around 4 PM. The house is an old and beautiful farm house with gardens surrounding it and the kids enjoyed swimming in the pool. Then we headed to the Croney's house in Pennington, NJ and the kids played and pretty much wrecked the Croney's house. They were so happy to have some toys to play with. We saw a deer run through the yard and Sabine went out to watch the "horse". I, of course, inquired about lyme disease since the kids were playing in the grass and the woods around the property and there were obviously deer around. Laura said that we should check the kids because they could definitely have ticks. The kids caught fireflies, played, and had a terrific time and we didn't get to the hotel until pretty late after getting lost quite a few times despite using our GPS...

Sunday morning we woke up very early to get ready to go to Cousin David's. We were on track for an on-time arrival, however, I noticed a TICK ON CHE while giving him a bath. I freaked out! It was super small and after quite a bit of research we realized it was most likely a baby deer tick. I really hope we got it off in time...

We arrived slightly late to David and Joanne's house after driving through Princeton's campus (stunning!) and it was beautiful. It is a farm house that is part of a bigger estate with a huge pond with frogs and lily pads, towering trees that Che loved hiding under, gardens, pastures, and even a wooden swing that hung from high up in a tree. It was great getting to catch-up with Joanne and David and Che loved the place and cried when we had to leave. He started out very shy, but by the end of our visit he was asking to hold hands with David. Sabine, of course, had a great time with everyone. It was an incredibly enjoyable visit and we hope we convinced them to come and visit St. Croix!

After we left David's we met the Croneys at Terhune, an orchard/farm, and ate delicious apple cider donuts, drank apple cider slush, picked blueberries, fed animals, and the kids all rode around on mini-tractors. We left straight from Terhune and headed to Westchester. It was a pretty ugly drive, although I got goosebumps when I could see New York City from New Jersey. I pointed it out to Che while we were stuck in traffic FOREVER to cross the George Washington Bridge and he thought it was pretty neat. We arrived at our hotel and Cesar promptly realized that he ALSO HAD A TICK ON HIM. This time it was an adult male deer tick, which (after researching) we found out does not carry lyme disease. I am freaking out though. We will need to take more precautions in Maine.

We then went and looked around different Westchester towns like Mamaroneck, which has a lovely waterfront, and Scarsdale. There were quite a few pretty houses and nice areas, but nothing said "come live here" to me, and Cesar is now more adamant than ever that he does not want to be in this area. We ate at Cheesecake Factory and I have decided I do not need to eat there again for a long, long, time.

When we got back to the hotel we unloaded our luggage and headed up to our room. The only problem was, after staying in three other Hampton Inns in the past week, we forgot not only our room number, but also our floor. It took a few elevator rides and trying a couple of doors before we got to the right room. I think that is evidence that it is time to settle down in one place for awhile.

In all of this traveling from the rural south, to urban areas, turnpikes, and industrialized northern cities, with pockets of beautiful and verdant areas, we have realized how much natural beauty resonates with us. Joanne used the word "bucolic" today to describe their property in Princeton, referencing an ideal rural life--is there a word for an ideal urban life?

We also realized, not surprisingly, that the best times we have had so far on the trips have involved spending time with old friends and family. It has been so enjoyable getting to see so many friends and catching up with them all. Tomorrow
we head to Cambridge where we hope to meet up with yet another one of our friends, Max Grinnell, from the University of Chicago whom we have not seen in ten years.

My Tummy Hurts

We left Chapel Hill around 9 this AM and took a lovely smaller highway through Hillsboro and some other small North Carolina farm towns. Everything was going well until Che said "My tummy hurts." Now he has said that a couple of times before when he is bored and wants to get out of the car or watch a movie. This time, however, he repeated "my tummy hurts" even after we let him watch a movie on the Ipad. One minute later he projectile vomited, a couple of times, all over the car and the Ipad. Cesar managed to get off the highway and drive to a nice country lane where we proceeded to get Che out of the car and tried our best to clean him, the car seat, the car, and the Ipad. We had to take off the car seat cover and all of his clothes, luckily we had plenty of clothes ready to go in the suitcase. We used baby wipes to wipe him and everything else down. I am not sure what we would have done without the wipes...I of course kept gagging and finally threw up myself. It was not a pretty scene. I would like to thank the kind people of Pittsylvania County, North Carolina for stopping to see if we were ok. A couple of kind families stopped and offered their assistance and one even went out of her way, in the complete different direction, to see if we were alright. Pittsylvania will always have a good place in my heart. Cesar of course blamed the whole incident on Che overeating Cheerios at breakfast, as well as a host of other things that I "forced" him to eat (according to Cesar), such as yogurt and banana. Che will not be eating so much tomorrow morning.

After that unpleasant incident we continued driving to Charlottesville, and by the way never saw a Welcome to Virginia sign as we had seen coming into Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina. The hills got bigger and bigger on the drive and we could see the Blue Ridge Mountains in the distance--very beautiful. UVA's campus was gorgeous. Lots of big trees and brick buildings and a surprising amount of activity for the summer. The Corners, which is a little area with restaurants and stores catering to students, was very cute and we ate a nice little Mexican restaurant there. It turns out that the day before a huge storm blew in (we have not really been paying attention to the news...) and so there were tons of trees down, people were without power and phones, and there was lots of traffic because work crews were trying to repairs lines and removes fallen trees. Although the campus and surrounding area were very pretty, it was also very dense with lots of apartment buildings stacked on top of each other and things turned shady pretty quickly. Cesar's conclusion: Charlottesville < Chapel Hill.

We arrived in Herndon, VA around 5 and went to our hotel to clean ourselves up. We were pleasantly surprised at how nice our Hampton Inn hotel was given the one we stayed in in Chapel Hill. It is very large, clean, and modern. What a relief!

We went to the Ruiz's and had a wonderful time hanging out with them. Cesar reminisced with Pocho and Urania, even looking at old pictures, while Che and Sabine played with Maxine. Che, in typical Che fashion, even stayed at the door while she went outside to talk to her boyfriend on the phone. It was very cute. She was so sweet with both of them. I of course felt awful having someone try to please my family of picky eaters, but Urania made a delicious pasta dish that three of us ate and Che had, of course, a grilled cheese.

We left very late and as Sabine slept on my shoulder in the elevator Che made friends with an older couple sharing the elevator with us even saying in Forrest Gump fashion "My name is Che" completely out of nowhere. At what point do we stop being so friendly? Apparently in Pittsylvania County one never stops being friendly.

"I'm Jack Sparrow"

Cesar woke up early to do some work and the rest of us were able to sleep in. Che and Sabine actually slept until 8:30! Then we went off to breakfast, which Che liked so much that he kept asking if we could go back to the restaurant with cereal. Then we headed to Franklin Street, the main commercial street in Chapel Hill, and after figuring out how to get the meter to work we wandered the street checking things out and ended up at Sugarland. It was a wonderful place with homemade gelato and sweets. I ate milk chocolate hazelnut, Cesar had passion fruit, and Che had Tar Heel Blue (it tasted like cream soda). It was all very delicious and the spot was cute too, with tin ceilings and intricate mosaics. Franklin Street is filled with several wonderful-looking restaurants, cute shops, brick storefronts, and tree-lined walkways. I loved it. We also checked out several neighborhoods and it looks like there are many of them from which to choose, although Cesar says he prefers a place like St. Croix where the biggest intersection is Five Corners. Chapel Hill is full of huge trees and lots of flowers and we even saw a deer eating right next to the street in one of the neighborhoods! We ate dinner in the yard of the Weaver Street Market Co-op while listening to some bluegrass and mountain music. The co-op was fantastic--tons of delicious food, lots of veggie choices, reasonable prices, and a very good vibe.

I finally booked the rest of our trip up to Portland. We leave tomorrow for a day trip to Charlottesville, VA; then head to Herndon, VA to see the Ruizes and stay the night; Saturday we head to Princeton, NJ to see the Croneys; Sunday we head to Westchester; and Monday we'll be in Cambridge and stay for a couple of days.

Children news: Che's new (and frequently used) saying is "Oh brother, not this again." He also still keeps asking when he will get to see Kaeden.
Sabine has decided that she wants to be a pirate and calls herself Jack Sparrow. She also has learned how to say "Stop it!" after having to deal with Che torturing her in the car.