A Dive, A Drive, and A Diving Horse

Chesapeake, Virginia

So, you may have noticed that there were no travel entries for the month of July. Since 2010 I have recorded my adventures taking kids to Europe either by blog or by email or by both followed by further travels by Eric and I in August. This did not happen this year for the simple reason that I finally made good on my promise to take a year off from Europe.

I missed the travel, but it was a good decision. Not only was I exhausted from my first year as a VP, I also managed to get kidney stones. This would have made for an interesting time in a foreign land! I almost took a complete rest from blogging this summer, but Eric and I are once again on the road and the muses call!

Eric and I are on our way to Disneyworld to join up with our chosen family on August 9^th. As per usual, we made it into an excuse for a road trip, this time to trace the eastern coast of the United States.

Our first day,  mostly spent with Eric pushing the pedal until we made it to Newark in the early evening. Using one of his apps, Eric chose the Hotel Riviera Divine in downtown Newark. This hotel was one of the most grandest of hotels in the area…in the 1920s. It never recovered from The Great Depression. And while Eric and I waited for our turn to speak to the woman working in the lobby behind the protective plexi glass, boy were we both experience a great depression!

We found no comfort in the bulletin advising long term guests that fumigation happens every first Wednesday of the month whether it was needed or not. Nor did we find joy in the fact that the security guard had to open our door for us as well as the gate to the secure parking lot.  We found our room clean, but clearly the old dame had seen better days. Long ago.

Anyways, once we pushed the big suitcase up against the door we went to bed and prayed to God that the joint wasn’t haunted.

We began our seaside journey the next day. The Jersey Shore is glitzy in places and authentic in others. We had a very late breakfast at Alice’s Kitchen in Seabright, New Jersey. A great breakfast in a beautiful little town that was basically one side of street that straddled the shore for a few miles. While there were touristy stores, the place has yet to fall into the overly touristy trap.

Atlantic City is everything you expect it to be. It was loud, busy, hell bent on consumerism, extravagant, ostentatious, desperate, weird and wonderful. We were offered 20 minute massages every fifty steps along with our fortunes. The place was packed solid and all of the major vendors were there.

We checked out the midway and was actually a little insulted. Or at least I was. The fact that those working there looked as though their souls had been sucked out them by their nasal passages was sad, but the whole place had an air of the approach commonly known as “Whatever…good enough.”

Here is a place where a bunch of adults have come just begging to spend money. An arcade in Atlantic City calls out to the decades of arcade activities. You know, the penny arcade machines, the pinball machines, Pac-Man and the crap that came out afterwards. Right? Wrong. We had a role of those claw pickers. The ones with stuffed animals in it. Like fifty of them. On each side of the aisle.

And a sad looking teenager without a soul.

What happened to that horse that jumped from a high platform and dived into a small pool of water? You know, the one in those old postcards?

We continued on our way south and eventually made our way to Ocean City. Which also had a boardwalk and an amusement park. Who knew?

Today we crossed the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel. This was very cool. A true engineering feat. Eric won the toss and got to drive, but I took a series of brief videos for the good old Facebook!

We are currently staying at a fairly cheap Motel in which we managed to somehow snag the handicap access room. This is what happens when you wait too late to find a place to stay. The big problem really is the fact that our allotted parking is also designated a handicap spot. So…we are not legally able to park in our paid for spot. Just a tad awkward. We thought about parking there anyways…for about three and half seconds. Then we moved our truck to another part of the 756 acre parking lot.

It should still be there in the morning…